NOTE: Ubuntu 8.10 already have all these updated drivers. Compiz is also supported (up to R500).
This is a quick guide on installing latest versions of open source radeon drivers for Ubuntu 8.04.
0 - Introduction and status
1 - Installing latest 2D ati and radeonhd drivers
2 - Installing latest drm modules
3 - Upgrading to latest libdrm and mesa packages
4 - Customize your "Device" section of /etc/X11/xorg.conf
5 - Reboot
6 - Test
7 - For more info:
8 - Suggestions welcomed
- if you have some problem after upgrading to 8.10, make sure to remove all packages installed from the PPAs while in Ubuntu 8.04 with dpkg (ignoring eventual dependencies) and, before rebooting, reinstall all these packages from 8.10 official repositories with apt-get;
- if compiz still isn't working, make sure you have compiz and compiz-gnome packages installed.
WARNING: the following guide is no longer actively supported. Please upgrade to Ubuntu 8.10 if you need updated radeon drivers.
This is a quick guide on installing latest versions of open source radeon drivers for Ubuntu 8.04.
0 - Introduction and status
- This guide uses prebuilt - by the Ubuntu community - packages for mesa, libdrm, xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd, xserver-xorg-video-ati, so that they can be easily replaced with original ones if you want to revert this.
- DRM modules are built and installed from sources using a script. Old ones are backupped with .orig extension.
- Keep in mind that this is experimental code. If you fear to break something don't try it. Anyway, it works well for many users. Ideally, you should first try these packages on the LiveCD, following HowTo test newest radeon/radeonhd/mesa from a live CD guide.
- Driver packages status:
- ati (radeon):
- all Radeon card should be supported
- fast 2D with Option "AccelMethod" "EXA" in xorg.conf (require DRM module)
- 3D support
- basic scalers (for full screen games in not native resolution) support
- textured video Xv support with bicubic filtering
- DynamicClocks (but not Powerplay) power saving support
- radeonhd:
- all Radeon card from Radeon X1xxx (R500) and later should be supported
- fast 2D with Option "AccelMethod" "ShadowFB" in xorg.conf (XAA and EXA are slower; DRM module not required)
- experimental, disabled by default 3D support
- configurable scalers (for full screen games in not native resolution) support
- Xv not yet supported
- power savings not yet supported
- ati (radeon):
- 3D packages status:
- all Radeon card <R600 (so, not Radeon HD 2XXX) should be supported.
- See RadeonProgram WikiPage for the status of many games with current code.
- AIGLX (and therefore Compiz) is not supported when using mesa 7.1 packages unless you also upgrade your xserver (for example using packages at PPA for xorg crack pushers: enable the repository and do a sudo apt-get dist-upgrade - WARNING: this is untested and may break your system, see also comment 20 and laters)
- Feature Matrix for Radeons Wiki Page
- Supported Program List for Radeons Wiki Page
1 - Installing latest 2D ati and radeonhd drivers
- Add
Code:deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/tormodvolden/ubuntu hardy main
- In a shell (one or both of the followings, depending on your desired driver):
Code:sudo apt-get install xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-ati sudo apt-get install xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
- Disable
Code:deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/tormodvolden/ubuntu hardy main
2 - Installing latest drm modules
- Add
Code:deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/xorg-edgers/ubuntu hardy main
- In a shell:
Code:apt-get source libdrm2
- Disable
Code:deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/xorg-edgers/ubuntu hardy main
- Download easy-drm-modules-installer from here and put it in the same directory of the libdrm2 sources:
http://bazaar.launchpad.net/~xorg-ed...kg-tools/files - In a shell:
Code:chmod +x easy-drm-modules-installer ./easy-drm-modules-installer radeon
Code:/lib/modules/`uname -r`/kernel/drivers/char/drm
- Note that after every kernel upgrade and its reboot you should redo this step.
3 - Upgrading to latest libdrm and mesa packages
- Remember that after installing the following mesa 7.1 packages AIGLX (and therefore Compiz) will not work (obliviously this is not a problem on R500 where Compiz never worked before), unless you also upgrade your xserver. If you have already working 3D and Compiz or you have a RS480 or RS690 with 3D or Compiz broken try first the updated mesa 7.0 packages at PPA for Andrius Štikonas that should also work with AIGLX/Compiz.
- Add
Code:deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/xorg-edgers/ubuntu hardy main
- In a shell:
Code:sudo apt-get install libdrm2 sudo apt-get install libgl1-mesa-dri libgl1-mesa-glx libglu1-mesa mesa-utils
- Disable
Code:deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/xorg-edgers/ubuntu hardy main
4 - Customize your "Device" section of /etc/X11/xorg.conf
- ati (radeon) driver fully supports 3D and EXA acceleration:
Code:Section "Device" Identifier "Configured Video Device" Driver "ati" Option "AccelMethod" "EXA" EndSection
- if you want to use radeonhd driver (note that in radeonhd XAA and EXA are a lot slower than ShadowFB AccelMethod):
Code:Section "Device" Identifier "Configured Video Device" Driver "radeonhd" Option "AccelMethod" "ShadowFB" # Un-comment the following to enable experimental 3D support: #Option "DRI" EndSection
5 - Reboot
6 - Test
- You can test 2D performance with gtkperf (download and install the "Debian i386" packages if you are on x86)
- If you installed also 3D packages, to make sure you really are using 3D try running glxgears. This is what I get:
Code:glxgears 9787 frames in 5.0 seconds = 1957.329 FPS 9890 frames in 5.0 seconds = 1977.899 FPS
- Testing openarena:
Install it from Ubuntu repositories:
Code:sudo apt-get install openarena
Code:mkdir -p $HOME/.openarena/baseoa/demos cd $HOME/.openarena/baseoa/ wget http://people.freedesktop.org/~anholt/benchmarking/anholt.cfg cd demos/ wget http://people.freedesktop.org/~anholt/benchmarking/anholt.dm_68
Code:openarena +exec anholt 2>&1 | egrep -e '[0-9]+ frames'
Code:840 frames 13.6 seconds 61.9 fps 7.0/16.2/31.0/3.6 ms
7 - For more info:
- Ubuntu resources:
- tormod comment on "xorg crack pushers" and "Tormod Volden" repositories usage
- GtkPerf
- Developer's blog:
- TiRDC - The irregular Radeon Development Companion
- ATI R500: Mesa vs. Catalyst Benchmarking (2008-08-29)
8 - Suggestions welcomed
- If you have some useful suggestions post a reply in this thread!
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