"Cut the Gordian Knot" of ATI

slackMeUp · 12-30-2004, 12:50 AM

Ahh...

While I'm at it... could you post the output of this command for us?

Code:

 #cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep EE

Just wanna see how well the SaX based config file works under slackware...

SlackerLX · 12-30-2004, 12:53 AM

Negative on command

Code:

slackerlx@Slackware:~$ cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep EE
        (WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown.
(II) Loading extension MIT-SCREEN-SAVER
slackerlx@Slackware:~$

SlackerLX · 12-30-2004, 11:30 AM

slackMeUp!
Again I hope that it's not a credibility test of mine, because as I have already said, It's my shared experience....

slackMeUp · 12-30-2004, 06:17 PM

No that's cool. . . I was just wondering...

SlackerLX · 12-30-2004, 06:22 PM

slackmeup!
I added some shots, tuxracer actually, on initial post

stef52 · 12-30-2004, 06:32 PM

Check this out, some good news!! Matthew Tippet, ATI's Linux guru has replied on a thread at Rage3D about the release date.

Quote:

Hey guys.

Sorry for the delay hitting this thread. I understand the frustration, but we had some unexpected requirements crop up that needed attention immeadiately. This has resulted in a number of stability improvements on the AGP, PCIe and AMD64 fronts for the new drivers.

This unfortunately resulted in a delay for the drivers. We have completed the work, and now must wait for the web-posting train for ati.com for the drivers to be posted officially. With Christmas/New Year, this will most likely be before the middle of January.

Not as a teaser, but as an answer to the questions, the new drivers will have a number of major new features...

o AMD64/EM64T Support
o XOrg 6.8 Support
o GLSL
o PCIe stability improvements

And of course we have bumped the major.minor version of the driver to match the Windows driver.

Once again, apologies to the Rage3D community for not being responsive for the last month. Some of the members on the Beta Program can probably make comment on the new drivers as well.

Regards,

Matthew
_________________

http://www.rage3d.org/board/showthre...9&page=6&pp=30

speedbump · 12-31-2004, 02:38 PM

SlackerLX-

Just looked at the screen-shot you provided.... the one of glxgears running. The frame-rate seems to vary wildly, anywhere from 1116fps to 14177fps - this is a HUGE range.

Wondering if you could run a quick check for me, and run glxgears again. Leave it as the "active" window, on top of everything - not minimized or covered up by another window.

Please report back the best (and worst) framerate you get?

I'm currently doing the testing I promised earlier, using a ATI-branded Radeon 9200 AGP w/128MBDDR.

test scenarios:
1. Stock Slack-10, 2.4.26 kernel, xorg6.7, with SUSE XFREE (renamed to xorg.conf), XORGSETUP, and XORGCONFIG configurations.

2. Slack-10 -current, 2.4.26 kernel, xorg6.8.1, with SUSE XFREE (renamed to xorg.conf), XORGSETUP, and XORGCONFIG configurations, using open-source driver

3. Slack-10 -current, 2.4.28 kernel, xorg6.8.1, with SUSE XFREE (renamed to xorg.conf), XORGSETUP, and XORGCONFIG configurations, using open-source driver

4. Slack-10 -current, 2.6.8.1 kernel, xorg6.8.1, with SUSE XFREE (renamed to xorg.conf), XORGSETUP, and XORGCONFIG, configurations, using open-source driver.

5. Slack-10 -current, 2.6.8.1 kernel, DROPLINE-GNOME 2.8.2 (w/xorg 6.8.1), with SUSE XFREE (renamed to xorg.conf), XORGSETUP, and XORGCONFIG, configurations, using open-source driver.

6. Slack-10 -current, 2.6.8.1 kernel, DROPLINE-GNOME 2.8.2 (w/xorg 6.7), with SUSE XFREE (renamed to xorg.conf), XORGSETUP, and XORGCONFIG, configurations, using open-source driver and using ATI FGLRX driver.

I'll report back in a few hours...

P.S. I'm *not* calling into question your credibility, I just want to understand what you're seeing and/or how your machine is set up. I think that if your results are repeatable, this would be great info for the rest of the slack community using (older) ATI cards.

SlackerLX · 12-31-2004, 03:13 PM

Dear speedbump!
I have already provided 2 shots on initial post, featuring Tuxracer as well

But especially for you

I was happy to "ghost" my kid's box and made another shot
http://eo.yifan.net/users/t/wdesborough/Screenshot1.png

Regards

SlackerLX · 12-31-2004, 03:21 PM

BTW, my son soon be joining this forum too. Because I really don't have time to break my head on WINE configuration (we live apart in neighbouring cities)

. He's already chosen his nick

Kids...

speedbump · 12-31-2004, 10:43 PM

The results are in!
(These are *MY* experiences only... YMMV!)

Test platform:
Processor: Pentium 4, 2.8Ghz, Hyper-thread (enabled in BIOS, not in kernel)
Memory: 1 GB, DDR400
Motherboard: ASUS P4P800-VM, Intel 865G chipset, 800Mhz FSB
Disk Drive: Western Digital 40GB, 7200rpm, 8MB buffer
Video Card: ATI-Branded Radeon 9200 128MBDDR 8xAGP

Purpose of test:
Testing theory that using SuSE's XFREE86 file on Slackware will dramatically increase framerate of GLXGEAR/TUXRACER, using the Free-Open-Source-Software (FOSS) driver (RADEON) included in XORG.

Background: Earlier in this thread, it was claimed that a framerate in excess of 13,000fps was achieved on a ATI Radeon 9000 by using the XFREE86 config file from SuSE 9.1. I was sceptical and wanted to independantly verify these results.

Testing process:
-Installed SuSE 9.1 on the above-described machine. Enabled 3D accelleration and set resolution to 1024x768, depth of 24. Updated to -current. Re-started, and messed around in SuSE for about a half-hour, making sure all was stable. Tested GLXGEARS, and it's best was 1344fps. Saved XFree86Config file to floppy.

-Installed bone-stock Slackware 10, with no tweaks, standard package selection except for emacs, development.

-Tested with GLXGEARS only, in it's original-sized window, with that window active, and not covered up. No other applications running, except required system processes. Tests run w/ resolution of 1024x768, depth of 24.

-FPS results are from letting GLXGEARS run for ten lines, and recording the highest result.

Various configs were generated from the XORGSETUP and XORGCONFIG scripts. XORGCONFIG was edited only to enable DRI. The SUSE XFREE config was edited only to switch from "Keyboard" to "kbd" when switching to XORG 6.8.1

System was re-started between each system re-config *and* each GLXGEARS test.

Results:
====================================
1. Stock Slackware-10, straight off the .iso (XORG 6.7, Kernel 2.4.26, Gnome 2.6)
SuSE 9.1 XFREE config: 1252.8fps
XORGSETUP (auto-config) 1628.6fps
XORGCONFIG (manual-config) 1264.2fps

2. Stock Slackware-10 -current (XORG 6.8.1, Kernel 2.4.26, Gnome 2.6)
SuSE 9.1 XFREE config: 1250.4fps
XORGSETUP (auto-config) 1624.6fps
XORGCONFIG (manual-config) 1260.0fps

3. Stock Slackware-10-current (XORG 6.8.1, Kernel 2.4.28, Gnome 2.6)
SuSE 9.1 XFREE config: 1260.4fps
XORGSETUP (auto-config) 1623.8fps
XORGCONFIG (manual-config) 1260.6fps

4. Stock Slackware-10-current (XORG 6.8.1, Kernel 2.6.8.1, Gnome 2.6)
SuSE 9.1 XFREE config: 1245.6fps
XORGSETUP (auto-config) 1626.2fps
XORGCONFIG (manual-config) 1259.8fps

5. Stock Slackware-10-current (XORG 6.8.1, Kernel 2.6.8.1, Dropline Gnome 2.8.2)
SuSE 9.1 XFREE config: 1239.2fps
XORGSETUP (auto-config) 1613.2fps
XORGCONFIG (manual-config) 1226.0fps

6. Stock Slackware-10-current (XORG 6.7, Kernel 2.6.8.1, Dropline Gnome 2.8.2)
SuSE 9.1 XFREE config: 1239.2fps
XORGSETUP (auto-config) 1613.2fps
XORGCONFIG (manual-config) 1226.0fps
ATI FGLRX driver 1609.4fps

================================================

Thoughts: Seems as though the stock Slackware 10 setup is the winner, but only by a fraction of a percent. What really surprised me was that the XORGSETUP auto-configuration works so well. The ATI proprietary driver also was surprising, in that it's score was slightly lower that the open source driver. I *would*think* that ATI could write a driver that was much better than the open source one that was written with little knowledge of the vpu's internals.

Through a little more experimentation (kernel and xorg.conf optimizing) I could probably get this card to approach 1900fps on this machine.

By comparison, the best I can get out of my Radeon 9600XT is ~2450 at this resolution.

What I think happened is that the pop-up glxgears window was covered or minimized for a short period while it was running. This is the only way I've been able to duplicate such a high framerate. Those 13,000fps numbers were generated for only one cycle, two cycles later it was back down to a more normal 1100, as evidenced by one of the pictures. The third picture supplied shows a more normal fps without the wild fluctuations.

These are just *my* observations. I was planning on building this machine today and decided to do a little experimentation along the way, and seek out it's best graphical configuration.

SlackerLX · 12-31-2004, 10:52 PM

The point of my post again

was not to prove but share that 3D acceleration may as well be achieved without installing drivers from ATI site, but only using initial drivers supplied by kernel
Regards

stef52 · 01-01-2005, 09:43 AM

It works that way with R200 and derivates. For R300 and newer you need Ati drivers for 3D.

My test:

Pentium III Coppermine 1 GHz
Intel Desktop Board i815
512MB SDRAM 133Mhz
SB Live!
Radeon 9700Pro
Slackware 10, Xorg 6.7, 2.6.9-custom kernel, fglrx 3.14.6 (with external agp gart module, Intel's agp gart)
1024x768x24, X configuration by fglrxconfig (everything default but agp gart module, which is external) .

glxgears 2915 FPS constantly, no oscillations
fgl_glrxgears 440 FPS
Quake III timedemo, demo four (with sound on) 77.8 FPS
More than 100 FPS average on every map in Quake III, 1024x768, game quality options and detail on highest.

In Windows I get 88 FPS on timedemo, and a bit more FPS per map on 1024x468x32 but with 4xAA and 4xAF.

XavierP · 01-01-2005, 10:35 AM

At the request of the original poster I am closing this thread - I am also moving it to Success Stories.