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Having something with pretty RGB lighting and want to play with it on Linux? Often the hardware vendor doesn't bother with Linux tools or drivers but the OpenRGB firmly has your back.

This is not just another open source project for Linux to make up for vendors ignoring Linux, in fact it's actually made for Windows too. Their aim is to sort the big stinking mess of vendor-specific tools and applications to deal with RGB lighting across various motherboards, GPUs, strips, keyboards and more. As the project page states:

One of the biggest complaints about RGB is the software ecosystem surrounding it. Every manufacturer has their own app, their own brand, their own style. If you want to mix and match devices, you end up with a ton of conflicting, functionally identical apps competing for your background resources. On top of that, these apps are proprietary and Windows-only. Some even require online accounts. What if there was a way to control all of your RGB devices from a single app, on both Windows and Linux, without any nonsense? That is what OpenRGB sets out to achieve. One app to rule them all.

A very noble aim and one I can get in with. OpenRGB recently had a new 0.3 release. According to the developer, it pulls in support for more devices and thanks to a rework with it now using hidapi-hidraw, it should nicely coexist with other tools too. It's got quite a long list of devices it supports too, which is most impressive.

While I can use ckb-next for my Corsair keyboard, having just one application needed for it and more is a very nice idea but currently ckb-next is a lot more functional for my Corsair keyboard. I'll definitely be keeping a closer eye on OpenRBG from now on.

Feature Highlight:

  • Set colors and select effect modes for a wide variety of RGB hardware
  • Save and load profiles
  • Control lighting from third party software using the OpenRGB SDK
  • Command line interface
  • Connect multiple instances of OpenRGB to synchronize lighting across multiple PCs
  • Can operate standalone or in a client/headless server configuration
  • View device information
  • No official/manufacturer software required

See more about OpenRGB on GitLab.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Tags: Apps, Open Source
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I am the owner of GamingOnLinux. After discovering Linux back in the days of Mandrake in 2003, I constantly came back to check on the progress of Linux until Ubuntu appeared on the scene and it helped me to really love it. You can reach me easily by emailing GamingOnLinux directly. Find me on Mastodon.
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beko Jul 24, 2020
Quoting: Purple Library GuyExcept it seems from numerous posts here that it is in fact often very difficult to turn off. And people are also claiming there is often a lack of alternatives. Given which, no, getting mad that it exists is getting mad that other people's preferences are being enforced and one's own preferences made needlessly unavailable.
I'd like this twice but since this is not possible have my lame comment here too :)
14 Jul 24, 2020
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Their wiki says it works with AMD Wraith Prism. I want to test this out because it would be cool to change those colors without booting into BIOS.
Valck Jul 24, 2020
Quoting: bisbyxYou can turn it off, so getting mad that it exists is just getting mad that people have different preferences.

I have a mainboard where you can thankfully disable the lighting in the BIOS settings, and a relatively new graphics card which requires vendor-specific software. And that software only exists for one OS... since this is GamingOnLinux, guess which is not it?

For both products I researched quite some time to find an RGB-less alternative, of which I found exactly none. I guess I was lucky to find RAM without RGB, and even though AMD themselves state that "Note: not every AMD Wraith cooler is equipped with user-controlled RGB illumination", I had to pay the same price for an OEM CPU that came without a fan.

That's what I call idiocy. If somebody likes their PC made of (plexi-)glass and lit inside, that's their choice, and fine by me. But WHY on earth should I have to spend more and waste resources if I don't want to? Money, electric energy, raw materials, and even more time and energy wasted searching for alternative products, and writing comments justifying what should be perfectly normal...
michaldybczak Jul 24, 2020
I wanted to try it on my Alienware because no other tool worked (aside Window native app), but reading the documentation, using it may be dangerous to the motherboard. So far only Gigabyte RGB Fusion 2.0 boards have been reported to have issues, but there is no word about Alienwares, so the unknown is there, the risk is there.
I'll wait and hope there will be more data about it in the feature.
m2mg2 Jul 25, 2020
Unfortunately it doesn't appear to work with my ASRock B550 board. Custom compiled the Fedora 31 kernel with the OpenRGB patch (PITA) and it doesn't detect the SMBbus rgb header... Hopefully they will add support
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