Problems with fglrx

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Revision as of 14:01, 21 October 2005 by 84.191.168.91 (Talk) (Beta Testing)
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Known Troubles and Solutions

No hardware acceleration

If the ATI driver works only without the hardware acceleration, take into consideration that fglrx_dri.so was linked against libstdc++.so.5 which may not be present if your system uses gcc-3.4.

To fix this, compile gcc-3.3.5 and copy libstdc++.so.5* to /usr/lib and update the dynamic linker cache via # ldconfig.

Troubles using software suspend

When the computer resumes from suspend, X only displays a garbled image and the computer is frozen. The problem is acknowledged in ATI's release notes and in knowledge base entry 737-218.

Using vbetool to save/restore the video card state before/after suspend solved this for some people. If you use swsusp2 scripts you just have to uncomment EnableVbetool yes in /etc/hibernate/hibernate.conf.

tested with the following configurations
model distro kernel fglrx PM success comments
T42 SUSE 9.3 2.6.11 8.14.13 swsusp yes
T42p Debian 2.6.10 Debian packaged swsusp2 yes
T43 ??? 2.6.12-rc6 8.14.13 swsusp2 no works if fglrx kernel driver not loaded

Troubles with large RAM

Version 8.14.13 (and probably earlier versions) of the driver does not seem to be able to cope with large amounts of RAM: with 512 MB it works, with 1.5 GB it crashes the machine as soon as X is started. The problem is present only if the fglrx kernel module is loaded, but independently of whether (CONFIG_HIGHMEM) is enabled.

Version 8.16.20 seems to fix the problem.

A workaround is to limit RAM by adding the mem=864m kernel parameter.

Display switching

The switching between internal and external display doesn't work, because the driver blocks messing around with the chipset via ACPI. If you want to use this feature (i.e. during presentations), you should use the VESA server instead (experienced with a R52, Kernel 2.6.11, xorg 6.8.2, fglrx 8.16.20).

Patches

The following patches might be needed for certain versions of fglrx.

V 8.8.25

Beta Testing

The fglrx developers are looking for T Series users to take part in their beta program.

If interested, plese contact mtippett (at) ati.com.