14 DAY TRIAL // After a month since AMD released a Radeon HD 2000 R600 Linux driver, they have launched another one that provides AIGLX support used for Compiz and Compiz Fusion.
The fglrx 8.42.3 driver, besides the AIGLX support, also addresses problems with previous Radeon product families, performance improvements, Rialto AGP fixes and new features added to the graphical control panel. Video playback improvements can be now noticed, and X.Org server 1.4 support is available. A disadvantage of the driver could be the fact it doesn't have Linux 2.6.23 kernel support so don't hurry in upgrading your kernel yet! This is not included because of the issues related to the x86_64 architecture support. However, the next release of this driver (8.43) might contain the Linux 2.6.23 kernel feature.
A fix in TexturedVideo playback was made which will lead to smoother video playback. The fglrx 8.42.3 driver came up at a very fortunate time, just a few days after the release of Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy Gibbon, which will have Compiz Fusion started by default. This way, if you have an ATI graphics card, you can enjoy all the eye-candy offered by Compiz Fusion. Be careful though - it seems there are some problems with Compiz 0.3. With version 0.6 you won't have these issues.
Now, the AMD Catalyst Control Center has a few improvements thanks to this driver. Improved anti-aliasing and anisotropic filtering controls as well as vertical refresh are included. When you override the anti-aliasing or anisotropic filtering settings, a preview is shown, so you can see the modifications you're doing. The anti-aliasing can be overridden up to 8x, although the maximum is 16x. The anisotropic filtering option can go up to the maximum of 16x.
If you have an older graphics card, like Radeon X300, don't expect to have extraordinary results from AIGLX.