I bought a Radeon 9800XT and under Windows everything went fine (as expected).
Under Linux I have problems getting the 3D accelleration to work.

Is there somewhere a good explanation what steps I have to follow to achieve
this? I found a how-to, but that didn't really help. The howto just says to
download the drivers, use rpm-Uvh --force <package> to install the driver and
that's it.

I used rpm and fglrx works so far. I can also insert it into the kernel, but
then I can't start X anymore. I get an errormessage telling me that some
PCI1:0:1 device description is missing. But I'm not sure if this is really the
problem.

Currently I use the kernel radeon module which kind of works. But I have not
even 2D accelleration, which means that the screen is totally slow. Of course
I can't play any games as well, because I only have mesa for now.

So I'm looking for some information as how to properly install this card. I
think that currently no driver for that card exists, but at least the Radeon
9700 drivers should work just as well, right? I guess I may not be able to use
all the features of that card, but I should be able to use OpenGL at least and
have a decently fast desktop.

When I try to use the fglrx module with X then X starts up

When I look into the logmessage I see the following:

Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] free AGP = 54800384
Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] max AGP = 54800384
Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] free LFB = 124440576
Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] max LFB = 124440576
Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] free Inv = 134217728
Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] max Inv = 134217728
Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] total Inv = 134217728
Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] total TIM = 0
Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] total FB = 0
Nov 30 20:18:19 user kernel: [fglrx] total AGP = 16384
Nov 30 20:18:24 user kernel: mtrr: no MTRR for f0000000,800000 found
Nov 30 20:18:24 user kernel: mtrr: no MTRR for f0800000,100000 found
Nov 30 20:18:24 user kernel: mtrr: no MTRR for f0900000,40000 found
Nov 30 20:18:24 user kernel: mtrr: no MTRR for f0940000,10000 found
Nov 30 20:18:24 user kernel: mtrr: no MTRR for f0950000,2000 found
Nov 30 20:18:24 user kernel: mtrr: no MTRR for f0952000,1000 found
Nov 30 20:18:24 user kernel: [fglrx:drm_ioremapfree] *ERROR* [mappings]
Attempt to free NULL pointer


The kdm.log is this:

XFree86 Version 4.3.0
Release Date: 27 February 2003
X Protocol Version 11, Revision 0, Release 6.6
Build Operating System: SuSE Linux [ELF] SuSE
Build Date: 17 March 2003
Before reporting problems, check http://www.XFree86.Org/
to make sure that you have the latest version.
Module Loader present
Markers: (--) probed, (**) from config file, (==) default setting,
(++) from command line, (!!) notice, (II) informational,
(WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown.
(==) Log file: "/var/log/XFree86.0.log", Time: Sun Nov 30 21:06:35 2003
(==) Using config file: "/etc/X11/XF86Config-4"
(WW) fglrx: No matching Device section for instance (BusID PCI:1:0:1) found
modprobe: Can't locate module fglrx
[drm] failed to load kernel module "fglrx"
(EE) fglrx(0): DRIScreenInit failed!

--
Gerhard Gruber
Maintainer of
SoftICE for Linux - http://sourceforge.net/projects/pice
Fast application launcher - http://sourceforge.net/projects/launchmenu

Gerhard W. Gruber wrote:

ATI do a binary-only install, much the same as NVidia do. You're mostly
stuck with the version of kernel that they will support (which is why
released specs on video cards are far better). Take a look at the ATI
drivers download page.

"Gerhard W. Gruber" wrote:
Did you edit your XF86Config file or let the ATI installer do it? One
or the other is essential to tell X to use the fglrx driver.

Hmm...that's your true problem. Where exactly is fglrx.o located? What
kernel version are you using (from 'uname -r')? All of the other
messages are irrelevant until you get that module loaded.

Gerhard W. Gruber wrote:


Hmm.. I've got the Radeon 9800 Pro, one step below yours and driver/module
works fine. I was freaked out that the new -144 kernel update screwed up my
gfx but it was me being tired.. :-)

Did you use Suses repackaged 'fglrx' 3.2.8?
(Instructions in the readme is a step-by-step, this is all you need.)

LINK:
http://www.suse.de/en/private/download/linuks/
Click: XFree86 -> "New: ATI "fglrx" driver update for SUSE LINUX 9.0"

jk

--
Suse Linux 9.0 | 2.4.21-144-smp4G | KDE 3.1.4 | XFree86 v4.3.0.1

Gerhard W. Gruber wrote:

<snip>

OK, I have recently been through the ATI driver install process, and found a
nice article on the topic here -

http://home.ptd.net/~karoly/ati/AtiFaq

This was enough to get my driver installed without a hitch (although there
appears to be at least one error, where it specifies an 'rpm' file to be
used in the dpkg command, when it really should be the 'deb' created with
alien).

As for your 'PCI1:0:1' device missing error, you can thank ATI for that, it
is a pretty bad error on their part. The fix is a minor adjustment to the
XF86Config file, and is explained in the article.

HTH

Bartman

On Mon, 01 Dec 2003 08:32:48 +0100 wrote Bartman <tonybart@bigfoot.com> in
alt.os.linux.suse with <bqdr4m$8gj$1@au-nws-0001.flow.com.au>

It sitll doesn't work, but I'm pretty sure that I did everything correctly, so
I think it is a problem with the driver itself.

Everything worked out and I can load the module into memory. I did some
googling in the meantime and I found many postings related to this. According
to this it was a problem with the agpgart module, so I checked this as well.
Now I tried to load the agpgart module before fglrx and it correctly
recognizes my AGP chipset, when I load fglrx it still works. But as soon as I
start X I get this error in the messagelog:

kernel: [fglrx:drm_ioremapfree] *ERROR* [mappings] Attempt to free NULL
pointer

So either something is still wrong with my configuration (but I sure don't
know what else I can try) or it is a problem with XFree86 4.3.0 and/or the ATI
driver.

--
Gerhard Gruber
Maintainer of
SoftICE for Linux - http://sourceforge.net/projects/pice
Fast application launcher - http://sourceforge.net/projects/launchmenu

"Gerhard W. Gruber" wrote:
I always see that message at shutdown. It doesn't seem terribly
important. It certainly doesn't affect my use of the system. Unless
your system isn't working, I'd say it is safe to ignore the message.

On Mon, 01 Dec 2003 17:07:25 -0500 wrote John-Paul Stewart
<jpstewart@sympatico.ca> in comp.os.linux.misc with
<3FCBBB9D.F8FF803B@sympatico.ca>

That's exactly my problem.

When I load agpgart and then flgrx both of them seem to work, but when I start
X it comes up and after a few seconds it vanishes with an error message. After
this the usage count of agpgart is 2 and I have to reboot, so it seems there
is something wrong. the errormessage I get is something about a protocolerror
or simialr. I have to retry this, as currently I'm working with the normal
desktop without acceleration, to have at least access to mail and everything.

--
Gerhard Gruber
Maintainer of
SoftICE for Linux - http://sourceforge.net/projects/pice
Fast application launcher - http://sourceforge.net/projects/launchmenu

"Gerhard W. Gruber" wrote:
The last 20 or so lines of /var/log/XFree86.0.log (or equivalent) from
the failed session would be helpful. It may be an X configuration
issue, since the module seems to load OK.