Multi-Display ATI HD

[andybleaden]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

Well I will give that a try over the weekend and see what happens .....it mt sounds like a good idea. To be honest as I have been testing jaunty since alpha 3-4 ish I have got used to backing up and reinstalling
I must say though that it is strange that the flicker now is on boot only when the k desktop loads and you get the gap between the second and third items on the splash screen ...then nothing....mind you x does seem to crash a little more ofetn when I open xorg.conf etc...strange really...must admit I am a little lost with all of this...new area to sort and it has been slow...under hardy envy sorted all of this for me before but I am enjoying learning

[sithlord48]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

this is my first ati card... i only built this machine a few months ago, so i am still learning how to config my xorg for ati as well..

[andybleaden]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

well I have had lots of experience but all of it has gone wrong..perhaps I could give you a how not to!

Have not had the time I thought I would to change my xorg file yet but will try tomorrow as I am working at home in the morning.

Have you tried doing any of the desktop effect yet ( not compiz just the ones on kde like the flip switch etc...sends my dell pc with ati 2400 into a nose dive everytime...and as for compiz....fuhgeddit!

[sithlord48]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

kwins effects work just fine, but i use compiz instead (along w/ emerald for my borders).
i do sometimes get black sections of my screen on some text areas now and again, just giving the affected window focus will remove the black area. its a slight annoyance that i have only seen just in the past few days start to happen on my desktop, and not my nvidia based laptop, that has me thinking its the ati driver.

here is a quick sum up of my video prformance / issues, i installed vice city w/ wine and it runs very nice with my current config,all settings are also maxed out in the game, and 3d settings in CCC are all maxed. but i can't get a native program (muppen64) to draw any video what so ever (draws output window, waits a min or two then the window explodes in to tiny parts cause the program crashed), but i can run in wine the win32 version (project64) and it works fine. or plug my n64 in to my capture card and watch it with tvtime w/ no problems (unless a notification is drawn on the screen then it slows down for a few seconds). i just can quite get why some things work perfectly and others don't (i can run muppen64 just fine on my laptop w/ nvidia card)
here are my results w/ glx gears (vsync is set in catalyst control center 3d->more settings->wait for refesh)
[code=running w/ vsync On]
chris@void:~$ glxgears
Running synchronized to the vertical refresh. The framerate should be
approximately 1/4613577 the monitor refresh rate.
290 frames in 5.1 seconds = 57.361 FPS
292 frames in 5.1 seconds = 57.595 FPS
304 frames in 5.0 seconds = 60.757 FPS
299 frames in 5.1 seconds = 58.998 FPS
303 frames in 5.1 seconds = 59.881 FPS
300 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.981 FPS
[/code]
[code=running w/ vsync off]
chris@void:~$ glxgears
Running synchronized to the vertical refresh. The framerate should be
approximately 1/4623190 the monitor refresh rate.
10011 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2001.876 FPS
9760 frames in 5.0 seconds = 1951.962 FPS
11080 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2215.959 FPS
11734 frames in 5.0 seconds = 2345.217 FPS
9807 frames in 5.0 seconds = 1961.066 FPS
7831 frames in 5.0 seconds = 1566.188 FPS
[/code]there is no visual difference between running w/ vsync on or off in glxgears, they both look just as good. Apparently the vertical refresh is always on sync.

[andybleaden]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

By v sync did you mean vertical refresh under 3d settings more then vertical refresh...mine is now set to max and when I ran glxgears I got this :

andy@andys-desktop:~$ glxgears
Running synchronized to the vertical refresh. The framerate should be
approximately 1/14785 the monitor refresh rate.
294 frames in 5.0 seconds = 58.633 FPS
300 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.905 FPS
300 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.856 FPS
298 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.505 FPS
299 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.705 FPS
300 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.856 FPS
300 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.904 FPS
299 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.663 FPS
XIO: fatal IO error 11 (Resource temporarily unavailable) on X server ":0.0"
after 114 requests (113 known processed) with 0 events remaining.


and with the setting as off or low

andy@andys-desktop:~$ glxgears
Running synchronized to the vertical refresh. The framerate should be
approximately 1/14785 the monitor refresh rate.
294 frames in 5.0 seconds = 58.633 FPS
300 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.905 FPS
300 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.856 FPS
298 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.505 FPS
299 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.705 FPS
300 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.856 FPS
300 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.904 FPS
299 frames in 5.0 seconds = 59.663 FPS
XIO: fatal IO error 11 (Resource temporarily unavailable) on X server ":0.0"
after 114 requests (113 known processed) with 0 events remaining.

Hmm

Took me twenty mins to reset my pc last night after trying kwin desktop effects...perhaps I am doing something wrong...is there a konsole or x log that could show this?

[andybleaden]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

oh gawd..had a fiddle with kwin desktop effects...crazy crashing going on...anyway turned them off and had a look at the xorg log...appears that this is here:

See paste bin file ( so as not to clog this site up )

http://pastebin.com/m39d4ee99


look at all them errors??

and xorg conf

http://pastebin.com/m6f3e3e6a


fglrx info:

andy@andys-desktop:~$ fglrxinfo
display: :0.0 screen: 0
OpenGL vendor string: ATI Technologies Inc.
OpenGL renderer string: ATI Radeon HD 2400 PRO
OpenGL version string: 2.1.8575

[andybleaden]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

aha ...finally got compiz working which I have missed ( do not ask why) but now it is working...I am 85-90 % happy with the fglrx driver

So maybe things are looking up!...yippee cubes and switching and fancy graphics return with 3d!

[sithlord48]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

well andy, i don't really know much about kwin (but the 4.3 version is coming along nicely, was using it when i first "upgraded to the beta)
happy to see you have compiz working, and i can understand missing compiz i use a lot of its features, the cube i find to be the most usefull (i admin a few machies at work and remote desktop on each cube face for ez admin access) desktop zoom is so very usefull, here is why i don't use kwin, it lacks the ability to set its commands w/ mouse events, when that is working then i will prolly switch to kwin full time.

if i had to guess your log should be in either your .kde dir or /etc/logs/
but again i don't really know its just a guess.

[fallen00sniper]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

your in luck i have a sapphire hd 4670 512mb 128-bit gddr4 card, i love it and it performs well with kubuntu 9.04 and i have the answer for your problem

the flickering at login is caused by, RandR 1.2 which is packaged with kubuntu, there is a direct conflict with that utility and the ati proprietary driver... now you may say to yourself 'so what who cares my video works thank god!' but that little flicker can become a nightmare of lag and system bog down, i googled for a week before i found this simple solution.

disable RandR that easy... you will get dual head working and 3d effects or should, only issue i have is with 3d effects enabled only for transparent panels = fullscreen video playback lags, turn them off and i am good to go.

now follow this instructions very very carefully.

if you do not have the proprietary driver installed open the kmenu > system > hardware devices

1.
enable the ati proprietary driver, when it is finished reboot and log in.

2.
reboot again, while at the boot loader choose recovery.

3.
once recovery loads arrow down key until root is selected, press return or enter.

4.
type in the console...

sudo nano /etc/ati/amdpcsdb

this will open a configuration file of some sort.

5.
find this exact string AMD/PCSROOT/SYSTEM/DDX

6.
after that exact string start a new line and type this in exactly as i show you.

EnableRandR12=SFALSE

7.
press ctrl+o, press enter, press ctrl+x

optional
8.
while still in the console type

sudo aticonfig --initial

once that is done

9.
type

reboot

log in to the desktop, enjoy no more flicker while logging in, dual head xinerama, and 3d effects.

now if you don't like being in 2048x768 like i am currently stuck in after reformatting, you can still use the kRandRtray to make some adjustments, but after you do make the adjustments open aticccle and see if you can save them there, it worked for me on the last install to get one monitor 1024x768 and my main monitor 1280x1024 with xinerama, but that was a stroke of luck.

good luck!

~Fallen

[andybleaden]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

Hey Wow that looks interesting. I will give it a whirl and get back to you as soon as I can with any progress with this. I seemed to get nice enough 3d with compiz now but there is still log in flicker and a few probs on full screen video playback. Not sure if r and r is disabled or not at the mo. I know when I was thinking of upgrading from 8.04 to 8.10 there was an issue with kde 4 and it seemed to be linked to my graphics card and r and r but not sure if that was disabled when I first installed 9.04 ...hmmm...interesting...will get back to you.

[fallen00sniper]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

well how well did it work out on the older ati card?
i still haven't gotten video playback with dragon player to work well with 3d effects enabled

my stats v-sync off :P

x@kubuntu:~$ glxgears
Running synchronized to the vertical refresh. The framerate should be
approximately 1/40942 the monitor refresh rate.
30384 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6076.637 FPS
32515 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6502.878 FPS
32620 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6523.949 FPS
32518 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6503.598 FPS
32647 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6529.331 FPS
32470 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6493.958 FPS
31728 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6345.553 FPS
32494 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6498.764 FPS
32582 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6516.288 FPS
32543 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6508.431 FPS
32526 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6505.199 FPS
32465 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6492.905 FPS
32381 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6475.998 FPS
^C

x@kubuntu:~$ fglrxinfo
display: :0.0 screen: 0
OpenGL vendor string: ATI Technologies Inc.
OpenGL renderer string: ATI Radeon HD 4670
OpenGL version string: 2.1.8575

[andybleaden]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

Well folllowed your advice about the disabling randr with a few exceptions as I did it in a normal session without running ati config afterwards and the flicker has all but gone from the start up. it only flickers now when I run ati catalyst which is a little weird but other than that it works just fine so thanks

[fallen00sniper]

Re: Multi-Display ATI HD

i don't know how much of a good idea it was to do that as a normal user, but if it worked it worked