HOWTO: Install the ATI driver on ANY stable version of Ubuntu

[darkpark]

welps! I'm happy to say that I finally got the dog-gone fglrx driver to work, but I had to use the version 8.38.6 ati driver (from their site: check their archive section). I also forced x8 agp speed (auto is the default) in my motherboard settings, although I'm not sure if that made a difference. anyway...
Yippe!!!

For the sake of completion and system comparison....

CPU: AMD Athlon X2 64 4400+
Video: Sapphire X1950Pro AGP 512MB
Audio card: Creative Labs X-FI xtreme-music
motherboard: Gigabyte K8NSC-939 nforce3 250 chipset

correction:
The fglrx driver does seem to work, but DRI doesn't and I MESA is being used for opengl.

(II) fglrx(0): Kernel Module Version Information:
(II) fglrx(0):     Name: fglrx
(II) fglrx(0):     Version: 8.34.8
(II) fglrx(0):     Date: Feb 20 2007
(II) fglrx(0):     Desc: ATI FireGL DRM kernel module
(WW) fglrx(0): Kernel Module version does *not* match driver.
(EE) fglrx(0): incompatible kernel module detected - HW accelerated OpenGL will not work
(II) fglrx(0): [drm] removed 1 reserved context for kernel
(II) fglrx(0): [drm] unmapping 8192 bytes of SAREA 0x2000 at 0xb7cdb000
(WW) fglrx(0): ***********************************************
(WW) fglrx(0): * DRI initialization failed!                  *
(WW) fglrx(0): * (maybe driver kernel module missing or bad) *
(WW) fglrx(0): * 2D acceleraton available (MMIO)             *
(WW) fglrx(0): * no 3D acceleration available                *
(WW) fglrx(0): ********************************************* *

[zamolxis]

Remove these sections which I have copied from your xorg.conf:
(...)
And finally things were all good in ATI land.

AWESOME!
Thank you, MrChips, I'm finally using the binary drivers.
glxgears gives me 2600-4400 FPS, hope this is normal
can't wait for the overhyped new drivers
still couldn't get beryl, etc, but at least now i have a starting point

I can't help but wonder: why was it necessary to remove those lines, what was wrong with them?

tia

[another_sam]

an ATI X1400 will work out of the box on Gutsy Gibbon (ubuntu 7.10)? at least to let me configure the wifi graphically and then, if i want, be able to download a better driver...

thanks

[.evan]

I'm new to linux (first post here) and after a week of tinkering with a dual head set up I finally have two monitors working well. The only lingering pain in the neck is that I can't drag windows from one monitor to the next.

I posted the relevant parts of my xorg.conf file on my blog along with a few images of the screens in action.

http://hobbylobby.wordpress.com/2007...iver-ati-card/

My linux teacher suggested that I post the link to that here to give back to the community after having learned so much from all of you thus far.

Section “Device”
# Crucial to give each Device a unique ID
Identifier “0 ATI Technologies Inc ATI Radeon XPRESS 200M 5955 (PCIE)”
Driver “fglrx”
# In my case, there’s only one PCI BusID
Busid “PCI:1:5:0″
Screen 0
EndSection

Section “Device”
Identifier “1 ATI Technologies Inc ATI Radeon XPRESS 200M 5955 (PCIE)”
Driver “fglrx”
Busid “PCI:1:5:0″
Screen 1
EndSection

Section “Monitor”
Identifier “Laptop Monitor”
Option “DPMS”
EndSection

Section “Monitor”
Identifier “Samsung Monitor”
Option “DPMS”
EndSection

Section “Screen”
Identifier “Laptop Screen”
Device “0 ATI Technologies Inc ATI Radeon XPRESS 200M 5955 (PCIE)”
Monitor “Laptop Monitor”
Defaultdepth 24
SubSection “Display”
Depth 24
# Despite not including any more modes, there are many more options in the GUI
Modes “1680×1050″ “1280×800″
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section “Screen”
Identifier “Samsung Screen”
Device “1 ATI Technologies Inc ATI Radeon XPRESS 200M 5955 (PCIE)”
Monitor “Samsung Monitor”
Defaultdepth 24
SubSection “Display”
Depth 24
Modes “1680×1050″
EndSubSection
EndSection

# Enabling the Xinerama caused problems every time -
# but it sounds like getting that working is the last step
# in having true interacting monitors.

#Section “ServerFlags”
# Option “Xinerama” “true”
# Option “DefaultServerLayout” “DualHead”
#EndSection

Section “ServerLayout”
Identifier “Default Layout”
Screen 0 “Laptop Screen” 0 0
Screen 1 “Samsung Screen” RightOf “Laptop Screen”
# DualHead means two monitors
Option “DualHead” “true”
Inputdevice “Generic Keyboard”
Inputdevice “Configured Mouse”
Inputdevice “stylus” “SendCoreEvents”
Inputdevice “cursor” “SendCoreEvents”
Inputdevice “eraser” “SendCoreEvents”
Inputdevice “Synaptics Touchpad”
EndSection

[JoePits]

an ATI X1400 will work out of the box on Gutsy Gibbon (ubuntu 7.10)? at least to let me configure the wifi graphically and then, if i want, be able to download a better driver...

thanks

i used the gutsy daily today and x1400 worked on its own after installing.

[kaktuskatta]

I have the drivers successfully installed, but I'm only able to get the correct info from fgrlxinfo when I run the command as superuser!

when I type fglrxinfo, this comes up:

libGL error: failed to open DRM: Operation not permitted
libGL error: reverting to (slow) indirect rendering
display: :0.0 screen: 0
OpenGL vendor string: Mesa project: www.mesa3d.org
OpenGL renderer string: Mesa GLX Indirect
OpenGL version string: 1.4 (1.5 Mesa 6.5.2)

when I type sudo fglrxinfo, this comes up:

display: :0.0 screen: 0
OpenGL vendor string: ATI Technologies Inc.
OpenGL renderer string: ATI MOBILITY RADEON X600
OpenGL version string: 2.0.6473 (8.37.6)

Same thing with glxgears:

libGL error: failed to open DRM: Operation not permitted
libGL error: reverting to (slow) indirect rendering
1455 frames in 5.2 seconds = 281.140 FPS
1356 frames in 5.5 seconds = 244.854 FPS
1356 frames in 5.3 seconds = 257.310 FPS
1356 frames in 5.2 seconds = 261.399 FPS
1130 frames in 5.0 seconds = 225.353 FPS
X connection to :0.0 broken (explicit kill or server shutdown).

output from sudo glxgears:

11212 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2242.262 FPS
11308 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2257.913 FPS
11302 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2257.020 FPS
11251 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2244.817 FPS
11313 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2257.681 FPS
11256 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2245.015 FPS

Ehh....a huge difference, so I assume that there's a permission issue. Does anybody know where I change this permission, and how?

Thanks in advance

[.evan]

[QUOTE=kaktuskatta;3352756]I have the drivers successfully installed, but I'm only able to get the correct info from fgrlxinfo when I run the command as superuser!

output from sudo glxgears:

11212 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2242.262 FPS
11308 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2257.913 FPS
11302 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2257.020 FPS
11251 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2244.817 FPS
11313 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2257.681 FPS
11256 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2245.015 FPS

I'm new here - so forgive the question if it's obvious to everyone else, but what does
the glxgears have to do with setting up the graphics card drivers?

.evan

[kaktuskatta]

The point is that the openGL setup is not working as it should be, the graphic is lagging, which means that the card is not set up correctly. I need some help with this, and this is the place to ask. Hope this answered your question. P.S: glxgears is a small application that can tell you whether everything is working or not. That's why I posted the FPS from the terminal

[Thecoldfrost]

The problem I have isn't that fglrx doesn't work, infact the one I get from "sudo apt-get install" works very well, if a little slowly. The problem I have is installing any driver downloaded from ati's site.

Following guides from this forum, and from cchtml also (or using envy, or just running the .run file), it doesn't matter, the install goes perfectly. however amdcccle doesn't work (I don't know if its meant to work before the first reboot), aticonfig works though. So from default xorg.conf I run aticonfig, and it makes the changes. I restart X or reboot completely. Following possible fixes from this forum and others just do nothing.

Everything goes nicely, the Ubuntu loading screen comes up, the orange bar moves up, but after than the screen doesn't move to the login screen, rather it "flashes" two shades of black infinately. ctrl+alt+f1 etc don't work. At this point I should point out I have found a thread with exactly the same error, however it was never replies to at all.

I am at my wits end, i thought since 8.40.4 wouldn't work, maybe with all the changes 8.41.7 would. Its exactly the same. I have literarly reinstalled ubuntu as many times as there are drivers, since using one from ati.com stops me being able to reinstall the one on the repositories. (The number of reinstalls is x2 because I tried, and am still on 32bit now, whereas I was using 64bit)

It isn't a problem with xorg.conf. I have tried the same xorg.conf I am using now, with any other driver version and above problem occurs. Unless its a refresh rate issue, which I tried to play about with, but I don't know if I had it right for my screen.

Is there something different about the repositories driver from ati.com's?

Could it be that the card isn't being detected correctly?

My system is:
Athlon x2 3800+
1.5gb ram
sapphire x1950pro 512mb agp
Abit AV8-3rd eye
Sound Blaster Audigy SE
Sony SDM-HS75P Monitor (1280x1024 @ 75hz)

The reason I want to install from ATI's site, is because I would like catalyst control center. Its not so bad for gaming with the driver already installed, everything works fine, only a little slower than I used to play them. I don't really like to ask for help, I prefer to persevere with something untill I fix it, but this is beyond me.

In summary -> Having tryed both ubuntu 32bit and 64bit the only fglrx driver I can install is the one from apt-get. Any from ati.com will boot me into a screen flashing between two shades of black. I am 99% sure its something I am doing wrong, as I refuse to believe the problem can be so persistant as going though so many driver releases.

[Harry789]

I used envy and get

laan97ac@laan97ac-laptop:~$ glxgears
Xlib: extension "XFree86-DRI" missing on display ":0.0".
3755 frames in 5.0 seconds = 744.296 FPS
3840 frames in 5.0 seconds = 762.530 FPS
3840 frames in 5.0 seconds = 761.791 FPS
3840 frames in 5.1 seconds = 760.374 FPS

How do I fix the DRI thing?

Actually I had higher FPS before install (ATI radeon x600)