Get GMA500 (Poulsbo) working in Karmic with Jaunty backports..

**Marko Helenius** · August 30th, 2009

Hi,

I've been using Karmic in my Poulsbo laptop with decent resolution and performance for a while now. Since there are lot of discussions ongoing where fellow forumers are looking for the same solution, I decided to publish my notes about it. Hopefully someone will find it useful, no guarantee..

Start by downloading lucazades psb-kernel-* packages http://swiss.ubuntuforums.org/showpo...7&postcount=13

Following code samples are stripped from my install-poulsbo.sh, almost everything requires sudo:

Code:

# Adding required PPAs
echo 'deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/ubuntu-mobile/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main' >> /etc/apt/sources.list
echo 'deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/ubuntu-mobile/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main' >> /etc/apt/sources.list
echo "" >> /etc/apt/sources.list

echo 'deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/albertomilone/poulsbo-graphics/ubuntu jaunty main ' >> /etc/apt/sources.list
echo 'deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/albertomilone/poulsbo-graphics/ubuntu jaunty main' >> /etc/apt/sources.list
echo "" >> /etc/apt/sources.list

# Keys for PPAs
apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys C6598A30
apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys 99C0198F

apt-get update
apt-get install  dkms fakeroot

apt-get install libdrm-poulsbo1
apt-get install poulsbo-driver-2d poulsbo-driver-3d psb-firmware

# Install downloaded psb-kernel-* packages
dpkg -i psb-kernel-*

echo "blacklist i915" >> /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

update-initramfs -u

Create xorg.conf with following content:

Code:

Section "Device"
        Identifier      "GMA500"
        Option "AccelMethod" "EXA"
#        Option "DRI" "off"
        Option "MigrationHeuristic" "greedy"
        Option "IgnoreACPI" "yes"
        Driver "psb"
EndSection

Section "DRI"
    Mode    0666
EndSection

And reboot..

I think the key elements are:
* Alberto's libdrm-poulsbo1 which doesn't collide with Karmic's librdm2
* Blacklisting i915 and updating initramfs, so i915 and wrong drm.ko are *not* loaded

Since I actually didn't do anything myself, I thank Lucazade, Albertomilone and Ubuntu-mobile for enabling this.

I'll try to keep this short instruction up-to-date, so please let me know how it goes.

__________________________________________________ _____________________
Edit: added DRI Mode Section

**jbernardo** · August 30th, 2009

Thanks! I'll try updating to karmic straight away, will tell you how it goes.

**lucazade** · August 30th, 2009

Great mate!

**jbernardo** · August 30th, 2009

It's working, at least the same as it is working in Jaunty - no working compositing, no 3d acceleration. But at least 2D now works. Thanks!

**Marko Helenius** · September 2nd, 2009

Originally Posted by jbernardo

It's working, at least the same as it is working in Jaunty - no working compositing, no 3d acceleration. But at least 2D now works. Thanks!

Nice to know!

Friend of mine reported that DRI Section was required for 3D operations in Dell laptop, added to xorg.conf example.

**jbernardo** · September 2nd, 2009

Originally Posted by Marko Helenius

Nice to know!

Friend of mine reported that DRI Section was required for 3D operations in Dell laptop, added to xorg.conf example.

With DRI on or off? I'll try now the "Section DRI" setting, to see if it changes anything.

**MartinuxP** · September 3rd, 2009

Hi, i've used your scripts and they runs, It says direct rendering: yes (glxinfo) but the computer is very slow, scrolling in the browser makes it flicks.
Is that right?

Sorry for my poor english!

**jbernardo** · September 3rd, 2009

Originally Posted by MartinuxP

Hi, i've used your scripts and they runs, It says direct rendering: yes (glxinfo) but the computer is very slow, scrolling in the browser makes it flicks.
Is that right?

Sorry for my poor english!

Try glblur (from xscreensavers-gl), here when I run it with "/usr/lib/xscreensaver/glblur -fps -window" I get about 16 fps, the same under jaunty. For comparison, my AA1, which has a GMA945, gives 25fps...

**Starks** · September 4th, 2009

Somebody should add this guide to the Ubuntu wiki. If not, I will.

Is the DRI section in the xorg.conf needed for 3D or Compiz?

**jbernardo** · September 4th, 2009

Originally Posted by Starks

Somebody should add this guide to the Ubuntu wiki. If not, I will.

Is the DRI section in the xorg.conf needed for 3D or Compiz?

It should be in the release notes, as a temporary work around for GMA500 support in Karmic, until there is a fully working driver.

As for the DRI section, I didn't test compiz, but on my Asus 1101HA it didn't change anything. The same fps with glblur, and still can't enable kwin effects.