AMD Catalyst 9.1 Brings OpenGL 3.0

[mirak63]

is video tearing fixed with xv for hd4850 ?

[RealNC]

No. .

[nbi1]

No. .

Great.

Since it seems to offer no improvement over 8.12 we're probably better off just waiting for 9.2. That's if we haven't dumped ATI for nVidia yet!

[mirak63]

and I am about to buy a nvidia mother board with onboard 9400gt ...

[RealNC]

I expect 9.2 will probably fix Xv with composite, but not tearing. But we can always hope. For now, OpenGL + VSync - Composite is the only option.

[nbi1]

Debian packageing was broken in too many drivers, I had to add workarounds / patches for em in order to install em. Therefore I switched over to use the Ubuntu packageing on Debian. This also prevents the driver from repository updates which use the Debian package name. Now the Ubuntu packageing relies on dkms. Informer dkms was optional, now you have to use it. Therefore I install dkms before and then use the Ubuntu packageing - no big trick behind that. If somebody does not like to use my script but wants to do that manually just fetch latest dkms deb from Ubuntu. m-a prepare could be used before to be sure that the kernel headers and some build tools are installed. I had to fix some issues with Ubuntu packageing too, but basically it works much better than the crappy Debian one. And dkms is nice to have too (which i also use for nvidia now).

So you understand why end users get aggravated by this stuff?

I did btw get 9.1 working with 2.6.28 under lenny!! Woohoo!!

I pretty much cookie-cuttered my successful approach from Intrepid. Along the way I had an epithany. dkms is not needed. Nor is make-kpkg nor a kernel headers package. After extracting the module source simply running `make` in /usr/src/modules/fglrx does the trick. This looks for headers in the source tree corresponding to the currently running kernel. Simply put the built fglrx.ko in the proper directory under /lib/modules and update modules.dep and voila you're done!

Performance wise I'm not seeing any perceptible improvement in 9.1 over 8.12. This jives with what others have been reporting. I guess if someone is happy with 8.12 they could skip 9.1 without missing much.

Bridgman - I'm not as hot as I once was, but I'm still quite upset with ATI over having wasted so much of my time. ATI should have taken the initiative on these package issues and not waited for Ubuntu, Debian, or Kano to sort it out. BTW, you still owe me an answer on the release vs. version number issue.
Thanks.

[GULLI.ver]

I am running Compiz (Ubuntu 8.10) on my
ATI Mobility FireGL V5700 with 512MB VRAM
which is kind of a modified Radeon HD3650M
installed in my IBM/Lenovo W500 Notebook.

So far the driver is doing better than anything before, but:

"Minor" Bugs: (would be considered "major" in NVidia drivers though )
- xv Video is "off", about 200 pixels to low
- flickering in OpenGL Apps (Google Earth, ...)
- two black boxes on top of the screen left and right from center in X-Server when setting a higher resolution VGA VESA mode in /boot/grub/menu.lst (where do these come from?!)
But I see that you are working on that, which gives me hope.

IBM T400/W500 specific bugs:
When BIOS is set to switchable graphics (Hybrid Graphics: ATI/Intel) FGLRX fails to load:
(II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules//libint10.so
(II) Module int10: vendor="X.Org Foundation"
compiled for 1.5.2, module version = 1.0.0
ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 4.1
(EE) fglrx(0): Invalid video BIOS signature!
(EE) fglrx(0): GetBIOSParameter failed
(EE) fglrx(0): PreInitConfig failed
(EE) fglrx(0): PreInit failed
although BusID "PCI:1:0:0" is specified in xorg.conf

"Major" Bugs: (what is really annoying)
- I cannot Log Out! Whenever GDM is trying to return to the Log In console (Log Out, Switch User, Return from Standby, ...) the system halts. I can switch between consoles and X-Server without any problem though. (ANYONE HAD THE SAME PROBLEM / SOLVED IT? )

[mirv]

As is usual for me, the drivers work just fine (at least for everything I use - no compiz for me, and I have compositing disabled) - actually worked for a simple video card upgrade too (radeon x1600 to hd3850). I still can't use amdcccle though (fairly certain that's a gentoo64 bug, but buggered if I know what causes it).
I haven't poked at anything with xv too much yet, will probably do that tonight.

[Kano]

@nbi1

When you don't know what dkms can do you for you then it is not my fault.

[Hephasteus]

Yes i know but but the IGP dont need so many Power compared with my HD 3850.

Their 4550 is a good compromise. Not as powerful as 3850 but it's really light on juice around 20 watts. Once they get a really nice chipset that supports SAS raid and about twice as much graphics power as the 3200 that would make a really nice hybrid. 20 watt add on card, 10 watt raid, 15 watt onboard gpu. Throw in a 45 watt cpu and you got a machine that would eat crysis for lunch on less power than a single 8800gtx.