Date 3-Feb-17
SIS 771/671 Video Chipset Driver Installation Guide
This post presents a solution for installing Linux SIS drivers on an Olidata U40SL1 notebook. This notebook is apparently identical to ECS, Uniwill, and Olivetti units with the same model number, and the solution should work for them, as well. The solution should also work for any device with a SIS 771/671 video chipset.
The solution is for LUbuntu 16.04 32 bit, but it should also work for various contemporary Ubuntu distros and forks - and maybe Debian, as well.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Temüjin and mörgæs here at UF: https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2350126
Thanks also to rasdark at Github for the largely anonymous and often thankless task of driver development: https://github.com/rasdark
Expectations
The results will not be perfect. The SIS drivers provide only some level of 2D acceleration and no 3D. There will be occasional display anomalies/corruption - restarting applications usually fixes this - in rare cases, rebooting or logging out/in is required. There will also be sporadic Ubuntu-has-experienced-an-internal-error messages, these associated with XOrg, probably as a result of the SIS drivers - the problem beneath the error message seems to be non-disruptive, however. In the end, 1280x800 resolution is achieved. The vesa drivers, the next best alternative, provide only 1024x768 resolution, with some minor distortion of aspect ratio and with no acceleration, and full screen video playback, Youtube, DVDs, etc, is either not possible or is of unacceptable quality. The SIS drivers provide higher resolution, better clarity, better colour, and better aspect ratio. They also allow full screen video playback, including DVDs, at a moderately acceptable level. I would also say that the notebook does not get as hot with SIS drivers as it does with the vesa ones, suggesting that the vesa drivers put more work on the proc. Overall the performance of the notebook is better. Web pages load faster, etc.
Don't Work in 600 x 480 unless You Are a Masochist!
The default fbdev drivers, those loaded, after installation, provide only 600x480 resolution. It is difficult to work with this. Create an xorg.conf file in /etc/X11/ in order to load the Linux-native vesa drivers which will provide 1024x768 resolution. You will need this file later, anyway, to load the SIS drivers.
If you are new/newish to Linux, you can open a terminal and use sudo to launch a text editor so that you will have rights to save the file in the X11 folder. For LUbuntu:
Copy/paste the following:
Code:
Section "Device"
Identifier "Configured Video Device"
Driver "vesa"
EndSection
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Configured Monitor"
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Monitor "Configured Monitor"
Device "Configured Video Device"
EndSection
Save the file as xorg.conf in the X11 folder - /etc/X11
Reboot
If you are new/newish to Linux and still have a terminal open:
This seems to work faster than GUI menu-driven reboot button.
You should have 1024x768 resolution, which will make the rest of the work easier.
Install a Log Reader
This is not a necessity, but if something goes wrong, you will have easy access to the XORG logs for diagnostics. For LUbuntu:
Code:
sudo apt-get install ksystemlog
Prerequisites
Here I present the creation of the environment in which the compilation and installation of the drivers worked. Not all steps may be necessary but this was the state in which things did work.
Run the following in a terminal. Copy/paste is your friend.
Code:
sudo apt-get install build-essential xorg-dev
sudo apt-get install autoconf automake git
sudo apt-get install libtool-bin
# typo found here by Temüjin: sudo apt-get install xutils.dev
# should read:
sudo apt-get install xutils-dev
Downloading, Compiling and Installing Driver
Run the following in a terminal. Copy/paste is your friend.
Code:
cd ~/ #or whatever dir you want to use - note: the process works well in the root of the home folder.
git clone https://github.com/rasdark/xf86-video-sis671.git
cd xf86-video-sis671/
git checkout for-xorg-1.18
autoreconf
automake
./configure --prefix=/usr --disable-static
make
sudo make install
Check for Driver Files
Look in /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers - there should now be two SIS driver files: sis671_drv.la and sis671_drv.so
Loading Driver: Edit xorg.conf
Open the xorg.conf file created above. Remember to use sudo to open the text editor.
Change:
Code:
Section "Device"
Identifier "Configured Video Device"
Driver "vesa"
To:
Code:
Section "Device"
Identifier "Configured Video Device"
Driver "sis671"
Save and close the file.
Reboot
Again you can use the command line, if you still have a terminal open:
Enjoy!
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