[SOLVED] Radeon driver instead of vesa_drv.so in Fedora 17

JZL240I-U · 09-06-2012, 08:00 AM

Hi, as you will recognize immediately from the question, I'm new to Fedora.

On my netbook (not the PC, see my signature at the bottom of the post) the vesa driver is loaded according to "Xorg.0.log". It uses a 1024x768 resolution on an unknown display instead of the 1366x768 of the existing display. Thus everything is stretched.

How can I make it use the "radeon" driver? I tried to add software but no "radeon" is offered. Do I need a different repository? If so, which one and how do I add it? How do I switch drivers?

Thanks in advance

.

business_kid · 09-06-2012, 08:17 AM

radeon is in xf86-video-ati. The binary blob is called Catalyst. Kind of obvious, huh? :-).
AMD are kind of

Vesa --> radeon or catalyst is ok. If you need to swap again, be sure to read docs on the fedora site about it. It isn't straightforward.

JZL240I-U · 09-06-2012, 10:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by business_kid

radeon is in xf86-video-ati.The binary blob is called Catalyst...

Funny. There is no xf86-video-ati on my PC but "Xorg.0.log" says

Code:

...
[    16.953] (==) Matched ati as autoconfigured driver 0
[    16.953] (==) Matched vesa as autoconfigured driver 1
[    16.953] (==) Matched modesetting as autoconfigured driver 2
[    16.953] (==) Matched fbdev as autoconfigured driver 3
[    16.953] (==) Assigned the driver to the xf86ConfigLayout
[    16.953] (II) Loading /usr/lib64/xorg/modules/drivers/ati_drv.so
[    16.953]     Module class: X.Org Video Driver
[    16.953]     ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 12.0
[    16.953] (II) Loading /usr/lib64/xorg/modules/drivers/radeon_drv.so
[    16.953]     Module class: X.Org Video Driver
[    16.953]     ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 12.0
[    16.953] (II) Loading /usr/lib64/xorg/modules/drivers/vesa_drv.so
[    16.953]     Module class: X.Org Video Driver
[    16.953]     ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 12.0
[    16.954] (II) Loading /usr/lib64/xorg/modules/drivers/fbdev_drv.so
[    16.954]     ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 12.0
...

Nor does the software installation application find xf86-video-ati

. What now? What repository is it in?

adamk75 · 09-06-2012, 10:53 AM

You clearly have it installed already or Xorg would be unable to load it.

Please show us the full /var/log/Xorg.0.log file so we can see why Xorg is unable to use the radeon driver.

Adam

John VV · 09-06-2012, 10:59 AM

Quote:

16.953] (II) Loading /usr/lib64/xorg/modules/drivers/ati_drv.so
[ 16.953] Module class: X.Org Video Driver
[ 16.953] ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 12.0
[ 16.953] (II) Loading /usr/lib64/xorg/modules/drivers/radeon_drv.so
[ 16.953] Module class: X.Org Video Driver

it already IS installed

the open ATI driver IS a DEFAULT part of fedora

it was and is installed BY DEFAULT

now if you want to switch the MUCH BETTER open driver with the "junk" proprietary binary blob
see the fedora guide pages
"Howto for fglrx / catalyst (Ati driver) "
http://forums.fedoraforum.org/showthread.php?t=155503

JZL240I-U · 09-07-2012, 12:02 PM

@adamk75 I attached Xorg.0.log and a much smaller and older Xorg.1.log. There are also 2 - 9 logs there -- whyever. Just holler if you need them.

@ John_VV No. I want to activate "radeon" (like I have in openSuSE and Ubuntu).

Btw. there is an "xorg-x11-drv-ati-6.14.4..." package installed...

adamk75 · 09-07-2012, 12:49 PM

You are passing the nomodeset option to the kernel, which disables the radeon driver. Is there some reason you added this option?

Adam

JZL240I-U · 09-08-2012, 07:26 AM

No. This is the original setup Fedora 17 created during installation. I don't even know where those kernel options are set. I'm used to GRUB legacy and only now starting to work with GRUB2 *sigh*. Could you name the file where this is handled? I do know that I have to run "grub2-mkconfig" after tinkering with these things, but it is not in /etc/default/grub nor in the files in /etc/grub.d/ that much I remember. On Monday I'll have the netbook back and try my luck.

adamk75 · 09-08-2012, 05:28 PM

I can assure you that Fedora does not pass nomodeset to the kernel by default. Perhaps you selected some failsafe option when you performed the installation.

I'm not completely sure where this option would normally, but my instinct tells me that it would be /etc/default/grub. There's a GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX parameter which is where these types of options are typically stored.

Adam

JZL240I-U · 09-10-2012, 04:12 AM

Hmm.

Code:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="resume=/dev/sda3 debug --all verbose vga=1366x768"
#GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="splash verbose vga=1366x768"

From the look of it you are right. Problem is, none of these existing parameters work (exept, perhaps, "resume"). I'm also aware, that "vga" is useless here. I'd dearly love to see the boot messages (pre-systemd and systemd), but they won't come

.

Btw. I copied this over from my Ubuntu installation -- where it works. Even worse, I changed the color scheme of the fonts in Ubuntu and can't find anymore where I did that

.

Any ideas what to do now?

JZL240I-U · 09-11-2012, 08:35 AM

You won't believe this. This is how one should not go about a procedure of changes in a new distribution.

So I'm also testing Ubuntu.

Several weeks earlier I copied its /etc/default/grub file to Fedora -- and forgot about that when I started this thread. I also used Ubunty-syntax, when I called "grub2-mkconfig", i.e. I left out the output option "grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfg" since that is the default in Ubuntu. Thus my Fedorea-grub.cfg was never changed from the Fedora-original, while I wondered abouot the "verbose output" of the "grub2-mkconfig" command in Fedora contrasting it to the few lines in ubuntu.

When I used "grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfg" on fedora I got a new Fedora-grub.cfg. Booting hangs now at a late stage but I get all the messages I wanted. And I guess radeon is loaded too, I'll find out when booting finishes.

There is a "nomodeset" option in the original /etc/default/grub file of Fedora, sorry adamk75. But all in all you solved the problem in spite of my bunglings, for which I apologize. Thanks to everybody helping in this thread

, marking it solved now.

JZL240I-U · 09-14-2012, 07:04 AM

The story continoueth here

: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...98#post4780198

syntax3rror · 09-20-2012, 06:43 AM

What is the fixed you made here??

JZL240I-U · 09-20-2012, 07:07 AM

No fix really. I use "nomodeset" and the distorted screen. As said in the thread I linked to in my previous post, I have to update Fedora before complaining about a bug. Currently my service provider has problems, no chance to download all those fixes right now

...