ATI Radeon 7000 / XFree86

SAngeli · l33t Joined: 16 Apr 2004 Posts: 904 Location: Italy

Greetings,

I have an ATI Radeon 7000 AGP video card 64MB.
I have completed the Gentoo Handbook.
All my system is updated and runs kernel 2.6.7-r10.
I have also enabled frame buffer and Ati Radeon in the kernel.
I am now following the Gentoo Linux Desktop Configuration Guide.
Having already completed the "# emerge xfree" installation I have a doubt for my ATI video drivers.

My Question is the following:
--------------------------------

My goal is to have in the XFree86 / Kde environment the correct video drivers so that I can fully utilize all the features my video card offers and have the optimal resolution and refresh rate.
I see that the Desktop Config. Guide covers a section "Gentoo Linux ATi FAQ"
What should I do?
- Was it OK to just install xfree (# emerge xfree)?
- Should I have emerged the ati drivers instead
# VIDEO_CARDS="radeon" emerge xfree-drm
- Is # emerge xfree just sufficient?
- Should it be first emerge xfree and then the emerge ati-drivers
or somethng similar to this?

I know that there are several articles on the Internet but I also know that some are old if compared to the new kernel releases. One of this is "[HOW-TO] Get ATI support in X with 2.6.x kernel "

Someone also told me that with the latest kernel 2.6.x I do not need anything else. Is it correct?

Please let me know what should I exactly do; what steps or manual or instructions to follow so that I can continue my installation.

Thank you very much for your interest and help to my case,
Spiro

pjp · Administrator Joined: 16 Apr 2002 Posts: 20113

Moved from Installing Gentoo.
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CompNerd · Posted: Thu Jul 15, 2004 12:16 am Post subject:

AFAIK, the ati-drivers do not support the RADEON 7000. However, you can install xfree or xorg-x11. Then use DRI to get some GL suporrt. I have not yet tried the xfree-dri, althought its suppose to support the radeon drivers better.

CompNerd

!db! · Posted: Thu Jul 15, 2004 12:23 am Post subject:

I've recently installed 2.6.7-r8 with an ATI 7500 Mobility - not the same, but a similar setup. I get ~1350 fps with glxgears. I've posted my kernel .config and XF86Config here ... look at the bottom of the page ... Hope this helps.

malone · Posted: Thu Jul 15, 2004 5:00 am Post subject:

As mentioned, the ati-drivers don't support the radeon 7xxx series of cards. All you need is support in the kernel for your card. So to answer your questions,

SAngeli · l33t Joined: 16 Apr 2004 Posts: 904 Location: Italy

Thank you so much Malone for your reply!

I only with to ask this last question, only because it is mentioned in the Desktop Guide (http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/desktop.xm):

"Almost every ATI board is supported by Xfree86, at least for the 2D accelerated features. The 3D support is provided either by the DRI project, which is already present inside XFree86, or by closed source drivers provided by ATI.

GPU Common Name Support
-------------------------------------------------------------
rage128 Rage128 xfree DRI
r100 Radeon7xxx, Radeon64 xfree DRI
r200,r250 Radeon8500, Radeon9000 xfree DRI, ATI DRI
r300, following Radeon9500,
Radeon9800 xfree 2D, ATI DRI

Is the above info of any relevance or importance or should I just ignore it?

Thank you,
Spiro

!db! · Posted: Thu Jul 15, 2004 11:11 am Post subject:

That tip from the Desktop Configuration Guide

SAngeli · l33t Joined: 16 Apr 2004 Posts: 904 Location: Italy

Thank you all.
All you have told me worked perfectly!

Few Questions:

(1) In X, when I type glxinfo | grep "renderer string" I get the correct OpenGL, but this way:
disabling TCL support
OpenGL renderer string: Mesa DRI Radeon........ 3DNow! No-TCL
WHAT DOES TCL MEAN AND IS IT CORRECT OR NEEDS A FIX?

(2) When I fire startx, when I tnel exit from it Ctrl+Alt+Backstaoce, I notice this written on the screen at the bottom of it:
(ww) RADEON(0): Failed to set up write-combining range (0xd0000000,0x4000000)
xterm: fatal IO error 32 (Broken pipe) or Killclient on X server ":0.0"
xterm: fatal IO error 32 (Broken pipe) or Killclient on X server ":0.0"
login: fatal IO error 32 (Broken pipe) or Killclient on X server ":0.0"
X Connection to :0.0 broken (explicit kill or server shutdown)
xinit: connection to X server lost waiting for X server to shutdown.

(3) in the XF.. log file under/var/log/ I get an error on the truetype font:
Could not init font path element /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/truetype
The directory truetype is there.
SHOULD I JUST DISABLE IT FROM THE XF86Config?

(4) Is there a command that I can see the phisical memory of my Video Card that Gentoo sees?

(5) I have included my XF86Config file. Could you please just take a look and see if you see anything to correct? I would Appreciate it a lot.

Thank you so much for your help!!!
Spiro

!db! · Posted: Fri Jul 16, 2004 1:10 am Post subject:

Concerning the 'disabling TCL support' message and what TCL is about ...

I'm no guru, but TCL (Tool Command Language) is an interpreted scripting language used often with the TK library o' widgets. In the rendering world, that combo is often used for handling textures, for instance. IMHO, it seems you either just don't have TCL (yet), or it's somehow disabled. I already had 'tcltk' in my USE flags, so I don't get that message. Maybe try re-emerging with the 'tcltk' flag ... I don't think this is critical for enabling DRI though, although it may prevent textures being correctly displayed in some instances ... that's why you might want to tweak with 'tcltk'.

As for the Radeon warning when running X, I don't know ... it's a warning, so not really critical. One Google search and I came up with this ... mtrr related?

IMHO, the other messages, it looks like X complaining about a brutal server shutdown coming from 'Ctrl+Alt+Backspace'.

'lspci' (as root) will give you some details on your card ... for the rest, I think you're in a good position to 'google' and 'gentoo forum' your way through them on your own. If you're going through the Desktop Configuration Guide, just move on to installing more important things like kde ...

At least you're now have DRI working ...

SAngeli · l33t Joined: 16 Apr 2004 Posts: 904 Location: Italy

Hi !db!,

You stated

!db! · Posted: Fri Jul 16, 2004 2:57 pm Post subject:

I'm not sure just how familiar you are with USE flags, but reading this is good. Assuming that you are indeed interested in always having tcl and tk support for any future packages, just edit the /etc/make.conf and add 'tcltk' as a USE flag. A complete list of USE flags is available here. Then:

SAngeli · l33t Joined: 16 Apr 2004 Posts: 904 Location: Italy

Hi,

I added 'tcltk' in my USE flags. I emerge sysnc.
I did not find any dependency onthe emerge -pv xfree or world.
I then decided to try with the emerge tk and opengl-update xfree.
I still get the same answer (No-TCL and disabling TCL)

I assume it is too early for me. So, I will continue with kde install and others. Perhaps, this way my kde will install it on its own. If now, I will get back soon.

I have not tried the emerge -pe <package> I will try it.

Thank you by now,
Spiro

!db! · Posted: Sat Jul 17, 2004 12:41 pm Post subject:

SAngeli · l33t Joined: 16 Apr 2004 Posts: 904 Location: Italy

OK, here is the status of my work:

(1) I emerged -pev xfree and among other dipendencies I found listed tcl...
I run # emerge xfree again.
Then, in startx, I tested again glxinfo | grep "rendered string" and got the same NO-TCL message.
Consequently, I was not able to fix this issue at present time. :cry:

(2) Could it be that there might be an hardware issue or better a conflict between the hardware and software that creates this issue related to the fb video driver (radeonfb) and (mtrr) and perhaps TCL? If so, how to detect it and fix it?
The article provided t me here talks about MTRR.
The other article talks about the overlaps issue but when I run # dmesg|grep mtrr I do not get *ERROR*. Consequently, I assumed it is not my case. Is is correct?
I wish to provide some portions of the log files content in case this can be of help:

!db! · Posted: Sun Jul 18, 2004 4:10 pm Post subject:

OOPS! Your issues have motivated me to Google this a bit more and I did come up with some interesting results ...

First my sincere apologies!!! My initial queries led me to believe that it was indeed a tcl/tk issue. And although there is a strong link between xfree/opengl/tcltk, the 'NO-TCL' message apparently has nothing to do with tcltk. Taken from here:

SAngeli · l33t Joined: 16 Apr 2004 Posts: 904 Location: Italy

Hi !db!,
thank your for your research and help.

(1)
I wish to show you this extra info and see if you would agree with me and perhaps advice me on how to solve it.

From kde, from Konsole, I get the following info:
---> bash-2.05b# cat /proc/mtrr
reg00: base=0x00000000 ( 0MB), size= 256MB: write-back, count=1
reg01: base=0x10000000 ( 256MB), size= 128MB: write-back, count=1
reg02: base=0xd0000000 (3328MB), size= 2MB: write-combining, count=1
reg03: base=0xe0000000 (3584MB), size= 64MB: write-combining, count=1
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---> bash-2.05b# dmesg|grep mtrr
Kernel command line: ro root=/dev/hdg3 video=vesafb:ywrap,mtrr vga=0x317
mtrr: v2.0 (20020519)
mtrr: 0xd0000000,0x4000000 overlaps existing 0xd0000000,0x200000
mtrr: 0xd0000000,0x4000000 overlaps existing 0xd0000000,0x200000
bash-2.05b#
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
bash-2.05b# cat /var/log/XFree86.0.log|grep ATI|more
(--) PCI:*(1:0:0) ATI Technologies Inc Radeon RV100 QY [Radeon 7000/VE] rev 0, M
em @ 0xd0000000/27, 0xdfef0000/16, I/O @ 0x7800/8, BIOS @ 0xdfec0000/17
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now, according to this link I should be able to fix this issue. But, because I am not so experienced with linux I am not confident in making some changes as the article describes.
So, can you please take a look and see if you thing this way I will be able to solve my conflict issue? I believe this can be solved this way.

I would do:
My conflict is:
mtrr: 0xd0000000,0x4000000 overlaps existing 0xd0000000,0x200000
(WW) RADEON(0): Failed to set up write-combining range (0xd0000000,0x4000000)
Therefore, I would chose reg02 and do:

!db! · Posted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 1:27 am Post subject:

Cool,

Looking up my own settings, I've noticed similar messages (ouch!), which is odd as the kernel is correctly picking up the right card (just like you). Going over your links and additional sites - here and here, this seems like a minor problem (at least for me). Basically, the vesafb is resetting the mtrr and it looks like only 2MB of your graphics card is being used (2 MB = 0x200000 vs. 64MB = 0x4000000).

If I were you, I'd just reboot and let KDE start normally. Then, as root, first:

SAngeli · l33t Joined: 16 Apr 2004 Posts: 904 Location: Italy

Hi,

I was able to apply the change and it worked perfectly.
I have to admint now that I do not know how to and where to create the script file. Then how to add it "rc-update add <script name> default" because of the dependencies.
Can you please explain step by step how to implement the script with its content, where to save it and what is the rc-update command line?

Thank you,
Spiro

!db! · Posted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 4:34 pm Post subject:

There is a good Initscripts page in the Gentoo Handbook. First read this and get familiar with the basic concepts. There would be several ways of adding those commands in the initscripts, i.e. adding your own script, changing an existing script, etc. The most important part is understanding 'when' you want this to load.

Now, let's go back a bit: vesafb is overriding your mtrr settings when the kernel image is loading, therefore the 'dmesg' errors are likely to remain. With me? If you still want to reset mtrr for improved gaming for instance, you can likely wait just before or when X is loading. That way, any apps using XFree86/OpenGL will have access to the new mtrr settings, without risking to upset the vesafb and pretty bootsplash.

Since you've just installed KDE, I think you could get away with minor changes to the existing xdm script:

SAngeli · l33t Joined: 16 Apr 2004 Posts: 904 Location: Italy

Hi,

thank you for all your support.
I was able to fix the issue exactly the way it was suggested.

The case is now closed and am very happy about it.

Thank you,
Spiro

lagaffe · n00b Joined: 04 Aug 2004 Posts: 24 Location: Lausanne (CH)

I'm sorry to introduce myself in this discussion and so late, but I am a newcommer in the Gentoo world.

I try to install Xfree86 with my ATI Radeon 7000 64M and all above has helped me so much. But I have still a great trouble : when I load startx, I have a black screen, with my mouse that function well. If I click left the Twm menu appears.

I tried the command glxinfo | grep "renderer string" but the answer is "... error while loading shared libraries. libGL.so.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory". I have also followed the steps of this speech for my kernel and watched the XF86Config but nothing changed.

So what is this glx?

Do I missed someting in my kernel?
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oscarwild · Posted: Tue Aug 31, 2004 6:34 am Post subject:

first and foremost, thank you all for this thread! It will be very helpful for me when my new gfx board has been shipped!

@lagaffe:
startx will only start a raw X session. What you rather like to do, is starting a display manager like kdm or gdm (this can be automated by the /etc/init.d/xdm script)
glx ist the openGL-eXtension for your graphics driver, enabling fast 3D graphics; however, no OpenGL-libraries are found. Please make sure, your USE-Flags (in /etc/make.conf) contain "opengl"; if not, you've got to add it and recompile xfree

lagaffe · n00b Joined: 04 Aug 2004 Posts: 24 Location: Lausanne (CH)