18.04 Corrupted login display after upgrade AMD MacBook Pro 2,1

[shades_aus]

Hi everyone,

I have just upgraded 16.04 LTS to 18.04 LTS on my MacBook Pro 2,1 Core2 Duo with AMD graphics. It's an older model, and the display is all corrupted but only on the login screen.
While it's loading, everything looks fine. The Ubuntu splash screen looks fine.

Could there be a setting I need to adjust?

The mouse cursor seems fine, and pre-boot splash also works fine however, once the GUI service is started, and the login page shows, it's all corrupted, not working at all and I can't login.
It worked fine under 16.04 LTS appart from some power issues. This seems like there is an incorrect Graphics Driver could be installed however, how do I check for this and correct it??

I have looked in numerous support areas and the majority of them talk about an Intel driver however, this MacBook Pro is the 2,1 version and uses an AMD GPU.
I do have access to the console, and the text mode works fine however, I am not able to fix the login display.
At first I thought it was Wayland however, 18.04 is supposed to use X so, I don't know.
I can't click on anything to try and change it anyway.

Is there anything I can do or do I have to delete everything and re-install 16.04 and never be able to upgrade.
My reason for the upgrade is 16.04 was a little slow esp playing video so I was hoping 18.04 would accellerate the video better and maybe some other "under the hood" upgrades would breath new life into my MacBook however, now I regret doing anything at all.

Could anyone assist me please, tell me what to look for and perhaps change?
I have attached screenshots to explain what I am seeing better.

[QIII]

Moved to Apple Hardware Users

[exploder]

I have seen this before. Even if the logon looks like that, press enter, type your password and press enter. It should still log you on and the desktop should appear fine.

[shades_aus]

I have seen this before. Even if the logon looks like that, press enter, type your password and press enter. It should still log you on and the desktop should appear fine.

@exploder
I have tried this. It refuses to login and the display stays corrupted.

Text mode console works fine so, the machine hasn't locked up.

I can use the FN+ALT+CTL keys and a F3 key to access the console, (text only) and confirm I can log in that way but, no GUI this way.

[shades_aus]

I have seen this before. Even if the logon looks like that, press enter, type your password and press enter. It should still log you on and the desktop should appear fine.

I also tried with an external display, no difference.

[shades_aus]

I can't be the only user with this problem can I? Has anyone else ever had this issue with an older MacBook Pro

Does anyone have any idea on where I can go looking and try a few things?
I know I am a basic user with no programming knowlege however, I can uninstall / install different packages if needed.

I'd really really appreciate some assistance from somone with Linux ability in this area. I don't know where else to go. Apple hate anyone not paying 5G every 3 years to keep useing their products but the hardware is standard PC hardware!
Maybe I need to try Debian? or something else? It's almost a crime to throw this thing out.

[tuckshoprn]

I can't be the only user with this problem can I? Has anyone else ever had this issue with an older MacBook Pro

Does anyone have any idea on where I can go looking and try a few things?
I know I am a basic user with no programming knowlege however, I can uninstall / install different packages if needed.

I'd really really appreciate some assistance from somone with Linux ability in this area. I don't know where else to go. Apple hate anyone not paying 5G every 3 years to keep useing their products but the hardware is standard PC hardware!
Maybe I need to try Debian? or something else? It's almost a crime to throw this thing out.


Did you try to see what driver is in use? From command line type: lspci -nnk | grep -i vga -A3 | grep 'in use'
This will tell you which driver is loaded for your card. From memory i think your card is no longer support by AMD's official drivers, so you will need to use the open source driver. This should have been installed for you during the update, but its worth checking and perhaps reinstalling from the command line.

This page is worth a read: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RadeonDriver

[shades_aus]

Did you try to see what driver is in use? From command line type: lspci -nnk | grep -i vga -A3 | grep 'in use'
This will tell you which driver is loaded for your card. From memory i think your card is no longer support by AMD's official drivers, so you will need to use the open source driver. This should have been installed for you during the update, but its worth checking and perhaps reinstalling from the command line.

This page is worth a read: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RadeonDriver

Thanks for the information tuckshopprn

I have done as you suggested and found that the dreiver being used is:
Kernel driver in use: radeon

According to the link you provided, the card is in the Fully Supported listing.
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] RV530/M56-P [Mobility Radeon X1600] [1002:71c5]

I have looked for any errors in the dmesg and didn't find anything using the commands in the reference :dmesg | egrep 'drm|radeon'

[ 1.796447] [drm] radeon kernel modesetting enabled.
[ 1.796522] fb: switching to radeondrmfb from VESA VGA
[ 1.797003] [drm] initializing kernel modesetting (RV530 0x1002:0x71C5 0x106B:0x0080 0x00).
[ 1.797125] [drm] Generation 2 PCI interface, using max accessible memory
[ 1.797130] radeon 0000:01:00.0: VRAM: 256M 0x0000000000000000 - 0x000000000FFFFFFF (256M used)
[ 1.797133] radeon 0000:01:00.0: GTT: 512M 0x0000000010000000 - 0x000000002FFFFFFF
[ 1.797146] [drm] Detected VRAM RAM=256M, BAR=256M
[ 1.797147] [drm] RAM width 128bits DDR
[ 1.797259] [drm] radeon: 256M of VRAM memory ready
[ 1.797260] [drm] radeon: 512M of GTT memory ready.
[ 1.797272] [drm] GART: num cpu pages 131072, num gpu pages 131072
[ 1.806399] [drm] radeon: 1 quad pipes, 2 z pipes initialized.
[ 1.808409] [drm] PCIE GART of 512M enabled (table at 0x0000000000040000).
[ 1.808555] radeon 0000:01:00.0: WB enabled
[ 1.808560] radeon 0000:01:00.0: fence driver on ring 0 use gpu addr 0x0000000010000000 and cpu addr 0x00000000f4b222d1
[ 1.808563] [drm] Supports vblank timestamp caching Rev 2 (21.10.2013).
[ 1.808564] [drm] Driver supports precise vblank timestamp query.
[ 1.808566] radeon 0000:01:00.0: radeon: MSI limited to 32-bit
[ 1.808616] radeon 0000:01:00.0: radeon: using MSI.
[ 1.808638] [drm] radeon: irq initialized.
[ 1.808651] [drm] Loading R500 Microcode
[ 1.808839] [drm] radeon: ring at 0x0000000010001000
[ 1.808871] [drm] ring test succeeded in 9 usecs
[ 1.809027] [drm] ib test succeeded in 0 usecs
[ 1.809863] [drm] Radeon Display Connectors
[ 1.809864] [drm] Connector 0:
[ 1.809865] [drm] LVDS-1
[ 1.809867] [drm] DDC: 0x7e60 0x7e60 0x7e64 0x7e64 0x7e68 0x7e68 0x7e6c 0x7e6c
[ 1.809868] [drm] Encoders:
[ 1.809869] [drm] LCD1: INTERNAL_LVTM1
[ 1.809870] [drm] Connector 1:
[ 1.809870] [drm] SVIDEO-1
[ 1.809871] [drm] Encoders:
[ 1.809872] [drm] TV1: INTERNAL_KLDSCP_DAC2
[ 1.809873] [drm] Connector 2:
[ 1.809873] [drm] DVI-I-1
[ 1.809874] [drm] HPD1
[ 1.809876] [drm] DDC: 0x7e40 0x7e40 0x7e44 0x7e44 0x7e48 0x7e48 0x7e4c 0x7e4c
[ 1.809876] [drm] Encoders:
[ 1.809877] [drm] CRT2: INTERNAL_KLDSCP_DAC2
[ 1.809878] [drm] DFP1: INTERNAL_KLDSCP_TMDS1
[ 1.965028] [drm] fb mappable at 0xC00C0000
[ 1.965029] [drm] vram apper at 0xC0000000
[ 1.965030] [drm] size 7258112
[ 1.965031] [drm] fb depth is 24
[ 1.965032] [drm] pitch is 6912
[ 1.965141] fbcon: radeondrmfb (fb0) is primary device
[ 1.965268] radeon 0000:01:00.0: fb0: radeondrmfb frame buffer device
[ 1.980118] [drm] Initialized radeon 2.50.0 20080528 for 0000:01:00.0 on minor 0

I have learnt how to mount a USB in console though, so that's nice! ;)
Any other things I can try?
What I don't get is the 'ubuntu' splash screen is working!, it's in high-resoultion, says 'ubuntu' has the moving dot graphics on both start-up and shut-down so, the graphics drivers must be loading, there is something else somewhere right?

[djlegge]

You are not the only one. I get the same thing on an old (2006/2007) iMac I use at home, just upgraded to 18.04.
I can actually login if I guess the correct mouse movements / clicks before entering the password. Once logged in the display works fine in gnome desktop, the problem is just with the login manager (called gdm I believe).
I think you can easily install a different login manager from the console (lightdm - as used in 16.04 is an option) so I was going to do that next. I haven't actually tried it yet as it was getting late yesterday.

[shades_aus]

You are not the only one. I get the same thing on an old (2006/2007) iMac I use at home, just upgraded to 18.04.
I can actually login if I guess the correct mouse movements / clicks before entering the password. Once logged in the display works fine in gnome desktop, the problem is just with the login manager (called gdm I believe).
I think you can easily install a different login manager from the console (lightdm - as used in 16.04 is an option) so I was going to do that next. I haven't actually tried it yet as it was getting late yesterday.

Would you mind sharing your mouse clicks etc?
I press the mouse and see the corruption change, then I type in my password and it goes blank for about 3 seconds, then it returns to the corruption.
Actually, if you can share how I replace gdm completely for lightdm or anything at this stage, I would be very grateful.
If I CTRL-ALT-APPLE-F2 I can get to a console that works no problem. I can log in fine, just no GUI obviously.

[djlegge]

From a boot, move the mouse up a long way (like to the top of the screen) then bring it down slowly.
When you see things change on your mangled screen the pointer is probably hovering over the first (maybe only) username. Now single click, type password and ENTER.
If you want to try lightdm it's easy from the console :

sudo apt install lightdm
I haven't tried this on my Mac yet so I can't tell you if it fixes the problem (assuming you, like me, have no problems with the desktop itself once you get into it). I'll try it myself over the weekend...
Once you have lightdm instead of gdm, the username and password box is already selected when you boot so there's no mouse clicking needed, just password and ENTER.

EDIT : Lightdm works perfectly on my Mac.

[shades_aus]

From a boot, move the mouse up a long way (like to the top of the screen) then bring it down slowly.
When you see things change on your mangled screen the pointer is probably hovering over the first (maybe only) username. Now single click, type password and ENTER.
If you want to try lightdm it's easy from the console :

sudo apt install lightdm
I haven't tried this on my Mac yet so I can't tell you if it fixes the problem (assuming you, like me, have no problems with the desktop itself once you get into it). I'll try it myself over the weekend...
Once you have lightdm instead of gdm, the username and password box is already selected when you boot so there's no mouse clicking needed, just password and ENTER.

EDIT : Lightdm works perfectly on my Mac.

Hmm, I did like you suggested and it states "lightdm is already the newest version (1.26.0-0ubuntu1)"
Could it be I am using more than one login manager?
Is there a way to check at all?
I am going to try a "purge" and see if it does anything or breaks it more.
*Edit: It made no difference whatsoever.
So, I googled. I ran # ls /usr/bin/*session and got /usr/bin/dbus-run-session /usr/bin/gnome-session /usr/bin/gnome-session-custom-session
I then ran # gnome-shell --version and got GNOME Shell 3.28.1

I tried #sudo apt purge gdm however, it said it wasn't found.
I'm lost. I thought GDM was the Gnome login manager.
The login screen is still corrupt and looks exactly the same before I removed lightdm so, I just have no idea.

*EDIT 2*
Well, it was GDM3, not GDM so, I removed gdm3 with # sudo apt purge gdm3 then re-installed lightdm with # sudo apt install lightdm -y and it WORKS!!!!

djlegge you awesome, awesome person. Thank you!!

I also had to select Ubuntu Unity at the login screen because the default didn't work and Wayland is broken also but, everything now works.
I can log in, all my prorams and documents are still there, it's awesome.

I can't thank you enough for your help, I have my laptop back wthout needing to blow everything away.

This issue is solved for me.

To recap, Ubuntu (Default) Desktop is broken, Wayland is also broken. Unity works fine, Remove gdm3 and install lightdm for the login manager.
Boom! hehe. Very happy.

[djlegge]

You're welcome, and thanks for the nice comments !
For me, the installation of lightdm asked me which display manager I wanted to use but I guess you didn't get that far as lightdm was already installed (but not selected).
Although gdm (and Wayland) are also broken for me, Ubuntu Default desktop does actually work (but I prefer Unity anyway).
Glad you got it fixed.

[Vind]

*EDIT 2*
Well, it was GDM3, not GDM so, I removed gdm3 with # sudo apt purge gdm3 then re-installed lightdm with # sudo apt install lightdm -y and it WORKS!!!!


Hi, just to confirm that this fix is not exclusive to Macs. I have used this method to fix my issues with an HP dv7 login screen too and it worked like a treat.

Many thanks,

Vind

[dmbomer]

So GDM3 doesn't work properly on boot up?