Debian 11 on Mac Pro 2013 (Intel)

willbprog127 · 05-05-2022, 12:12 PM

Greetings all!

I've always been a firm believer in having more than one OS installed on my computers at a time, just in case one acts up, explodes or gets corrupted.

Debian 11 has been installed to an external USB SSD drive. After installing the necessary firmware packages, I'm still having some issues. For one, I'm getting a persistent warning in dmesg:

Code:

[    8.283244] ------------[ cut here ]------------
[    8.283248] WARNING: CPU: 7 PID: 439 at drivers/platform/x86/apple-gmux.c:680 gmux_probe.cold+0xa5/0x3c6 [apple_gmux]
[    8.283249] Modules linked in: apple_gmux(+) apple_bl video pcc_cpufreq(-) acpi_cpufreq(-) evdev parport_pc ppdev lp parport fuse configfs efivarfs ip_tables x_tables autofs4 ext4 crc16 mbcache jbd2 crc32c_generic amdgpu gpu_sched sd_mod uas usb_storage scsi_mod hid_generic usbhid hid radeon i2c_algo_bit ttm drm_kms_helper cec xhci_pci nvme ehci_pci drm ehci_hcd xhci_hcd tg3 nvme_core libphy t10_pi crc_t10dif crc32_pclmul crc32c_intel crct10dif_generic i2c_i801 thunderbolt ptp usbcore lpc_ich i2c_smbus crct10dif_pclmul pps_core crct10dif_common usb_common button
[    8.283278] CPU: 7 PID: 439 Comm: systemd-udevd Not tainted 5.10.0-14-amd64 #1 Debian 5.10.113-1
[    8.283279] Hardware name: Apple Inc. MacPro6,1/Mac-F60DEB81FF30ACF6, BIOS 429.60.3.0.0 10/27/2021
[    8.283281] RIP: 0010:gmux_probe.cold+0xa5/0x3c6 [apple_gmux]
[    8.283283] Code: be 70 00 00 00 4c 8d 6c 24 0c 4c 89 ef f3 ab 48 89 ef c7 44 24 1c 02 00 00 00 e8 12 fa ff ff 89 44 24 10 3d ff ff ff 00 7e 0a <0f> 0b c7 44 24 10 ff ff ff 00 4d 89 e8 48 c7 c1 a0 56 f8 c0 48 89
[    8.283284] RSP: 0018:ffffa807c0da7c48 EFLAGS: 00010212
[    8.283285] RAX: 0000000004000b00 RBX: 0000000000000004 RCX: 0000000000000000
[    8.283286] RDX: ffff99034bb4af80 RSI: 0000000000000007 RDI: ffff990341027598
[    8.283287] RBP: ffff990341027580 R08: 0000000000000007 R09: 0000000000048a81
[    8.283288] R10: ffffa807c0da7a68 R11: ffff990abff81f28 R12: ffff990341a6a400
[    8.283288] R13: ffffa807c0da7c54 R14: 0000000000000400 R15: ffffffffc0f846e0
[    8.283290] FS:  00007f86889338c0(0000) GS:ffff990a9f9c0000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000
[    8.283291] CS:  0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033
[    8.283291] CR2: 00005606c16aeef8 CR3: 000000010bb68006 CR4: 00000000001706e0
[    8.283292] Call Trace:
[    8.283298]  ? kernfs_add_one+0xe2/0x130
[    8.283303]  pnp_device_probe+0xaf/0x140
[    8.283308]  really_probe+0x222/0x480
[    8.283310]  driver_probe_device+0xe1/0x150
[    8.283312]  device_driver_attach+0xa1/0xb0
[    8.283314]  __driver_attach+0x8a/0x150
[    8.283316]  ? device_driver_attach+0xb0/0xb0
[    8.283318]  ? device_driver_attach+0xb0/0xb0
[    8.283319]  bus_for_each_dev+0x78/0xc0
[    8.283321]  bus_add_driver+0x12b/0x1e0
[    8.283323]  driver_register+0x8b/0xe0
[    8.283324]  ? 0xffffffffc0f8a000
[    8.283327]  do_one_initcall+0x44/0x1d0
[    8.283330]  ? do_init_module+0x23/0x240
[    8.283333]  ? kmem_cache_alloc_trace+0xf5/0x200
[    8.283334]  do_init_module+0x4c/0x240
[    8.283336]  __do_sys_finit_module+0xb1/0x110
[    8.283340]  do_syscall_64+0x33/0x80
[    8.283343]  entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x44/0xa9
[    8.283344] RIP: 0033:0x7f8688dec9b9
[    8.283345] Code: 00 c3 66 2e 0f 1f 84 00 00 00 00 00 0f 1f 44 00 00 48 89 f8 48 89 f7 48 89 d6 48 89 ca 4d 89 c2 4d 89 c8 4c 8b 4c 24 08 0f 05 <48> 3d 01 f0 ff ff 73 01 c3 48 8b 0d a7 54 0c 00 f7 d8 64 89 01 48
[    8.283346] RSP: 002b:00007fffb5f69818 EFLAGS: 00000246 ORIG_RAX: 0000000000000139
[    8.283347] RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 00005606c1845180 RCX: 00007f8688dec9b9
[    8.283348] RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: 00007f8688f77e2d RDI: 0000000000000010
[    8.283349] RBP: 0000000000020000 R08: 0000000000000000 R09: 00005606c16b1750
[    8.283350] R10: 0000000000000010 R11: 0000000000000246 R12: 00007f8688f77e2d
[    8.283350] R13: 0000000000000000 R14: 00005606c183cec0 R15: 00005606c1845180
[    8.283352] ---[ end trace b50ba08f282dd9d0 ]---

The other issue is that I get *zero* audio output from the 'audio out' and 'headphone' jacks despite setting everything properly in PulseAudio. I *do* get audio through my monitor's (tiny) speakers via DisplayPort, but the quality is very poor and often accompanied by 'digital static'. Here is the lspci output for the audio:

Code:

Device:	00:1b.0
Class:	Audio device [0403]
Vendor:	Intel Corporation [8086]
Device:	C600/X79 series chipset High Definition Audio Controller [1d20]
SVendor:	Intel Corporation [8086]
SDevice:	Device [7270]
Rev:	06
Driver:	snd_hda_intel
Module:	snd_hda_intel

I know Macs are often pretty finicky with Linux, but I'd really like to run Debian full-time on here and only pop into macOS for specific things.

Are there any tricks I could try to get the proper (non-DisplayPort) sound working? Also, if the dmesg warning is a problem with the kernel, should I report it to the kernel bug tracker, or through Debian?

uname -a

Code:

Linux debian 5.10.0-14-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 5.10.113-1 (2022-04-29) x86_64 GNU/Linux

Thank you!

mrmazda · 05-05-2022, 01:05 PM

See if this helps.

willbprog127 · 05-05-2022, 01:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mrmazda

See if this helps.

Thanks mrmazda. While I am a developer, that page is pretty dense reading. Was there something in particular you wanted to point out on there?

Thanks!

mrmazda · 05-05-2022, 02:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willbprog127

Was there something in particular you wanted to point out on there?

amdgpu.dc=0

Without knowing which AMD GPU you have, it's tough to suggest anything at all.

willbprog127 · 05-05-2022, 02:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mrmazda

amdgpu.dc=0

Without knowing which AMD GPU you have, it's tough to suggest anything at all.

Sorry for the omission. This Mac Pro has FirePro D300 graphics cards.

Thanks!

willbprog127 · 05-08-2022, 07:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mrmazda

amdgpu.dc=0

Hi again...

I tried this and there was no change -- the error in dmesg still is there and there is still no sound through either of the sound output jacks.

Thanks!

mrmazda · 05-08-2022, 10:09 PM

Did you try both, amdgpu.dc=1 also?

All my Mac experience is with older models than yours, so I don't really have any special experience from which to make suggestions here. You seem to have Southern Islands graphics, which I have in non-Mac form, and which I suppose could play a part in that there are some special parameters needed for some installations for proper display operation. What side effects may show up using them or not I don't know anything about. They are linux command line options (in Grub) as follows:

For use with amdgpu DDX or modesetting DIX display driver:

Code:

radeon.si_support=0 amdgpu.si_support=1

For use with radeon DDX or modesetting DIX display driver:

Code:

radeon.si_support=1 amdgpu.si_support=0

Possible kernel options for various purposes are many: https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/late...t-options.html

About audio I can't help at all.

willbprog127 · 05-08-2022, 11:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mrmazda

Did you try both, amdgpu.dc=1 also?

All my Mac experience is with older models than yours, so I don't really have any special experience from which to make suggestions here. You seem to have Southern Islands graphics, which I have in non-Mac form, and which I suppose could play a part in that there are some special parameters needed for some installations for proper display operation. What side effects may show up using them or not I don't know anything about. They are linux command line options (in Grub) as follows:
[snip] About audio I can't help at all.

Thanks mrmazda.

I tried amdgpu.dc=1 and no change. At this point, I give up. I have a non-Mac system with Linux that I can use after replacing the blown graphics card. I have an Intel i7 Mac mini, but that had graphical corruption both in macOS and Linux. One of these days I'm going to have a Linux machine that works well, without all these glitches...

Thanks again!

willbprog127 · 05-10-2022, 04:12 PM

Well, this Mac Pro is having (non-Linux) hardware issues (again). I'm probably going to get rid of it, so this topic is no longer relevant. Leaving open for future search engine users...