3.7.0-7 kernel update broke ATI driver

[gamblor01]

I have manually installed the binary driver from AMD's website. I have actually done it many times in the past and whenever a new kernel update comes out it generally breaks my drivers, so I simply rebuild the thing for the new kernel and reboot. It's a bit of a pain but this is a laptop and therefore I cannot install a new card. The fglrx driver from the repo is outdated and performance is horrible when I use it so I have to manually install. For all previous kernels the installation worked fine, but for 3.7.0-7 it seems permanently broken.


I actually had to reinstall everything the other day due to a hard drive that crashed and was no longer bootable. After putting in a new hard drive and reinstalling, I was up and running with the 3.5.0 kernel. Then this morning I updated to 3.7.0-7 and this time when I tried to install I get an error about missing version.h in the log:

$ cat /usr/share/ati/fglrx-install.log
Supported adapter detected.
Check if system has the tools required for installation.
fglrx installation requires that the system have kernel headers.  /lib/modules/3.7.0-7-generic/build/include/linux/version.h cannot be found on this system.
fglrx installation is being forced. Installation will proceed without the required tools on the system.
Uninstalling any previously installed drivers.

Creating symlink /var/lib/dkms/fglrx/9.012/source ->
                 /usr/src/fglrx-9.012

DKMS: add completed.

Kernel preparation unnecessary for this kernel.  Skipping...

Building module:
cleaning build area....
cd /var/lib/dkms/fglrx/9.012/build; sh make.sh --nohints --uname_r=3.7.0-7-generic --norootcheck....(bad exit status: 1)
[Error] Kernel Module : Failed to build fglrx-9.012 with DKMS
[Error] Kernel Module : Removing fglrx-9.012 from DKMS

------------------------------
Deleting module version: 9.012
completely from the DKMS tree.
------------------------------
Done.
[Reboot] Kernel Module : update-initramfs

Interesting, and I know what you're thinking. You're probably thinking to yourself something like "version.h is missing? Dude -- you have to install the linux-headers-generic package". And you're right -- but it's already installed (along with the linux-headers-3.7.0-7 package) and here is proof!

$ dpkg -l | grep linux-headers
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-17                    3.5.0-17.28                                                                 all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-27                    3.5.0-27.46                                                                 all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-27-generic            3.5.0-27.46                                                                 amd64        Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 64 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-3.7.0-7                     3.7.0-7.15                                                                  all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.7.0
ii  linux-headers-3.7.0-7-generic             3.7.0-7.15                                                                  amd64        Linux kernel headers for version 3.7.0 on 64 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-generic                     3.7.0.7.11                                                                  amd64        Generic Linux kernel headers

One odd thing is that the generic package is version 3.7.0.7.11 and yet the 3.7.0 headers packages are 3.7.0-7.15. I'm not sure and I don't know if that means anything. But clearly version.h is missing from this directory and I'm not sure how or why. Anybody know what to do to get this file and get the graphics driver to actually build? Did they simply release the package in an incomplete manner or am I at fault here?

[Mark Phelps]

In future, you could save yourself a lot of grief if you read the AMD Linux Driver Release Notes (see link) before you did a kernel upgrade ... the notes clearly say up to kernel v3.5:

http://support.amd.com/us/kbarticles...easenotes.aspx

[gamblor01]

In future, you could save yourself a lot of grief if you read the AMD Linux Driver Release Notes (see link) before you did a kernel upgrade ... the notes clearly say up to kernel v3.5:

http://support.amd.com/us/kbarticles...easenotes.aspx

Ugh...wonderful. To be fair I have never had this problem in the past though that's good to know. I had no idea they even had any upper-level restrictions on the kernel version. I figured a lower-bound might be possible but lesson learned. Thanks for the pointing that out -- I'll be sure to look at that more carefully in the future.

So now what do I do now -- can I force the system to boot up using the 3.5 kernel instead? Or I guess I could just install the fglrx driver and then fallback on the default driver? That's actually what I'm running in right now but it doesn't seem to be configured properly. None of the Unity UI is available to me. In order to even launch firefox here I had to use CTRL+ALT+T to get a terminal and then run the command firefox. I have been searching stuff on google but so far cannot figure out how to reconfigure the default driver.

I have tried sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg but that doesn't work

[gamblor01]

Ok somehow I have gotten it back to sort of working. I'm in Unity and I get the UI but in the top left corner I constantly see a little blinking, black cursor. If someone can help me get rid of that for now that's sufficient I guess. I'm still unable to currently use my dual monitors attached to the docking station but I can at least do my work for now...

[gamblor01]

Ok so on the bright side I learned lots of stuff today. I was able to boot up with my older kernel by hold down the shift key and then selecting advanced in the grub menu to choose my older kernel. Then I reinstalled the fglrx driver for the 3.5.0-27 kernel and rebooted. Again, holding down shift to select that 3.5.0-27 kernel. Now I'm back up and running with the fglrx driver on my old kernel. I'm still getting some strange graphic glitches but I'll try to reinstall and hopefully fix those later tonight I guess. Basically it's some weird flashing cursors on the top of the screen. Someone else has apparently had this problem in the past:

http://askubuntu.com/questions/28039...n-top-of-unity


If you're curious about reconfiguring grub for timeout options, default selection, and so on then here is a great tutorial:

http://askubuntu.com/questions/82140...kernel-version



I'm marking this as solved for now and will be more careful about kernel updates in the future (thanks Mark). Either than or I'll take this laptop outside and go all Office Space on it. Then I'll just request one with an Nvidia card in it and live happily ever after.

[r.stiltskin]

Excuse my curiosity, but what prompted the rush to upgrade to 3.7 if it's a machine that you actually use for work?

And while I share your preference for Nvidia over AMD, why would you assume that any driver would automatically work with a kernel that hadn't been written yet when the driver was written?

Just wonderin'.

[gamblor01]

Honestly I have never experienced anything like this before so I didn't realize that there was such a problem. To be fair though, my system at home is using an nvidia card with packages installed directly through the package management system (jockey, and now software sources or whatever it has moved to). So apt should be taking care of dependencies and not allow this happen.

As for the rush? I don't know -- I just saw update manager stating that there were like 62 updates available. I scrolled through the list and noticed the kernel update but figured it was no big deal, I would just have to manually recompile the driver like I always have in the past and so I hit install. I have always just installed whatever updates it's prompting me to install...otherwise it just keeps prompting me to install them every day or so and that's annoying.

Clearly in the future I should be more careful when installing kernel updates, particularly on this machine where the graphics drivers are not installed via the package management system (and yes -- it is my work laptop). I have just never had any issue like this in the past but there is a first time for everything right?

Then again, I keep having problems with this laptop so part of me sort of wishes that something will just go completely and utterly wrong with it so that I can request a new one...and then choose one to my specs. While this is a pretty powerful system (8 core i7 with 16GB of RAM), it's also a 17" brick, and weighs a ridiculous amount. Something more portable with an nvidia card would be preferable.

[r.stiltskin]

I'm puzzled. I assumed you had manually installed that kernel. I don't see any kernel offered beyond 3.5.0-27. Were you using the 13.04 beta?

I agree I wouldn't ordinarily worry about regularly-offered updates. But then I wouldn't be using a beta or even an official release that was just released today on a machine that I have to use for work every day.

[gamblor01]

I'm definitely not using the 13.04 beta. This is still 12.10:

$ cat /etc/*release
DISTRIB_ID=Ubuntu
DISTRIB_RELEASE=12.10
DISTRIB_CODENAME=quantal
DISTRIB_DESCRIPTION="Ubuntu 12.10"
NAME="Ubuntu"
VERSION="12.10, Quantal Quetzal"
ID=ubuntu
ID_LIKE=debian
PRETTY_NAME="Ubuntu quantal (12.10)"
VERSION_ID="12.10"

[r.stiltskin]

That's weird. I'm using Xubuntu 12.10, 64-bit, us repository, and it is up-to-date (I just ran apt-get update to be sure) and the latest linux-* that I see is 3.5.0-27.