Just a quick tip to say that I recently purchased an RX-480 8GB XFX card and have used it for gaming over the last week. Here's a few tips to get things up and running if you go this route. It's a niche, I know, but maybe it will help someone out, as it will work on any modern AMD card (R9 290 / 380 / 390, RX 480 / 470 / 460, etc.). Here's what you need to get things working - it's pretty simple really.
1) Install a newer kernel from the Ubuntu Mainline Kernel site. You'll need a kernel >= 4.9. At this time, you'd want the v4.9-rc7 kernel, but 4.9 is scheduled to release proper in the next few weeks. 4.9 has all the MESA and RadeonSI open source goodness
Note: Here's a great script to automate downloading the latest kernel and installing automatically - works like a charm! Note: Should you use the script, it will only ask two questions - Do you want the latest mainline kernel, and do you want it to be low-latency. You would answer 'y' and 'n', respectively: Ubuntu Kernel Upgrader Script
2) For modern games to run using open source drivers, you need need an updated MESA and graphics stack. Luckily this is as easy as installing Oibaf's 'Updated and Optimized Open Graphics Drivers PPA' from here. This PPA gets updated practically daily, just so you know.
3) Do a full system upgrade and re-boot
5) Game!!*
* One note I found whilst trying to run games made with Unity in Steam, you might experience a game freeze shortly after launch. If that's the case, the fix is easy: Right-click the game in Steam and select 'properties'. Then go to 'launch options' and in the text box type '-force-gfx-direct' (minus quotes). Then launch the game. Running in to this bug is fairly common as many Linux games are built using Unity.
1) Install a newer kernel from the Ubuntu Mainline Kernel site. You'll need a kernel >= 4.9. At this time, you'd want the v4.9-rc7 kernel, but 4.9 is scheduled to release proper in the next few weeks. 4.9 has all the MESA and RadeonSI open source goodness
Note: Here's a great script to automate downloading the latest kernel and installing automatically - works like a charm! Note: Should you use the script, it will only ask two questions - Do you want the latest mainline kernel, and do you want it to be low-latency. You would answer 'y' and 'n', respectively: Ubuntu Kernel Upgrader Script 2) For modern games to run using open source drivers, you need need an updated MESA and graphics stack. Luckily this is as easy as installing Oibaf's 'Updated and Optimized Open Graphics Drivers PPA' from here. This PPA gets updated practically daily, just so you know.
3) Do a full system upgrade and re-boot
5) Game!!*
* One note I found whilst trying to run games made with Unity in Steam, you might experience a game freeze shortly after launch. If that's the case, the fix is easy: Right-click the game in Steam and select 'properties'. Then go to 'launch options' and in the text box type '-force-gfx-direct' (minus quotes). Then launch the game. Running in to this bug is fairly common as many Linux games are built using Unity.
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