Gallium3D being default on R300c, classic mesa being dropped... my thought

[sabby]

I had to play around recently with the open source driver stack mesa 7.11.6, libdrm 2.4.26-1, xserver-xorg-video-ati 6.14.2 and tried it on a R300 and I'm a little concerned with it being the default for the next ubuntu release. For example, I cannot run nexuiz on that setup with the Gallium3D driver but can with classic mesa. In addition, google disabled acceleration in chrome 11 because of crashes in ati linux

http://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=76428

and with classic mesa I can run webgl acceleration and accelerated 2D canvas, however I cannot with Gallium3D. In general, my opinion is that on the stack above Gallium3D doesn't feel as stable as classic mesa. I believe classic mesa should be at least built in dri experimental package like the nouveau driver so people can switch between them. I didn't have time to post this before and read today about dropping classic mesa altogether so I though I better hurry before classic mesa no longer exists. I have mix feeling about it, if it would be just for the R300c not R600c I could justify by saying well it's old hardware... I guess you can justify the R600c drop by saying people can just use Catalyst instead... From a developer standpoint the Gallium3D code is much nicer to work and I would want to get rid of classic mesa as soon as possible, but from the user point of view not sure it is the best decision. My opinion is that at least on 7.11 Gallium3D doesn't feel as stable as classic, with the example given above. The powers that be can take that into account when weighing the pros and cons of dropping R600c/R300c.

[agd5f]

Have you filed bugs? They won't get fixed if the don't get filed. No one is working on the classic drivers anymore and I think for the vast majority of people the gallium drivers are much more stable and performant.

[bridgman]

I'm not 100% sure, but I think the r300 Gallium3D driver has been default in Ubuntu releases for a while now. Wondering if you're seeing an issue specific to that Mesa release rather than the Gallium3D driver in general...

[Michael]

I'm not 100% sure, but I think the r300 Gallium3D driver has been default in Ubuntu releases for a while now. Wondering if you're seeing an issue specific to that Mesa release rather than the Gallium3D driver in general...

Yeah, R300g has been default in Ubuntu since at least 10.04 or earlier, maybe even Ubuntu 9.10 if my memory serves me.

[sabby]

I'm not 100% sure, but I think the r300 Gallium3D driver has been default in Ubuntu releases for a while now.

Perhaps, I'm sorry I was thinking of the next LTS. I saw that 11.10 went out with mesa 7.11 and with the next LTS coming up I thought they might decide to keep 7.11 for it, in that case I would have liked at least r300c to be in dri experimental with the nouveau driver so people can switch easily without having to rebuild mesa. In addition, the debian config files currently in 7.11 don't allow easily to rebuild with r300c being the default with changing the rules/configure.ac, I doubt many people will bother with it if they run into problems. I can't see any disadvantage to put r300c in dri experimental at least for the 7.11 branch, it might not be worth the time however if the next LTS goes out with mesa > 7.11. I can't say much about Gallium3D stability in general as I didn't have time to do much testing, it could well be something specific to that Mesa release.

[sabby]

Yeah, R300g has been default in Ubuntu since at least 10.04 or earlier, maybe even Ubuntu 9.10 if my memory serves me.

Sorry, I thought I saw classic mesa in the glxinfo string of the vanilla install of that 10.04 system and no longer have access. I guess it won't be a shock to anybody in the next LTS if 10.04 was already like that...

[marek]

Yeah, R300g has been default in Ubuntu since at least 10.04 or earlier, maybe even Ubuntu 9.10 if my memory serves me.

It had been available in the PPA for a long time, but I think it was officially included as late as in 10.10 or 11.04.

[Michael]

It had been available in the PPA for a long time, but I think it was officially included as late as in 10.10 or 11.04.

Yeah I think it was 10.10 then, had my years mixed up :P

[ChrisXY]

For example, I cannot run nexuiz on that setup with the Gallium3D driver but can with classic mesa. In addition, google disabled acceleration in chrome 11 because of crashes in ati linux

http://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=76428

and with classic mesa I can run webgl acceleration and accelerated 2D canvas, however I cannot with Gallium3D. In general, my opinion is that on the stack above Gallium3D doesn't feel as stable as classic mesa.

You might want to try mesa git. It's no more unstable than the stable versions in my experience.