slow graphics with Packard Bell Dot M-A RS690M / Radeon X1200

m00ny · 09-20-2014, 10:46 AM

Hi there,

is there anybody who managed to get smooth and fast graphics, especially on video playback with the netbook mentioned in the topic? I'm using the open source driver.

I once got a binary driver to work, that was faster, but then I couldn't set up the untypical resolution of the netbook screen. I've tried to set new resolutions in X11-config files, but they didn't work.

RockDoctor · 09-21-2014, 09:42 AM

Have you tried inserting an appropriate modeline into /etc/X11/xorg.conf (or creating a file in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d)? I get my modeline info from gtf, as shown below):

Code:

~$ gtf 1680 1050 60

  # 1680x1050 @ 60.00 Hz (GTF) hsync: 65.22 kHz; pclk: 147.14 MHz
  Modeline "1680x1050_60.00"  147.14  1680 1784 1968 2256  1050 1051 1054 1087  -HSync +Vsync

~$

m00ny · 09-21-2014, 10:10 AM

Thanks for your reply, RockDoctor. Do you have the same netbook? I'll try the modeline as a file in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d. But which driver / kernel module are you using? Is your movie playback allright, without almost 100% cpu usage?

RockDoctor · 09-22-2014, 12:41 PM

I've got a Dell Inspiron 1011 and an Acer Aspire One ZG5. Both have Intel graphics. The Dell is currently running Linux Mint 16 with LXDE; the Acer boots Fedora 20. Playing video on either netbook kicks cpu usage up to 100%. I use the Dell as a webserver for files I want to access when I'm not at home; the Acer I use to dump photos from my camera's SD card while on the road.

business_kid · 09-26-2014, 04:04 AM

I have something with the RS690M. A HP 6715S

Full cpu usage indicates software rendering is going on. Post the output of
glxinfo |grep OpenGL
glxinfo |grep render
The GPU is crap - let's get that out in the open, so 'good graphics' by modern standards is not possible.

I ended up installing llvm & recompiling mesa --with-llvm. The RS690M has no shader worthy of the name, and benefits from this, I am told; it dates from 2007 or so. I'm on 1280x800 and a movie on fullscreen keeps the lips in synch with the speech - just about. A quick talker with a big mouth gives it trouble. We have progressed to the point where direct rendering is faster than software rendering, but it took years. My box is running an oldish distro, Slackware-13.37. I have mesa-8.0.4 & xf86-video-ati-6.14.4

Best results come with a recent libdrm, libpixman, xorg-server, mesa, & ati drivers.