The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

a1ex · 2010-01-05 12:39:09

Hey, thanks for testing guys. It actually works very well.
fps are between 65 and 125, compared to rather constant 125 before but it is playable. (KMS enabled, radeon, HD4850)

Finally Syu without tons of holdpkgs :X

Neuro · 2010-01-05 22:27:00

I'm still waiting for kernel 2.6.33 in hope that the power management stuff finally goes into kernel mainline.

Apart from that, the only thing that would keep me bound to fglrx is the promised XvBA. Already it works nice with some videos, but most have corrupt colours.

hunterthomson · 2010-01-06 04:18:43

Hum, I'm on HD3650... I think R600...

I'm going to try out the Open radeonhd driver with all the newest stuff. I'll let you guys know how it preforms for me.

I figure sens I have to turn off ACPI on my card for the Catalyst. I already am running with NO power-saving So no change there. What I am sick of mostly is that I have to us the Xserver with No-backfill. So, when a menu or window fist opens it looks like crap with all messed up stuff for a second or two. This makes the whole desktop look kind of 'Beta' when I am showing it to Windows users & explaining how it is the 'Video Driver' just makes it sound worse. Full screen video is choppy, Flash video unusable in full screen. When the Kwin desktop effects are on and doing a cool Vdesktop switch it gets a tarring thing that looks crappy. . .

Basically, all the 2D stuff looks like crap with the Catalyst on a HD3650. However, I get VARY good 3D in video games like Regnum and stuff. (I've always been a Intel GMA guy so I am use to 20FPS)

Well, we will see. I feel like playing around.
-----------
P.S. Another good Web-browser Java game with Super Good(for Java) graphics is Tribal Trouble 2.
It's a Command & Conquer type strategy game, P2P.
http://tribaltrouble2.com
So, now we have a FPS and a base builder that should work with the Open driver.

Last edited by hunterthomson (2010-01-08 10:13:25)

hunterthomson · 2010-01-06 06:45:51

Never mind,
My head is spinning thinking about all the stuff I have to do and in what order to get the Open driver working.

And, I know that it will suck anyway (for 3D). So, I'll just wait until Kernel 2.6.33 I guess. I mean the whole point of the Open Driver is that it should be way "easier" to use not way harder.

Last edited by hunterthomson (2010-01-06 06:51:07)

descendent87 · 2010-01-06 16:41:08

You don't have to do anything to get 3D with the opensource drivers, all the needed packages are already in the repo's the guide on how to get 3D acceleration using all the git packages is for extra features. I'm using the opensource driver from the repo's and have 3D acceleration working fine in KDE

devadittya · 2010-01-06 17:09:28

I just installed catalyst 9.12.1 and the latest kernel. My 3d is not working anymore. When I do modprobe fglrx I get this error:

FATAL: Module fglrx not found.

Help!

P.S. Strange! Uninstalled (Pacman -Rd) and reinstalled, and it is fixed. Everything works

Last edited by devadittya (2010-01-06 17:38:43)

hunterthomson · 2010-01-07 01:22:14

descendent87 wrote:

You don't have to do anything to get 3D with the opensource drivers, all the needed packages are already in the repo's the guide on how to get 3D acceleration using all the git packages is for extra features. I'm using the opensource driver from the repo's and have 3D acceleration working fine in KDE

Right on. I think I will still wait until 2.6.33 though. I really want KMS. I switch to virtual terminals all the time so it would be vary helpful for me. Plus it would make up for slower 3D.

P.S. The Descendants are Awesome

Last edited by hunterthomson (2010-01-07 01:25:37)

hunterthomson · 2010-01-08 07:37:38

Well, I tried to install the new Catalyst and everything got all messed up. I after 2hrs of messing around I just removed the catalyst, commented out that IgnorePackage line in pacman.conf, pacman -Syu, reboot into new Kernel, moved /etc/X11/xorg.conf to xorg.conf-bkp, pacman -S xorg xf86-video-ati.

Ya 3D!
Kwin is Soooo much better now that I don't have to use that No-Backfill patched Xserver. I can now watch Flash Video in Full Screen Even Hulu works in Full screen now!

Nexuis stays at about 28FPS but upto 50FPS. Quakelive 50-150FPS Both Vary Playable

I am staying with the Open Source driver and never looking back. I'd rather have a stable system, good 2D and 3D that is getting better all the time. Then junk 2D on my HD3650 and good 3D.

But, Thanks for all the work of the Catalyst package
Keep up the good work. People will still need it for a while but there is light at the end of the tunnle. The Open Driver REALLY is going to be the best. I see ATI becomeing the GoTo video card for all Linux/BSD/Solarus users Vary soon problay when Kernel 2.6.33 is out the Open Driver should be the sugjested driver. Unless you need CAD or paly video games all the time.

Last edited by hunterthomson (2010-01-08 07:46:28)

snack · 2010-01-08 08:17:34

hunterthomson wrote:

The Open Driver REALLY is going to be the best. I see ATI becomeing the GoTo video card for all Linux/BSD/Solarus users Vary soon problay when Kernel 2.6.33 is out the Open Driver should be the sugjested driver. Unless you need CAD or paly video games all the time.

Until a decent PowerPlay will be implemented the open driver is a no go for laptop users like me.

hunterthomson · 2010-01-08 11:09:02

Ya, right on.
I have to disable acpi on my HD3650 with the Catalyst. So, I am fairly certain I never had PowerPlay working on my laptop anyway. I don't use cpufreq ether. The 45nm Core 2's stay vary cool 25-30C so I don't care.

Last edited by hunterthomson (2010-01-08 11:18:54)

Vi0L0 · 2010-01-08 13:50:13

Its good to hear that open source driver is good and getting better.
I think that everyone who experienced some problems with catalyst should try it.
Still i dont like performance of open source driver, and i dont mean 3d only, even my DE is much slower with it, with or without kwin/compiz. Actually my 2nd pc with radeon 9550 onboard and open source driver is as fast as hd 4850 and os driver ...
Im gonna stay with catalyst for few months or longer .

There was rumor that catalyst 10.1 will be released yesterday, and happily it wasnt true :>. Why happily? Well there were holidays and new year - so the devs have much less time for writing driver and so such early released catalyst wouldn't bring anything new. Just like it was with 9.9.

Yesterday on CES 2010 ati shows 3d movies and games. So it looks like this feature of 10.1 is working fine.
Hmm... im wondering how bad those 3d movies are looking on linux with flickering/tearing all around?

So what will bring 10.1 for linux? Maybe already mithological xorg-server 1.7 support ? Maybe this support will suffer on kde laggy disease, like the older one is? And maybe we will have to wait few months for some patches? Maybe XvBa will work well (dreaming)? Nobody knows. Ahhh this new year is looking sooo great for and with catalyst! Guess what? Im gonna sing Queen's "This could be heaven for everyone" for one hour from tik tik tik now

kensai · 2010-01-08 23:02:56

Too sad, been gone for a while, and when I return, catalyst is still a pain. At least this time the open source driver is a bit better.

Vi0L0 · 2010-01-09 00:12:38

kensai wrote:

catalyst is still a pain.

Yes, it looks like never ending story hehe.

Video is flickering as always and we should make some standard for it... heh
But this xorg-server...
------------------------------------------
TO EVERY[linux-security-newbie]ONE: (i havent write this before, it may seems obvious for many ppl, but i have seen so many vulnerabilities and bugs nowadays, no, not even for this xorg... well it may be late but still i gotta write this)
DONT you ever think about using remote access to your precious archlinux with this old xorg-server. Run it only locally, lock all doors for it, block it with iptables, and hire security guard!
And if you even must use it remotelly please use portknocking, single-packet-authorization or whatever authorization method you prefer. Just dont leave open port for this service. Edit: This advice is good for whatever non-public service you are running, doesn't matter that your are running fresh updated software or not, basic security is something that everybody should to learn/know about nowadays...
Edit: Aww... that also means you shouldn't use simple xhost + command, use xhost +local:username instead, ex. xhost +local:root
------------------------------------------

But, well, there were also good things in catalyst:
- OpenGL 3.2 support, so there is more supported wine games, with also greater performance
- OpenCL is finally working on archlinux with nice 'nopat' trick

Ps. Have you heard about 2009 malware record? http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/ … curity.htm
~55 000 new strains of malware every day! O.M.G.

Last edited by Vi0L0 (2010-01-09 01:08:35)

hunterthomson · 2010-01-09 04:07:06

Hardened-Gentoo

Last edited by hunterthomson (2010-01-09 06:44:54)

Vi0L0 · 2010-01-09 14:42:48

hunterthomson wrote:

Hardened-Gentoo

You can also use some patches (PAX, SELinux, Grsecurity, etc) on your kernel and with that make your arch more secure, without whole sys-reinstalling and gentoo learning stuff...
But this solution is good for sys-admins and their holy systems. Also with such distribution or such kernel patches you probably wont be able to get fully functionall desktop system (i mean there have always been such choice - security or usability). I was talking about some basic security with iptables and without making such stupid mistakes like service standing on very old server .
Im gonna bet there are people who are using xhost + just to run some root X software while being connected directly to the net, and i just wanted to warn them .

Ps. Sorry for offtopic

Ultraman · 2010-01-09 20:08:07

http://www.behardware.com/news/10636/ca … r-way.html

The bit I found most interesting:

- Improvement of 2D performance in Linux
- Support for Ubuntu 9.10 and OpenSUSE 11.2

Afaik Ubuntu uses Xorg 7.4 since the 9.04 release.
So if that information is accurate, good news for the folks using the catalyst driver

Vi0L0 · 2010-01-09 22:42:38

Ultraman wrote:

http://www.behardware.com/news/10636/ca … r-way.html
The bit I found most interesting:
- Improvement of 2D performance in Linux

This could be usefull

Ultraman wrote:

- Support for Ubuntu 9.10 and OpenSUSE 11.2
Afaik Ubuntu uses Xorg 7.4 since the 9.04 release.
So if that information is accurate, good news for the folks using the catalyst driver

I guess you are sarcastic by saying "good news"?
Edit: That could mean no new xorg-server support... "yeeey"
Yes, both ubuntu and opensuse are working on old xorg 7.4.
Yes, that wont change anything , hmm... im just wondering why they havent added those distros to supported before? Strange... Edit: aaah... maybe thats because of opencl support! (cuz afaik you need to change something in driver to work with specific Xorg without nopat option).

Last edited by Vi0L0 (2010-01-09 22:46:51)

Ultraman · 2010-01-10 01:56:44

Meh, nvm that last one... I thought Ubuntu had moved to Xorg 7.5 (containing xorg-server 1.7) with 9.10.
But I just did a search and they didn't, http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=n … &px=NzQzNA
Sorry about that.

Can't blame an Archer for not knowing what Ubuntu is up to...

Up to April 2010 it is then, http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=n … &px=Nzc3OA
That is the planned release date for the Lucid Lynx.

I'm still sticking with the xf86-video-ati drivers, they are doing an awesome job!

Last edited by Ultraman (2010-01-10 02:03:52)

idx · 2010-01-10 17:39:57

Hi all, just joined the ati-owner-club since my old nvidia card fried. Got a HD5750 so I'm stuck with catalyst ATM (it's working just fine though -- without openCL, don't have usage for that right now). I have two possibly ati-newbie questions :

- When will the opensource driver support the Evergreen series (57xx 58xx) ? Are people working on it already ?
- I noticed there is a xvba-video PKGBUILD in AUR (http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?ID=31723). Is this of any use with the latest catalyst release ? I tried booting with the nopat option, but that actually makes video tearing worse in full screen.

Vi0L0 · 2010-01-10 19:28:49

idx wrote:

- When will the opensource driver support the Evergreen series (57xx 58xx) ? Are people working on it already ?

Heres some info:
AMD Publishes Evergreen Shader Documents - http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=n … &px=NzgzMg
Feature Matrix for Free Radeon Drivers - http://wiki.x.org/wiki/RadeonFeature

idx wrote:

- I noticed there is a xvba-video PKGBUILD in AUR (http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?ID=31723). Is this of any use with the latest catalyst release ? I tried booting with the nopat option, but that actually makes video tearing worse in full screen.

Neuro's howto: http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php? … 30#p654230 XvBa works (but colours are still bad) with newest 9.12 hotfix: http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?ID=32968

idx · 2010-01-10 20:26:15

Thanks for the info. I'd seen that feature matrix already, but it's good to know AMD freed the docs for this gpu.

As for XvBa, I'll be trying it out soon -- and reporting here. (There's a promising comment on the AUR page by someone who got it to work with a 5770, which is a very similar card to mine.)

EDIT
The comment on the AUR mentioned above was on the catalyst-opencl page, not the video-xvba one, my mistake.

Followed the tuto linked in previous post after installing 9.12 hotfix. vainfo results look good, but video playback is not working well at all (looks worse than what you are calling bad colors, I get a funky load of disordered pixels, could post screenshot if necessary)

I read this thread a few pages back and didn't spot anyone else trying XvBa on the Evergreen series. Can anyone confirm my results ?
Also, if it can help, I'm willing to run other tests on this card.

Last edited by idx (2010-01-10 21:53:56)

Vi0L0 · 2010-01-10 23:25:57

Ultraman wrote:

I'm still sticking with the xf86-video-ati drivers, they are doing an awesome job!

After your words i have decided to give open source drivers another shot, and... you are right
On normal desktop using (without games ;P) they kick catalyst ass more than strongly!
Even with kwin enabled xf86-video-ati is with 2D drawing as fast as catalyst's 2D without kwin... or maybe faster

Tested on 2.6.32.2-ck (well its not important but with 2.6.32.3-ARCH i couldnt build vbox modules, my pc have no luck to 2.6.32.3 at all) and with packages taken from normal (not git/aur) repos.

ukreator · 2010-01-12 03:47:59

Have someone encountered problems with catalyst and 2.6.32.3 kernel? Or it's only my problem?
I've updated kernel yesterday and today could not start Xorg. Rebuilding catalyst modules also didn't help me.

handy · 2010-01-12 05:04:34

ukreator wrote:

Have someone encountered problems with catalyst and 2.6.32.3 kernel? Or it's only my problem?
I've updated kernel yesterday and today could not start Xorg. Rebuilding catalyst modules also didn't help me.

I don't think Catalyst is yet compatible with versions of xorg-server greater than 1.6.

So the problem you are experiencing could be caused by the version of xorg-server you are running. If you were unaware of this problem, then it is not hard to fix:

Have a read from post_991 of this thread, you will see which files need to be blocked from upgrading (only 5 or if it's a notebook 6), you'll also see which versions of those blocked packages that you need to have installed.

Last edited by handy (2010-01-12 08:29:33)

ChemBro · 2010-01-12 10:20:10

handy wrote:

ukreator wrote:
Have someone encountered problems with catalyst and 2.6.32.3 kernel? Or it's only my problem?
I've updated kernel yesterday and today could not start Xorg. Rebuilding catalyst modules also didn't help me.
I don't think Catalyst is yet compatible with versions of xorg-server greater than 1.6.

I have the same problem, I did the same things and my xserver is a 1.6.x.

Arch Linux

#1151 2010-01-05 12:39:09

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1152 2010-01-05 22:27:00

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1153 2010-01-06 04:18:43

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1154 2010-01-06 06:45:51

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1155 2010-01-06 16:41:08

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1156 2010-01-06 17:09:28

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1157 2010-01-07 01:22:14

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1158 2010-01-08 07:37:38

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1159 2010-01-08 08:17:34

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1160 2010-01-08 11:09:02

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1161 2010-01-08 13:50:13

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1162 2010-01-08 23:02:56

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1163 2010-01-09 00:12:38

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1164 2010-01-09 04:07:06

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1165 2010-01-09 14:42:48

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1166 2010-01-09 20:08:07

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1167 2010-01-09 22:42:38

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1168 2010-01-10 01:56:44

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1169 2010-01-10 17:39:57

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1170 2010-01-10 19:28:49

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1171 2010-01-10 20:26:15

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1172 2010-01-10 23:25:57

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1173 2010-01-12 03:47:59

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1174 2010-01-12 05:04:34

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

#1175 2010-01-12 10:20:10

Re: The AMD/ATI Bar & Grill

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