[SOLVED] Replacing one kernel with the same from another distro possible?

LinWinux · 01-21-2024, 06:04 AM

The solution is in my last post further down. I should have probably titled this thread differently. It's not just about swapping out one 6.5 kernel for another slightly different 6.5 kernel, but actually and more importantly about getting Intel Iris XE Graphics working on an MX Linux 23 (and possibly some other distros) machine correctly.

Hi everyone.
My wife and I both received new mini computers for Christmas, first time that we got new machines in the past 12 to 15 years. We utilize pretty much identical software, the only differences being in the Linux distro that we use. Hers is Linux mint version 21.3 while mine is a modified MX Linux version 23. Both of us utilize XFCE for our desktops. The minis from MinisForum have pretty new hardware processors and graphics, so for everything to work properly kernel 6.6 was installed on both machines.

For the mini with Linux Mint the kernel was installed directly through the mint repositories.
For the MX Linux mini the kernel was installed through the MX Linux package manager.

After installing kernel 6.6 on the mini for my wife, everything worked absolutely flawless and the performance improvement was immediately evident after the first reboot. In the display settings all of the available resolutions are listed and the hz usage of the display is also properly listed.
But on the MX Linux machine with Kernel 6.6 AHS (Advanced Hardware Support) there appeared to be no such improvement and the display settings show only one possible resolution with a blank field for the hz display.
Yet both kernels are listed as 6.6 ....

My question is this: Can I revert back to an older kernel on my machine (of course) followed by removing kernel 6.6 AHS ... followed by then installing the kernel 6.6 from Linux mint on my MX Linux? Her 6.6 kernel on Mint appears to work as desired. Is it possible to swap those kernels safely? (initially I installed 6.5 on both machines, which still had issues with the installed wifi modules).

When all is said and done, I would like for the MX Linux updates to continue working as before, just not with anything MX Linux kernel related.
Thanks.

hazel · 01-21-2024, 06:21 AM

Yes, you can always have alternative kernels. In fact many distros, when they "upgrade" a kernel actually install the new kernel and add it to the main GRUB menu, while the old kernel goes into a submenu. That ensures that if a new kernel doesn't work on your hardware, you can still boot the old one.

Remember though that if you install an alternative kernel, you will need to install its modules too.

LinWinux · 01-21-2024, 06:32 AM

Thanks. My concern has to do with me never realizing that distributed kernel versions with the same number were actually not identical. I was really surprised to see the difference in both machines with identical hardware and same XFCE desktops. Yet still a difference in performance with what I thought to be "identical" version 6.6 kernels.

LinWinux · 01-21-2024, 08:36 AM

Hmmm, I consider this to be pretty strange. Apparently Linux Mint developers must tweak their own kernels because I followed the instructions on this page for the latest stored / made available kernels by zabbly ...
https://www.linuxcapable.com/how-to-...-debian-linux/

.... only to find out after the installation & reboot that absolutely nothing has changed on my system. Utilizing the command: uname -r
displays the currently running kernel which indeed happens to be version 6.6.11-zabbly+
Display settings are the same as before. Well, that's a bummer.

LinWinux · 01-22-2024, 10:23 AM

From everything that I could find as far as documentation goes, kernel 6.5 is the minimum requirement if you wish to take advantage of all that Intel Iris XE graphics has to offer. However, installing the MX Linux (MX23) 6.5 AHS Kernel did not do the trick. Absolutely nothing changed on the system even though the kernel was indeed installed. Somehow many of the kernel changes simply didn't take. At this point I'm going to assume that MX Linux receives their kernel information from zabbly as well. I have to assume this because after swapping out the kernels and installing kernel 6.6.11 zabbly+ there still was no noticeable change.

I was able to find the fix on this intel page:
https://dgpu-docs.intel.com/driver/installation.html

It's for the Ubuntu base but it works just as well for MX Linux and probably many other Linux distros as well. Be careful reading through this information as some of it is mildly confusing. I stopped after the configuration steps which read:
1.1.3.3. Configuring Render Group Membership

After completing that, followed by adding sudo apt update I received notification that 20 updates were available.

Code:

  Package upgrades are being calculated…
  The following packages will be updated (Upgrade):
     libegl-mesa0 (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     libegl1-mesa (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     libgbm1 (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     libgl1-mesa-dri (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     libgl1-mesa-glx (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     libglapi-mesa (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     libglx-mesa0 (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     libigdgmm12 (22.3.3+ds1-1 => 22.3.12-742~22.04)
     libmfx1 (22.5.4-1 => 23.2.2-775~22.04)
     libva-drm2 (2.18.0-1~mx23ahs => 2.20.0.2-75~u22.04)
     libva-wayland2 (2.18.0-1~mx23ahs => 2.20.0.2-75~u22.04)
     libva-x11-2 (2.18.0-1~mx23ahs => 2.20.0.2-75~u22.04)
     libva2 (2.18.0-1~mx23ahs => 2.20.0.2-75~u22.04)
     libvpl2 (2023.1.1-1 => 2023.3.1.0-775~22.04)
     libxatracker2 (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     mesa-va-drivers (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     mesa-vdpau-drivers (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     mesa-vulkan-drivers (23.1.2-1~mx23ahs => 24.0.0.20231114.1-2088~22.04)
     va-driver-all (2.18.0-1~mx23ahs => 2.20.0.2-75~u22.04)
     vainfo (2.12.0+ds1-1 => 2.20.0.2-1~u22.04)
  20 updated, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not updated.
  27,4 MB of archives need to be downloaded.
  After this update 13,2 MB space will be freed up.

After the update I used this command to check if the graphic drivers were recognized correctly:

Code:

sudo lspci -k | grep -EA3 'VGA|3D|Display'

This produced:

Code:

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Raptor Lake-P [Iris Xe Graphics] (rev 04)
	DeviceName: Onboard - Video
	Kernel driver in use: i915
	Kernel modules: i915

When I used that command before following these steps I merely received those last two lines with i915 and not the actual recognition of the Intel Raptor Lake-P Iris XE Graphics. So to me this was proof that neither the MX Linux Kernel 6.5 AHS nor the later installed 6.6 zabbly kernel were working correctly. Now I went and checked the display settings. Voila, everything was finally there just like on my wifes Mint machine. All of the resolutions, the hz output, etc. After another reboot I could immediately notice a performance improvement.

There was one small problem though which I didn't notice until awhile later. Apparently Google-Chrome Browser / Chromium do not like having hardware acceleration enabled without causing some screen tearing. The screen tearing corrects itself after a couple of seconds but it does keep on repeating on every existing tab. As soon as hardware acceleration was disabled, everything was fine. The screen tearing did not appear in Firefox or Vivaldi. I did not check to see if it had an effect on Brave or Opera.

Opening MX Tools / MX Tweak I left everything as I had it before. Compositer tab was left with vblank = xpresent and compositor = xfwm

Sorry about all of the text. I like to explain things but some people don't like so much reading ....
Peace.