Updated and Optimized Ubuntu Free Graphics Drivers

[jsa1983]

It did not work. KDE 4.11 still could not load the libraries. So I had to revert to KDE 4.10. Even though, I think some of Rico's ppa packages may have been updated and broken something (for example, vt's not working properly) and that may have accounted for some of the problem. So probably setting an additional ppa with wayland 1.2 + mesa packages could be a good way to isolate this problem and see if it works OK (of course, only if you have time to do it!). I'll stick to KDE 4.10 until the thing's worked out.

Regards

[Dukenukemx]

How do I get the R600 SB optimizations working? I'm running Mint 15 btw.

[oibaf]

@Dukenukemx: it will be default soon.

@jsa1983 (and everyone with the KDE-wayland problem): tried fixing wayland installation problem in my test PPA, but it still doesn't work. I'd suggest subscribing or commenting on upgrade to wayland 1.2 bug report and mesa wayland bug report so that eventually 1.2.0 can be in Ubuntu and I can backport an official and hopefully working version or mesa can be fixed with older wayland.

@pandev92: I think it get fixed in current git, update mesa package from the PPA.

@mmstick: corruption on radeonsi should be fixed also.

[jsa1983]

How do I get the R600 SB optimizations working? I'm running Mint 15 btw.

I think you need at least Mesa 9.2. You can check your current version by opening a terminal and typing glxinfo. There you should get a few lines which read more or less like this:

OpenGL vendor string: X.Org
OpenGL renderer string: Gallium 0.4 on AMD RV710
OpenGL version string: 3.0 Mesa 9.3.0-devel (git-7568a89 raring-oibaf-ppa)"

There you can see your mesa version. If it is lower than 9.2 then you will need to install a newer version (e.g. by adding oibaf's ppa).

If your mesa version is higher or equal to 9.2, then you can pass the following argument before the name of the app:

R600_DEBUG=sb

For example, if you want to launch steam with that, open a terminal and type: R600_DEBUG=sb steam

If everything works ok, you can make that argument permanent by adding it to your ~/.profile file or for example, for KDE users, to a file with execution permission under ~/.kde/env/ (in my case, for example, r600g_optimize.sh).

I hope this helps.

Regards

[Dukenukemx]

Thanks jsa1983, I typed "glxinfo | grep -i opengl" and got this. So I'm good for now. I wanna do some tests, especially when the DX9 state tracker is ever released.

OpenGL vendor string: X.Org
OpenGL renderer string: Gallium 0.4 on AMD REDWOOD
OpenGL version string: 3.0 Mesa 9.3.0-devel (git-86751cb raring-oibaf-ppa)
OpenGL shading language version string: 1.30

[jsa1983]

Thanks jsa1983, I typed "glxinfo | grep -i opengl" and got this. So I'm good for now. I wanna do some tests, especially when the DX9 state tracker is ever released.

OpenGL vendor string: X.Org
OpenGL renderer string: Gallium 0.4 on AMD REDWOOD
OpenGL version string: 3.0 Mesa 9.3.0-devel (git-86751cb raring-oibaf-ppa)
OpenGL shading language version string: 1.30

Then you're good to go. I have tried that sb optimization with a Radeon HD 4570 (as well as the llvm backend) and I must say that I am impressed. It yields very noticeable improvements. Check it yourself.

Regards

[callegar]

How about a ppa with kde-workspace compiled with support for wayland switched off?

All this is very weird...

How can kwin in kde 4.11 work with nvidia legacy or catalyst graphics that have no wayland? Does it dynamically link in the "wrong" libwayland from mesa mixing it with the legacy opengl from a non-mesa stack and live happy with it since it does not need libwayland anyway (when configured for the opengl backend?)...

All this seems wrong...

Until it is sorted (and given that the wayland support in kwin is only very preliminary) wouldn't it make sense to provide a build of kde-workspace with wayland fully disabled?

[oibaf]

Mesa is confirmed to require wayland 1.2 and merged my patch.

The best way to properly address this is to backport wayland 1.2 in the PPA, once the installation conflict of ricotz wayland package is fixed (or a proper package get committed to Ubuntu saucy). But I have no time to do this, so if someone contribute a fixed package I can integrate it in my PPA and reenable wayland-egl.

[pandev92]

kde for me doesn't run with this ppa( kde 4.11), any solution ?

non me funziona xD, se po fa qualcosa o no se po fa? ehehe ciao!

[oibaf]

Try again this PPA, hopefully the wayland problem should be fixed. Let me know if there are problems (e.g. error installing packages): https://launchpad.net/~oibaf/+archive/test/