Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Trying to configure Radeon card

[Alex Schuster <wonko@wonkology.org>]

Jeff Cranmer writes:

> Regarding eselect, I used eselect opengl xorg-xll to select the open
> source driver instead of ati.  I think this is correct?

Sounds right.

> The kernel options are configured as follows
> 
> Device Drivers  ->
> Generic Driver Options  ->
>   <*> Userspace firmware loading support
>    [*] Include in-kernel firmware blobs in kernel binary
> Graphics support  ->
>   <*> /dev/agpgart (AGP Support)
>   <*> Direct Rendering Manager (XFree86 4.1.0 and higher DRI support)
> -> <*> ATI Radeon
>     [*] Enable modesetting on radeon by default

The help for this last setting tells:

  This is a completely new driver. It's only part of the existing drm
  for compatibility reasons. It requires an entirely different graphics
  stack above it and works very differently from the old drm stack.
  i.e. don't enable this unless you know what you are doing it may
  cause issues or bugs compared to the previous userspace driver stack.
  [...]
  This code support the following hardware : R1XX,R2XX,R3XX,R4XX,R5XX
  radeon up to X1950). Works is underway to provide support for R6XX,
  R7XX and newer hardware (radeon from HD2XXX to HD4XXX).

You seem to have a HD 5700 card, even newer than the HD4XXX which is not 
yet supported. So I'd turn this option off and try again.

I have the driver compiled as a module, and get these messages in dmesg 
when loading:
[drm] Initialized drm 1.1.0 20060810
[drm] radeon defaulting to userspace modesetting.
fglrx_pci 0000:01:05.0: setting latency timer to 64
[drm] Initialized radeon 1.33.0 20080528 for 0000:01:05.0 on minor 0
[drm] Setting GART location based on new memory map
[drm] Loading RS780 CP Microcode
[drm] Resetting GPU
[drm] writeback test succeeded in 1 usecs
[drm] Resetting GPU

I suggest compiling as a module, so you can easier check for kernel 
messages when loading the module, and it allows to try the closed-source 
ati-drivers. I had a memory problem with them (but did not try the last 
version), and had to use an older X server, so I gave the open-source 
drivers a try. They work, with less memory and CPU usage, but I get 
distortions. I also have to use the older xorg-server 1.7, because with 
1.8 X crashed every few minutes.

Whoops, I just see that I also have the fglrx module running, this should 
not happen. Could this be the cause for my graphics distortions? Let's 
see.

	Wonko