Oh my gosh, may I just say that you are my most favorite person of all time. I have been fighting with my Radeon 9600 Pro on Debian for almost 2 weeks now and your howto was pretty much right on! Thank you thank you thank you!
pibby@poopsmith:~$ glxinfo
direct rendering: Yes
pibby@poopsmith:~$ glxgears
17114 frames in 5.0 seconds = 3422.800 FPS
23196 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4639.200 FPS
23186 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4637.200 FPS
23115 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4623.000 FPS
23290 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4658.000 FPS
23257 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4651.400 FPS
23195 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4639.000 FPS
23082 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4616.400 FPS
23204 frames in 5.0 seconds = 4640.800 FPS
pibby@poopsmith:~$ fglrxinfo
display: :0.0 screen: 0
OpenGL vendor string: ATI Technologies Inc.
OpenGL renderer string: RADEON 9600 Generic
OpenGL version string: 1.3.4641 (X4.3.0-3.14.1)
Again, thank you!