AMD Catalyst 8.4 Linux Driver

[bridgman]

I thought for sure I saw a post from bridgman in another thread about DRI2 stuff coming in 8.4... or at least there were hints in his post that led me to believe such a thing. Oh well... forward looking to 8.5. Keep up the diligent work AMD!

I definitely posted about DRI2 and provided some links but (hopefully ) sure didn't say anything about specific plans for adding it to the open or proprietary drivers. DRI2 is brand new and really exists only as a prototype today, albeit a prototype which is running in the master code to stay current.

Kristian Hogsberg just finished (~45 minutes ago) a presentation on DRI2 at XDC. He gave a nice talk and demo, showing video and glxgears running on a spinning cube, which looked great and ran for at least a minute before the screen turned grey and froze.

It seems like the API is starting to stabilize and nothing was thrown during Kristian's talk, so things are looking good.

[Vighy]

I just want to say that the new driver is nearly perfect with ubuntu hardy and ati mobility x1800. Suspend and Hibernation is working. The performance is great with compiz fusion. No slow scrolling anymore. For now i only use metacity composite manager without compiz fusion. I can play games with high fps and no problems with video too. No crash anymore.

If i want use compiz, i just turn desktop effects on. The only bug is still flickering with xv video on my machine.

if i'm not wrong... you should use textured video with such gpu... but look in the catalyst 8.3 thread, when bridgman spoke about it if you want to be sure.

[gfxdrone]

bridgman, looking good. We're able to resume direct ATI fglrx install with 8-4 in our installer scripts, no hacks, using Debian Sid create deb then install it, installer option. Since no hacks to run installer was my core requirement, that requirement is met, so no reason to not again offer current fglrx direct from ATI instead of via Debian sid packages.

Initial user reports positive. Hopefully we won't lose fglrx with 2.6.25, we'll see how that goes.

[bit7]

if i'm not wrong... you should use textured video with such gpu... but look in the catalyst 8.3 thread, when bridgman spoke about it if you want to be sure.

I have already Option "TexturedVideo" "on". It doesn't help anyway. I guess maybe it's a compiz bug or ati doesn't fix this flickering on x1800 gpu.

If anyone have compiz (ubuntu hardy) without flickering and xv on ati x1800, please let me know the settings.

But for now i don't really need compiz as default desktop effects. Metacity with composite looks great.

This version is much stable than the versions before.

[SledgeHammer_999]

For users having this problem:

dpkg-divert: `diversion of /usr/X11R6/lib32/libGL.so.1 to /usr/X11R6/lib32/fglrx/libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa by xorg-driver-fglrx' clashes with `diversion of /usr/X11R6/lib32/libGL.so.1.2 to /usr/X11R6/lib32/fglrx/libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa by xorg-driver-fglrx'

This is what you have to do:

I had to modify driver.preinst and driver.postrm and fix those dpkg-diverts. For you, they should be under packages/Ubuntu/dists/gutsy. Find the lines where there is a divertion from libGL.so.1 to libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa (should be around line 71 and 74 for driver.preinst and 28, 32 for driver.postrm) and modify it to libGL.so.1.xlibmesa then rebuild the packages.

Thanks c0un7d0wn


The New driver experience:
I am updating from 8.1 and I like it very very much. I love the work done on the video playback. No blockiness and no tearing and correct colors and no ghosting(on some videos with the previous drivers). Thank you very much.

The packaging scripts:
Up until 8.1 worked perfectly. For newer versions you should take into account that people are updating from older ones, so you need to do some clean up work before the 'real' installation.

Thank you.

EDIT: With this fix compiz doesn't work for me. I don't really care since I have correct video playback.

[cornelius]

Suspend still doesn't work with Compiz (leaves the screen dark with a blinking cursor) on this Mobility Radeon X300 (Dell Inspiron 6000). It's been many months now. That's really all I expect from AMD in the short term, and transition to DRI2 in the long term.

[fred]

Compiz + games doesn't work well. If you haven't already try without it. I don't know how exactly to do it with distros, but I wouldn't consider playing games with compiz running.

I didn't test the gaming part with compiz.

[Netsnipe]

It looks like the package maintainer did a copy and paste but forgot to change the filename for the new line. So the Debian package is trying to divert two different files into same place. Here's how to patch it, remember to substitute Ubuntu/gutsy with whatever version that you're using.

$ ./ati-driver-installer-8-4-x86.x86_64.run --extract ati-driver
$ cd ati-driver

Edit

packages/Ubuntu/dists/gutsy/driver.preinst

Look for the these two lines

dpkg-divert --add --rename --package $PKGNAME --divert /usr/X11R6/lib32/fglrx/libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa /usr/X11R6/lib32/libGL.so.1 > /dev/null

and

dpkg-divert --add --rename --package $PKGNAME --divert /usr/lib32/fglrx/libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa /usr/lib32/libGL.so.1 > /dev/null

and change libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa to libGL.so.1.xlibmesa

Then run

$ ./ati-packager-wrapper.sh Ubuntu/gutsy

and it'll build the .deb packages as usual in the parent directory. It's also safe to delete the ati-driver directory after you're done. Thank heavens I used to maintain packages for Debian otherwise I'd never have figured out how to do all of this.

[allartk]

I have still this problem:

http://www.phoronix.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8402

with 8.4 Also on a clean install of ubuntu hardy heron.

Disabling atieventsd solves the cpu peaks/short moments of freeze, but I'm still wondering what those messages mean and if anyone else has them (with or without the cpu peaks).

[hobbes]

It looks like the package maintainer did a copy and paste but forgot to change the filename for the new line. So the Debian package is trying to divert two different files into same place. Here's how to patch it, remember to substitute Ubuntu/gutsy with whatever version that you're using.

$ ./ati-driver-installer-8-4-x86.x86_64.run --extract ati-driver
$ cd ati-driver

Edit

packages/Ubuntu/dists/gutsy/driver.preinst

Look for the these two lines

dpkg-divert --add --rename --package $PKGNAME --divert /usr/X11R6/lib32/fglrx/libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa /usr/X11R6/lib32/libGL.so.1 > /dev/null

and

dpkg-divert --add --rename --package $PKGNAME --divert /usr/lib32/fglrx/libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa /usr/lib32/libGL.so.1 > /dev/null

and change libGL.so.1.2.xlibmesa to libGL.so.1.xlibmesa

Then run

$ ./ati-packager-wrapper.sh --buildpkg Ubuntu/gutsy

and it'll build the .deb packages as usual in the parent directory. It's also safe to delete the ati-driver directory after you're done. Thank heavens I used to maintain packages for Debian otherwise I'd never have figured out how to do all of this.

I followed these steps and it doesn't work for me.

@Ubuntu-Gutsy:~/8.4/ati-driver$ sudo bash ati-packager-wrapper.sh --buildpkg Ubuntu/gutsy
ati-packager-wrapper.sh: line 18: .: argumento de nome de arquivo obrigat?rio
.: usage: . filename [arguments]
ati-packager-wrapper.sh: line 19: .: argumento de nome de arquivo obrigat?rio
.: usage: . filename [arguments]
ati-packager-wrapper.sh: line 26: ./packages/--buildpkg/ati-packager.sh: Arquivo ou diret?rio inexistente


Any idea?