Jump to content

how is mandrake's ATI support?


Recommended Posts

I want to install Mandrake 10.0 on my laptop and my graphics card is ATI Mobility Radeon 9000. I was just wondering what the chances were of Mandrake recognizing the card and installing the driver. I guess my question is, does Mandrake have good support for ATI cards?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You might want to check out the status of suspend. I am running Mandrake 9.1 on a Dell Inspiron 8200 with Radeon 9000, and the only way I could get suspend to ram to work was to install a fresh XFree 4.4 from cvs. But that messes up the rpm database so I have to do a reinstall every now and then, which is very annoying. XFree 4.4 also turns off the display backlight properly, which isn't the case with 4.3.

 

The ATI proprietary drivers did not work at all when I tried them a year ago, but that might have improved. You can get a Mandrake rpm for them via urpmi if you are a member of MandrakeClub.

 

XFree 4.4 was originally intended to be included in Mandrake 10.0 but was revoked because of licensing issues. Alas!

 

Otherwise the card works fine, glxgears gives ~2100 fps.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have 9.2 PowerPack running on an Thinkpad with the 32Mb M9 card. The ATI drivers came with the CD. They work most of the time. The card works including 3D, though the screen freezes sometimes during running graphic intensive apps (evolution, acroread, xdvi).

 

I was not able to configure X to use a resolution other than the native 1400x1050 (the infamous "Screens not found" message). Also, I can't get an external monitor work with Mandrake's proprietary ATI drivers (the 3D acceleration, a variety of resolutions and the monitor work perfectly with Knoppix using the radeon driver - so it's not the card's fault). The ATI config utility was not included with the CDs, Mandrake support team was not helpful at all.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Have you considered installing X.org from the 10.1 beta or from Cooker. It is effectively a development beyond XFree86 4.4 and will be included in 10.1

 

Yes, X.org is definitely the way to go. But I will probably wait for 10.1 before reinstalling on my laptop, I don't have the time right now anyway.

 

Also, TV out has never worked for me. I can get a picture on the TV with atitvout but it gets messed up completely when I move the mouse. Does anyone know if TV out works with X.org or the ATI proprietary drivers?

 

Another poster mentioned a radeon pro card. As far as I know the mobility cards are the ones having issues with suspend. Other cards should work ok. Of course, most laptops come with radeon mobility cards these days.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Get this guys...when I installed Mandrake on my laptop, it automatically recognized and installed the ATI Radeon driver, but in Windows, it sees it is installed, but won't install a driver for it. I even went to the driver site and tried to install it from there and it won't install because it keeps giving me a "missing file" error message. Go figure, huh? Windows sucks sometimes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

building from source is in fact usually preferable to installing cooker rpms on stable systems. just don't do it. it's not supported intended or recommended. if you absolutely must use a cooker package on a stable release, at *least* grab the SRPM and recompile it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

building from source is in fact usually preferable to installing cooker rpms on stable systems. just don't do it. it's not supported intended or recommended. if you absolutely must use a cooker package on a stable release, at *least* grab the SRPM and recompile it.

 

 

I am not so sure. I have had pretty good success using cooker RPMs on a stable system. Some things I have recompiled but not with any real thought to doing it for any reason except 'just because I can'

 

Your mileage may vary of course

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On my laptop right now I have Mobility M6 so far I'm in the process with ac_dispatcher to make it better. Right now I get about 700 FPS from glxgears. Which is really really bad. But by far the most annoying problem yet is that for somer reason my gnome restarts or kde what ever it may be just restart randomly. That is the only problem that I seem to have. But it's not to the point where it just happened too much, some people have suggested that I try out a new distro, but I LIKE mdk way too much to just give up on it like that. Because mdk has not given me any other problem besides this. As soon as 10.1 comes out I'm switching to that since it has x.org which I hear that might be much better altho some say that they don't see the change of XFree86 and x.org.

 

-Luis

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The key to ATI on Linux is do you have DRI (Direct Rendering)

 

$glxinfo

 

name of display: :0.0
disabling TCL support
display: :0  screen: 0
direct rendering: Yes
server glx vendor string: SGI
server glx version string: 1.2
server glx extensions:
  GLX_ARB_multisample, GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating,  
  GLX_EXT_import_context, GLX_SGI_make_current_read, GLX_SGIS_multisample
client glx vendor string: SGI
client glx version string: 1.2
client glx extensions:
  GLX_ARB_get_proc_address, GLX_ARB_multisample, GLX_EXT_import_context,  
  GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_MESA_allocate_memory,  
  GLX_MESA_swap_control, GLX_MESA_swap_frame_usage, GLX_OML_swap_method,  
  GLX_OML_sync_control, GLX_SGI_make_current_read, GLX_SGI_swap_control,  
  GLX_SGI_video_sync, GLX_SGIS_multisample, GLX_SGIX_fbconfig,  
  GLX_SGIX_visual_select_group
GLX extensions:
  GLX_ARB_get_proc_address, GLX_EXT_import_context, GLX_EXT_visual_info,  
  GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_MESA_swap_control, GLX_MESA_swap_frame_usage,  
  GLX_SGI_video_sync
OpenGL vendor string: Tungsten Graphics, Inc.
OpenGL renderer string: Mesa DRI Radeon 20030328 AGP 4x x86/MMX+/SSE2 NO-TCL
OpenGL version string: 1.2 Mesa 5.0.2

 

note direct rendering yes

 

and

 

Mesa DRI Radeon 20030328 AGP 4x x86/MMX+/SSE2

 

This means I have DRI and I running at its max speed (AGP4x)

 

 

by the way jet2k5 -

 

Right now I get about 700 FPS from glxgears.

 

That is better than I get with DRI

 

$glxgears

disabling TCL support
2118 frames in 5.0 seconds = 553.600 FPS
2186 frames in 5.0 seconds = 630.200 FPS
2140 frames in 5.0 seconds = 632.000 FPS
2194 frames in 5.0 seconds = 635.800 FPS

 

Think you said you get around 200 FPS

 

From your PM

702 frames in 5.0 seconds = 140.400 FPS

880 frames in 5.0 seconds = 176.000 FPS

1520 frames in 5.0 seconds = 304.000 FPS

1200 frames in 5.0 seconds = 240.000 FPS

 

You get around 700 frames but around 200FPS. but we will fix that this week. :P

 

I will probably make a ATI Mobility How-To for DRI later (my way requires a kernel 2.6 compile)

 

 

btw:

If a Nvidia card tries glxinfo and getts direct rendering no Im pretty sure that means nothing. Nvidia has its own DRI. Rest assured if you glxgears is over around 400 you probably have DRI on.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

yeah yeah yeah,

 

Thanks to ac_dispatcher I compiled my own kernel using one of his config files that are great for both our laptops since we pretty much have the same one.

 

Now after we have compiled the kernel and tweaked XFree86 this is what I get from $glxgears,

 

[zero@localhost zero]$ glxgears
3322 frames in 5.0 seconds = 664.400 FPS
3524 frames in 5.0 seconds = 704.800 FPS
3510 frames in 5.0 seconds = 702.000 FPS

 

as you can see it's pretty good from the last time. And usually last time before I had my compiled kernel I would get different results from glxgears, now I get the same thing around 3400 3500 frames.

 

-Luis

:thumbs:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...