[RV350 9600] [Needs quirk] X freezes in drmCommandWrite() when Compiz is enabled

I'm adding only Xorg.0.log because Xorg.0.log.old appears to be empty.

Looks good to me, I'm coinfirming

I got another backtrace, almost identical (from what I remember, where did it go?), although I'm running Gutsy on a X800 (not a mobility)

lspci -vvnn

I've got a similar problem with my almost identical ThinkPad T42 / Mobility Radeon 9600 chip.
Well, with the latest version of the fglrx driver compiz runs perfectly well and the machine is also able to suspend properly. But however, when I try to resume - with compiz previously enabled - I a get a grey and somewhat speckled slim bar on the lower right of the screen with some artifacts around the mouse cursor. The mouse can be moved but nothing else will work - compiz desktop will just not awake a second time!
When I previously disable compiz and then set my machine in suspend mode, this grey bar shows up as well, but only for a couple of milliseconds and then the desktop appears to start normally.
There is another problem, I don't know if it is related to this one: when I log-off and try to lag back on (with compiz enabled) X freezes totally and the only thing I can do is a hard reboot! This happens every time I try to start X for a second time.
I can provide you with more information - configuration files and logs - just say what you need and where I can find it!

I just tried to follow the step in https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingXorg, but when I try to restart X it freezes, and when I pgrep Xorg, I get two process numbers. If I try to attach process No 1, I get the following error message:

This GDB was configured as "i486-linux-gnu"...
Using host libthread_db library "/lib/tls/i686/cmov/libthread_db.so.1".
(gdb) attach 5488
Attaching to program: /usr/bin/Xorg, process 5488
warning: process 5488 is a cloned process
/build/buildd/gdb-6.7.1/gdb/linux-nat.c:979: internal-error: linux_nat_attach: Assertion `pid == GET_PID (inferior_ptid) && WIFSTOPPED (status) && WSTOPSIG (status) == SIGSTOP' failed.
A problem internal to GDB has been detected,
further debugging may prove unreliable.

If I try to attach the second process ID, the computer freezes again!

I have to add to my previous post, that when I log off and try to log back in, the computer seems to freeze once the audio gets initialized, because I hear a freezing typical audio loop (just like "zzzzzz"). I don'T know if this helps.

Do I just have to wait for the release of Hardy, or is this a problem related to the proprietary fglrx driver? Is this a problem of my installation, or did you have suimilar problems on your machines running hardy+fglrx(+ati mobility radeon graphics)???

For info : I have the same bug with radeon mobility X700 : enabling compiz freezes X (but the movement of the mouse cursor) after a few minutes/hours (randomly), disabling compiz solve the problem.

I'll try to find the log/debug info and attach them (no promises, Linux newbie)

These problems seem to be fixed in hardy, at least when using the ati driver. I suspect fglrx users will still have issues but that's fglrx for you.

Is anyone still having this problem in hardy while using the 'ati' driver?

No, logout/login and suspend/resume seem to work, but with the ati-driver everything is white with no textures while all compiz effects seem to work (at least slowly)...
So what are we - the (newbie) users supposed to do? I guess we just have to wait once again - maybe once in a while everything will just work out of the box with ubuntu. I love it already but its not yet enough to be a full replacement for the proprietary stuff:'-(

> Is anyone still having this problem in hardy while using the 'ati' driver?

I'm sorry I can't test this before next week.
Isn't the next alpha release around the corner anyway?
I'm going to report back on a fresh install of Hardy Alpha6 then.

We may end up just blacklisting all people using a laptop with the 'ati' driver since other bugs I read after this one show that people are still having problems.

Please, not all.
I have a laptop with open source "ati" driver and no freezes at all
with compiz. Never. (IGP 340M)
Just a problem with suspend but it's not related to compiz.

2008/3/5, Travis Watkins <email address hidden>:
> We may end up just blacklisting all people using a laptop with the 'ati'
> driver since other bugs I read after this one show that people are still
> having problems.
>
>
> --
> X freezes when Compiz is enabled on ATI Radeon Mobility
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/195051
> You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to compiz
> in ubuntu.
>

Hi all,
when switched to proprietary ati drivers, I got no more freezing on my ATI Mobility Radeon X600 laptop.
Still compiz-fusion was working much better without proprietary drivers: now effects seem to be slightly less rapid and, most of all, I'm subject to the slow-scrolling bug which is very very annoying.
I have the feeling that with such proprietary drivers some computation are no more in charge of the GPU and are processed by the real CPU, bringing more slowness over all the system.
Sorry, but let me say that it's very annoying thinking that with the kubuntu 7.04 beryl was working great and that it is since almost one whole year that I cannot use such great effects I got used - addicted - to.

Is anyone still having this problem in hardy while using the 'ati' driver?

Yes. I use the open-ATI driver with X700 and if I use any 3D application (compiz or small 3D game) I get desktop freezes with mouse movement, so it is not related to Compiz only. It smells of some 3D buffer overun perhaps in the ATI driver, just guessing :-)

We may end up just blacklisting all people using a laptop with the 'ati' driver since other bugs I read after this one show that people are still having problems.

I certainly hope not. Limiting the use of Ubuntu to fix various problems is hopefully not the way forward. I mean what about next time a problem of this size occurs, do we then blacklist our way out again. Hopefully the problem will be analysed and fixed before the official release of Hardy :-)

I think a lot of us first experienced the problem in Oct. 07 just before the official release of Gutsy, when both Compiz and the 'ati' driver was updated. It should be possible to go back and see the few changes to better isolate the current problem. I can easily reproduce the problem especially with Compiz enabled and I'd be happy to do help with any tracing or bug catching is necessary :-)

>We may end up just blacklisting all people using a laptop with
>the 'ati' driver since other bugs I read after this one show that
>people are still having problems.

This is frightening. I can't imagine any situation (unless you're Apple) where a valid "fix" would be to blacklist hardware that is otherwise completely supported and functional.

As Arngren said, I'd be glad to help with any tracing that is necessary to find a fix. I can't stand to think that blacklisting hardware/software combinations is a valid bug fix.

I'm not a driver developer and I don't even have ATI hardware. If you can find a fix by all means, go for it. We'd be happy to get compiz working on these systems. If not, the only other answer is to make sure people don't have these problems in the default install by blocking compiz from starting.

This has been broken for two releases now, I don't think we're going to get a fix in the next month.

The ATI X700 hardware has previously been blacklisted, but only temporarely - If that is the suggestion, then I don't mind, as long as a permanent fix, where compiz is fully functional, is the aim.

I also believe from the various bug reports on this issue, that Compiz is not part of the problem. It is most likely the ATI driver running 3D which causes the X server to freeze. Compiz just happens to use a lot of 3D effects and thereby provoke the problem faster than any other application.

Perhaps the responsibility of this bug should also be considered by the ATI driver team? Just an idea to make the bugfixing more efficient :-)

This bug is assigned to the ati driver, I'm just talking about what we can do to make sure most users don't have this problem as compiz will probably be the only 3D application they would run.

Of course a permanent fix would be preferred but that doesn't seem possible at this point.

I can confirm the bug is still there on a fresh install of Alpha6 with all updates.

I started compiz via SKIP_CHECKS and was able to use it for some minutes, then X froze and this time I couldn't even use SysRq to communicate with the kernel in order to shut it down.

I have to say I'm surprised there hasn't been any feedback from the people in charge. Is nobody working on this?
Has it been reported upstream?

I would be glad to help but it seems like there's very little interest in working on this.
Anyway... I did some investigation myself and installed Feisty again as well as Debian testing on this machine. Both are running fine with Compiz and the ati/radeon driver.
But both are using version 1:6.6.3-2 of xserver-xorg-video-ati so that may be no surprise after all.

If there's anything I can do to help investigate some more, please let me know.

I have the same problem with ati rv515. Hardy Heron alpha 6

I have this one since gutsy (feisty was working fine) and I was hoping that for a LTS something will be done to correct it. It seems that I'll have to try another distribution for my next upgrade.

Nicolas: This is not something Ubuntu has broken, it's a regression in the ati driver.

Ok so the choice is going back to an old driver very buggy and slow, use a new one also buggy or use the proprietary buggy one...

Arglll I hate ATI!

Nick, thanks for collecting a backtrace, however it looks like you did not install the debug symbols (the -dbg or -dbgsym packages), as you can see in the following where there are ?? instead of the functions. Please install them and collect another backtrace. Also, please do it by '(gdb) backtrace full' which collects more data than the default backtrace. I'll up the priority on this bug, thanks for filing it separate from 108527 which has gotten too crowded with unrelated issues.

For everyone else, I want to focus this bug on Nick's issue, which is with lockups with the ATI 9600. Unless you have the same card and exact symptoms, or unless you have *exactly* the same backtrace as him, please file a separate bug with backtrace and Xorg.0.log. Even if these turn out to be the same underlying issue it will make investigation easier to have them organized this way. We can always dupe them in LP if they end up being the same issue.

Program received signal SIGINT, Interrupt.
[Switching to Thread 0xb7c3b6b0 (LWP 6074)]
0xb7f63410 in __kernel_vsyscall ()
(gdb) backtrace full
#0 0xb7f63410 in __kernel_vsyscall ()
No symbol table info available.
#1 0xb7db1929 in ioctl () from /lib/tls/i686/cmov/libc.so.6
No symbol table info available.
#2 0xb7b3ea8b in drmCommandWrite () from /usr/lib/libdrm.so.2
No symbol table info available.
#3 0xb2dee3c2 in ?? () from /usr/lib/dri/r300_dri.so
No symbol table info available.
#4 0x00000008 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#5 0x00000017 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#6 0x083e0754 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#7 0x00000004 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#8 0x083e7010 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#9 0x00000001 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#10 0x083e0700 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#11 0xb2fc3e1c in ?? () from /usr/lib/dri/r300_dri.so
---Type <return> to continue, or q <return> to quit---
No symbol table info available.
#12 0x083e7010 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#13 0x083df750 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#14 0xbfc4bb98 in ?? ()
No symbol table info available.
#15 0xb2e139c8 in _mesa_Finish () from /usr/lib/dri/r300_dri.so
No symbol table info available.
Backtrace stopped: frame did not save the PC

Sorry, I see you did do backtrace full - great. So you just need the debug symbols installed. drmCommandWrite() is already a useful hint - evidently this has something to do with libdrm?

Bryce,

thanks for looking into this.
I did have xserver-xorg-core-dbgsym installed by the time I did the backtrace.

Now I installed xserver-xorg-core-dbg (instead) as well as xserver-xorg-video-ati-dbg

$ dpkg -l | grep dbg
ii xserver-xorg-core-dbg 2:1.4.1~git20080131-1ubuntu5
ii xserver-xorg-video-ati-dbg 1:6.8.0-1

Unfortunately it doesn't make a difference (see attachment).

Do you have an idea what dbg/dbgsym packages are missing?

Just a heads-up: I filed a similar bug (at Bryce's suggestion) at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-ati/+bug/206845

I'm running a similar setup (ThinkPad with ATI Radeon Mobility 9000), but I'm getting some different output in the backtrace. I've also discovered that the freeze with mouse activity can be reproduced on my system by switching to the "Braid" screensaver in Gnome Screensaver Preferences. Nick, could you give it a try?

When I switch to Braid, everything but the mouse locks up. Strangely, the system will recover if I choose a different screensaver (even though the system appears unresponsive to clicks). This freeze will persist anywhere from 5 minutes to an hour and then POOF, the system is again responsive with the new screensaver selected. I should also warn that I get broken pipe if I select random screensaver and Braid happens to come up (that's how I stumbled across the problem with Braid in the first place).

Anyway, all the backtraces I managed to collect during the "freeze" ended with problems in Dispatch() in dix/dispatch.c and dix/main.c. No problems with drmCommandWrite() here.

Kris, thanks for taking the time to work on this.
Like I said in the upstream report I filed over at fd.o (http://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=15096) this issue is not limited to Compiz but 3D apps in general.

I tried your suggestion and I do not have the same problem with the Braid screensaver. I can watch it in the preview just fine for several minutes (although I noticed it does not work properly in fullscreen – no freeze, though).
It's not a 3D screensaver anyway, so I guess your problem is not exactly the same. X never recovered here from the freeze also (at least not within an hour, which was the longest time I waited one time).

But I tried the Bubble3D screensaver next to it and the X almost instantly froze.
Interestingly the backtrace is more verbose this time (attached).

Some more testing, this time with 'extremetuxracer' (3D game from Ubuntu sources).

This game works fine on my desktop machine (Radeon 9600 XT) with the open radon driver.
On the Thinkpad the game appears to freezes after 2-5 seconds. The music continues, though.

The backtrace is similar to the last one from the 3D screensaver (attached).
I tried to kill the game remotely which only worked via 'kill -9'
The screen stays the same but the music stops, so obviously it's not the game that froze in the first place but X.

Then I tried to restart X via:
$ sudo /etc/init.d/gdm restart
 * Stopping GNOME Display Manager... [ OK ]
 * Starting GNOME Display Manager... [ OK ]

Although it looks good in the remote shell, the screen stays the same and there's nothing I can do.
Finally 'sudo shutdown -h now' did work.

Perhaps is it related not only to ATI but also to Thinkpad. The majority of people touch bit it does have a laptop from thsis brand. (Mine is a Thinkpad Z60m).

I know that you cannot install on windows the ATI catalyst version but you have to use the Lenovo one's...

ps: by the way I saw exactly the same things than Nick. I have been able to connect by ssh on the laptop but nothing to restart X worked.

I have a desktop system running an ATI X600 that previously exhibited the all-but-mouse freeze, I'll run the debugger on that system to see if it produces anything different than the ThinkPads.

Hi,

I also a problem with my ati card : X hangs shortly after login, with our without compiz. I solved it by adding
Option "AGPMode" "1"
in my xorg.conf. However, it's not good, as it really slows graphics display. I reported a bug here :

http://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=14892

could anyone try this option to see if those bugs are related?

Forgot to add : My problem only occured since kernel 2.6.24. On gutsy (with a self-compiled kernel) and on hardy.

Will this be fixed in the final version of Ubuntu Hardy? I'd like to get rid of the Windows crap ASAP!
---
T42p // 15" UXGA / Pentium M 755, 2GHz / 2gb Ram / 160gb HD / ATI Fire GL T2

See also upstream bug http://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=15096

I commented on the upstream bug, and will do so here. I showed this bug to Alex Deucher; he hadn't seen this particular bug but has an idea what the underlying cause is. When -ati was developed they did not have access to the Radeon register documentation so made a lot of guesses, that have been proven wrong since then as the Radeon documentation has become available. As a result, he believes a lot of registers have been incorrectly mapped in -ati, causing random failures such as have been described. He plans to get these mappings corrected within the next 3-6 months. So there's no chance this will be fixed for Hardy, but hopefully will be in place for Intrepid.

I don't know how hard the register mapping work is, but suspect it's pretty straightforward grunt coding work. If anyone is anxious to see these issues fixed and interested in putting some time into it, please contact me or Alex (aka agd5f on #xorg-devel/Freenode) for details.

Not sure why this got beudbeud - assuming that's accidental; if not, please fix.
Setting milestone to Ubuntu:Later; this should be set to Ubuntu: Intrepid-alpha-1 once that has opened.

just one thing...
on my card (radeon7000/VE) all worked fine with the driver 6.6.3 from 7.04. it's freezing with 6.7.195 from 7.10.
also, i bought specifically my card at the time because ATI developped free drivers (it was a while back). at the time they gave NDA docs and paid some people to develop the drivers.
anyway, just wanted to point out. for at least some of the freezes, all was fine with 6.6.x and broke with 6.7.x. i believe adding support for newer cards and for XRANDR broke some things.

from a mail on the ati driver list it seems that this bug could be just ubuntu related and that some user decide to try other distributions with success (no freeze for 3 weeks)... I'm pretty sure that it's too late for Hardy to have a solution for this problem. It's too bad and can be very damaging for ubuntu...

http://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=15096#c5

> it seems that this bug could be just ubuntu related

Nope. I already tested Debian unstable as well as Arch Linux and they are both affected too.

After posting my success with Fedora 8 on the freedesktop lists (linked above), I did discover a similar bug on Red Hat's bugzilla indicating problems with the 6.6.3-1 ati driver. It's an older bug, and I have still been unable to duplicate the problem with the newer 6.8.0-1 drivers. It makes me wonder if it may be a problem with another package, something that may differ in Fedora 8, but may be common to Ubuntu 7.10, 8.04, Debian unstable, and Arch (and possibly more?). It's also entirely possible that I've just been lucky for the last three weeks. I don't currently have time to check for package version differences between Fedora and the others, but I will keep running this install to see if the freeze shows up. I do still have a Hardy workstation with an ATI X600 exhibiting the freeze, so when I have a bit of free time I'll start checking versions of Xorg and Compiz related packages on both the Hardy and the Fedora machines.

I talked further with Alex about this bug and the mis-mapped registers. He gave me a list of patches he felt that would be high priority for addressing the various issues that may cause Compiz to lock up, particularly on newer 3xx architecture cards. I've packaged up these fixes into a deb to make it simpler for people to test:

http://people.ubuntu.com/~bryce/Testing/ati/

I would love to hear if these patches solve the drmCommandWrite() freeze for 9600 cards. Please give it a test and let us know.

So, if this lock ups affects newer cards, why Bug #201330 has been marked as "won't fix", since compiz has ALWAYS worked nice for older cards? (cards that are not supported by proprietary driver).
It would be nice to whitelist them, no lock ups reported...

Note that I said "particularly" on newer cards. There are also register mismap issues on older cards as well and the .deb has a few fixes for r100/r200 class hw as well, just that *most* of its patches focus on newer cards.

Regarding whitelisting of older ati cards, you'd need to take that up with the compiz maintainers (mvo and amarath) since they would need to implement/update that list. My focus is to get the underlying -ati issues resolved so no white/black lists are needed at all.

Bryce, I just installed your packege(s) and tried 'etracer' ("extreme tux racer", see above) after a reboot. Sadly, it froze immediately like before.

I don't have the time to do a backtrace right now, because I have to got. Maybe tomorrow.

Okay thanks. If you get feeling ambitious, a next step would be to
build and test the current git head of the -ati driver. If it works
properly there, then perhaps there is another patch we could pull in.

Bryce

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 04:40:42PM -0000, Nick Bauermeister wrote:
> Bryce, I just installed your packege(s) and tried 'etracer' ("extreme
> tux racer", see above) after a reboot. Sadly, it froze immediately like
> before.
>
> I don't have the time to do a backtrace right now, because I have to
> got. Maybe tomorrow.
>
> --
> X freezes in drmCommandWrite() when Compiz is enabled on ATI Radeon Mobility 9600
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/195051
> You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu-X,
> which is subscribed to xserver-xorg-video-ati in ubuntu.
>
> Status in X.org XServer - ATI gfx chipset driver: Confirmed
> Status in Source Package "compiz" in Ubuntu: Invalid
> Status in Source Package "xserver-xorg-video-ati" in Ubuntu: Triaged
>
> Bug description:
> Binary package hint: xserver-xorg-video-ati
>
> I'm starting this new report on behalf of what Bryce Harrington said here: https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-ati/+bug/108527/comments/143
>
> OK, first things first:
>
> What happens?
> X freezes on my Thinkpad T42 with an ATI Radeon Mobility 9600 when running Compiz.
> There are no problems at all when Compiz is disabled.
> This problem started with Gutsy and persists with an up-to-date version of Hardy Alpha5
>
> Also: I have a Radeon 9600XT on my main machine which has no problems whatsoever with running Compiz on Gutsy ??? that's why I think this is a problem with Mobility chips.
>
> What are the symptoms?
> I can run Ubuntu with Compiz fine for some minutes. Then all of a sudden the fan kicks in and X just freezes.
>
> What works?
> Only the movement of the mouse cursor.
> Restarting the system via SysRq REISUB
>
> What does not work?
> Everything else. I can't even restart X via [Ctrl]+[Alt]+[Backspace] or log into a console via [Ctrl]+[Alt]+[F1]
>
>
> Infos.
> I followed the steps in https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingXorg so I'm adding that output here.
> X froze prior to the backtrace.
>
> I'm also attaching Xorg.0.log, Xorg.0.log.old and the output of lspci -vvnn _right after the crash_ (recieved via ssh) as well as the xorg.conf
>
> [Note]
> For anyone else seeing freezes, please collect a backtrace and check if you are also failing in drmCommandWrite(). If not, you may be seeing an unrelated issue, so please file a separate bug. -- bryce

I know this isn't exactly helpful in resolving this bug, but I tried running `etracer` on my ThinkPad (a 9000, not a 9600) on this Fedora 8 install and it functions perfectly. I still wonder if this is not, in fact, an issue with the -ati driver (Fedora uses the same version 6.8.0-1). Unless, of course, either Fedora or Debian has made some change to the driver code. Seems doubtful. When I get into the office tomorrow, I'll compare the versions of Compiz, Xorg, -ati drivers, etc., between this Fedora machine and my workstation which is running Hardy current with an X600 and which is still exhibiting the freeze.

OK, Alex suggests the same thing (see fd.o report) -- how would I be
doing it in Ubuntu?
I git cloned xf86-video-ati as well as mesa/drm
Then I did a build-dep for xserver-xorg-video-ati

So far so good, but what packages do I have to remove before I install
those two? xserver-xorg-video-ati and libdrm2?

Am Mittwoch, den 23.04.2008, 17:29 +0000 schrieb Bryce Harrington:
> Okay thanks. If you get feeling ambitious, a next step would be to
> build and test the current git head of the -ati driver. If it works
> properly there, then perhaps there is another patch we could pull in.
>
> Bryce

I have a T42 with a Mobility Radeon 9600 as well. I'm using the testing .deb that Bryce suggested. The lockup only seems to occur for me when I'm using OpenOffice + compiz. Don't know if anyone else has experienced that. I also have the problem with restarting the xserver--if I logout or Ctrl+Alt+Backspace I sometimes get a blank screen. Sometimes gdm comes up, but if I try to login again, the system locks up before the startup sound has finished playing and before the desktop is rendered.

I started comparing packages on my Hardy workstation (ATI X600, randomly freezing) and my Fedora 8 ThinkPad (Mobility 9000, no freezing), and the only difference I could find was in Compiz. The Hardy machine is running Compiz 0.7.4 and the ThinkPad 0.6.2. Both are using the 6.8.0-1 -ati drivers. I didn't have a chance to attempt to roll back the Compiz packages on the Hardy machine and won't have another chance until at least Monday. I also have no idea how many dependency problems will pop up in trying to do so. If anyone is bored over the weekend and has a current Hardy install, it might be worth trying to roll back to Compiz 0.6.2 to see if the latest 0.7.4 version is the culprit for the freeze. I still haven't seen a freeze on the Fedora 8 ThinkPad and it's been almost a month of 8+ hour daily use with Compiz enabled. And the most obvious difference is in the Compiz packages.

I have the same problem on my laptop until now :( I have an Acer Aspire 2026 with an ATI mobility radeon 9700.

I must use the vesa driver but the display is not correct : 1024x768 and my screen is 1280x800...
If I use the ATI drivers the screen resolution is correct but the computer freezes just after GDM. I must use the "failsafe seesion" to log in.

Oh and btw, I tried to use the open source ati driver by configuring xorg.conf, but it fails ! X freezes, and can't display anything... (just the mouse cursor in the right resolution).

Well I was disappointed by Ubuntu 7.10, and I was waiting for 8.04 because it's a LTS, but it's even worse... I think I'm just going to switch OS...

I know this isn't exactly helpful, but I still have not had any freeze problems with my ThinkPad T40 (Mobility 9000) running Fedora 8. Like I said before, the only difference I can find between this and my freeze-prone workstation running Ubuntu 8.04 (ATI X600) is the Compiz version (0.6.2 in Fedora 8 versus 0.7.4 in Ubuntu 8.04). I haven't looked into what it would take to roll back Compiz on the workstation, but it might be helpful in isolating the problem. Has anyone else had a chance to look at rolling back Compiz?

If it freezes when switching from one window to another that's a known bug in compiz that will be fixed in hardy-updates. Otherwise I can't think of any change between 0.6 and 0.7.4 that would make it freeze on start.

One upstream reporter says that his issue disappeared by flipping on EXA.

Section "Device"
        ...
        Option "AccelMethod" "EXA"
        ...
EndSection

That is just excellent Bryce!
I have not experienced freezes on Hardy Final since I applied the "EXA" change 3 days ago. (had crashes since Gutsy)

Section "Device"
 Identifier "ATI Technologies Inc RV370 5B60 [Radeon X300 (PCIE)]"
 Driver "ati"
 BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
 Option "AccelMethod" "EXA"
EndSection

Hi Bert,
I have the same ATI Technologies Inc RV370 5B60 [Radeon X300 (PCIE)], the only value which is different is the BusID "PCI:5:0:0".
I dont't want to mess up anything, so please could you take a look at my bug #227936 if "EXA" would be appropriate in my settings. Were the outputs similar when starting compiz in a terminal?
Thanks a lot, I'll appreciate your help.

I have a laptop with a radeon mobility 9600, and I would like to check to see if the "Option 'AccelMethod' 'EXA'" workaround works over here. How do I override the blacklist and enable Compiz on this laptop? I am running Hardy.

> How do I override the blacklist and enable Compiz on this laptop?

mkdir -p $HOME/.config/compiz && echo SKIP_CHECKS=yes >> $HOME/.config/compiz/compiz-manager

I may have the same problem with acer travelmate 4001lmi (mobile radeon 9700 / 64mb).
I disabled compiz, but as soon as a access the screensaver applet or any other 3d apliccation (glxinfo, glxgears...) the system freezes.

This started during 08.04 alpha (even the live / install-cd was affected). It was fixed in the stable version but after updating the system, it reoccurred.
Fedora9 shows the same symptoms.

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-ati/+bug/195721
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/203007

switching from XAA to EXA solved my problems with an ATI Mobility Radeon X700 (RV410 - M26). I don't get any freezes with Compiz enabled any more even if I try to run more 3d Applications simultaneously. I have tested it for about two weeks before I post here.

Option "AccelMethod" "EXA"

Update:
News from Alex Deucher
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg-announce/2008-June/000585.html
Lets hope it can be expected in Hardy 8.04

I think for me it was two causes of my freezes. First it was ati fglrx drivers that made it freeze when I used effects and so on. But have now changed to the open gl drivers and doesn't have any freezes when using the computer heavily. Now my computer only freezes when I don't use it. If I leave my computer on without using the processor so much it will allmost without fail hang itself until I use it again:( Only reisub helps

My random freezes continues and I guess that's the problem for others also. Should I give up the LTS version until next comes out in 2-3 years?

Does anyone know what the plan is for the future of this release. I understand that it seems like a very difficult problem but something that works perfectly on previus machines doens't work now. This version isn't stable for me and ok I can fix this(maybe) by upgrading kernel as was suggested to the one that 8.10 would use. But will that really be the solution you ask every newcomer to linux to use when they chose a LTS version for this year and years to come?

I would really appriciate a comment on this subject.

I'm not meaning to be rude and I really like ubuntu and have it as anlo operating system. If you ignore the stability I would say it is the best operatingsystem I've tried.

Sorry for my bad english.

Hmm sees that I posted this in the wrong place. Sorry.

From Alex's reply on the upstream bug, it sounds like these freezes are common symptoms of a variety of independent bugs - the best default settings for EXA, AGP, etc. etc. are extremely hardware specific. Thus, each of these issues needs to be treated as a separate bug.

So what I'd like to do is focus this particular bug report on Nick's hardware (and anyone else that has identical hardware), and please have each of the rest of you file NEW bugs for your freeze issue. When you do so, please include the following in your report:

 * /etc/X11/xorg.conf
 * /var/log/Xorg.0.log and /var/log/Xorg.0.log.old from after when you've had a freeze
 * Output of lspci -vvnn
 * A full backtrace (see https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingXorg for directions)
 * A description of what happens. Was Compiz running? What are the exact symptoms? How long have you noticed the issue? What steps seem most likely to reproduce the issue?

Meanwhile, since it seems a fix is not at hand, I'm dropping the milestone for this particular case of the issue.

Thanks for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. In the development cycle for Intrepid there have been some vast improvements in the open source ati video driver and we could use your help testing them. Could you please download the latest Alpha CD image of Intrepid and test this particular bug just using the Live CD? You can find the latest image at http://www.ubuntu.com/testing . Your testing can help make Ubuntu and the open source ati driver even better! Thanks in advance.

I'm not sure if this is the same problem...

I tried Intrepid Alpha 4 but I'm still unable to use the desktop installation cd. I tried several times.
- System freezes a few seconds after x starts.
- System freezes a few seconds after x starts but I can move the mouse-cursor.
- System freezes a few seconds after x starts and the cursor moves very slow as if the system is under high load.

System is an acer Travelmate 4001lmi with ati radeon mobility 9700.

Noticeable are two more things:
picture1: Splash-Screen during first boot of alpha 4 on this machine.
picture2: Splash-Screen during the next boots (the white characters move as if they were boot-messages.
Something goes wrong with the graphic card which persists the reboot...X is displayed correctly.

I pressed the power button before.

The issues in your screen captures are reported in bug #245849 and bug #243682

@kede, your issue is not this bug. Report it separately; don't simply pick one that sounds similar and add comments to it.

Still awaiting word from Nick, so keeping as Incomplete.

Based on the description of the symptoms, it sounds like (at least for some reporters) this might be caused by an incorrect AGPMode setting, which is used when DRI is enabled. If you're seeing a hang, you should test if changing this makes the issue go away. In your /etc/X11/xorg.conf set AGPMode to various values like this:

Section "Device"
   ...
   Option "AGPMode" "2"
EndSection

Possible values include 1, 2, 4, 8. You can see what it's currently set to by looking in /var/log/Xorg.0.log. It's worthwhile to test all four values even once you find one that works. If this takes care of it for you, we may be able to establish a quirk to set it for your hardware combo, if you can provide the following data:

  * AGPMode value(s) that work
  * Make/Model of laptop or motherboard
  * Output of lspci -vvnn
  * Is the system all factory hardware, or have any parts been replaced?
  * Is there an AGP Mode in the system BIOS?
    - If so, is it set to the factory default?

For more details on this, please see the "ATI AGP Mode Quirk" section at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/X/Quirks

I have exactly the same problem as billythegates describes. (see qoute below)

I found that when I uninstall the fglrx driver (by unselecting it in the proprientary hardware drivers dialog) then the default driver is better. It unfortunately still freezes occasionally...I hope this mobility radeon bug can be fixed soon.

I have a LG LM50a notebook with a Mobility Radeon 9600.

Qouting Billythegates:
"
I've got a similar problem with my almost identical ThinkPad T42 / Mobility Radeon 9600 chip.
Well, with the latest version of the fglrx driver compiz runs perfectly well and the machine is also able to suspend properly. But however, when I try to resume - with compiz previously enabled - I a get a grey and somewhat speckled slim bar on the lower right of the screen with some artifacts around the mouse cursor. The mouse can be moved but nothing else will work - compiz desktop will just not awake a second time!
When I previously disable compiz and then set my machine in suspend mode, this grey bar shows up as well, but only for a couple of milliseconds and then the desktop appears to start normally.
There is another problem, I don't know if it is related to this one: when I log-off and try to lag back on (with compiz enabled) X freezes totally and the only thing I can do is a hard reboot! This happens every time I try to start X for a second time.
I can provide you with more information - configuration files and logs - just say what you need and where I can find it!
"

By the way, I am currently looking for ways to contribute to linux. I can program and have a computer related degree, I just don't know the linux development scene yet, so If anyone can point me in the right direction I'll be happy to try and help find a fix to this bug!

Cheers.

Hi revanb,

Depends a lot on what your interests are. There's a ton of info available off of https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuDevelopment, although it might be intimidating. Feel free to email me directly if you're interested in working on X stuff and need more direction (also see http://wiki.ubuntu.com/X).

Model: Acer Travelmate 4001lmi.
Replaced Parts: Removed one 256MB Ram Module and inserted a 1GB one (1GB + 256MB).
Flashed Bios some years ago.

Information from Bios Setup:
 System Bios Version: 3A10, Build Time: 10/12/04 22:25:09
 VGA Bios Version: ATI M11-008.018M.017.001
 Product Name: TravelMate 4000
 Manufacture Name: Acer

AGP 1x: Seems to be stable
AGP 2x: Freezes after a few seconds, login not possible. Fan spins up, can't move curor. => Power-Key.
AGP 4x: Login possible, after selecting the screensafer "4D Hypertorus" it is not displayed in the preview window, fan spins up, curor is "sticky" and moves very slow, can't click or type. System still reachable by network. Cant't kill X, does not shut down. => Power-Key.
AGP 8x: Login possible, but slows down before any icons appear on the desktop (the same as with agp 4x).

OS: Ubuntu 8.10 Alpha 4.

According to my information, the Ati mobility radeon 9700/64MB supports AGP 8x (?).
It is the same as mobility radeon 9600 but has a higher clock.

Output of lspci -vvnn: see file.

kede, a quirk for your setup to use AGPMode 1 is included in 1:6.9.0+git20080826.a3cc1d7a-2ubuntu1.

Thank you very much!

I happened to install Windows XP and used this opportunity to check the graphic card with the tool "powerstrip".
Here are the readings:

Interestingly, kede's Windows XP uses AGP x4 (and even FastWrites enabled). One might start to suspect there is a bug in Xorg AGP handling, even though upstream so far says it's a hardware setting incompatibility (card vs bridge).

Hi Nick, it's been some time since we last heard from you - are you still interested in this bug? If so, it'd be great if you could re-test it against intrepid, and provide the info mentioned above. Otherwise, we'll close this as expired; the bug report has wandered a bit from topic so would be nice to get closed out one way or the other.

Hi,

I have just found this bug as until now my ati t60 worked perfectly with ubuntu/compiz. Today I installed Intrepid and I was pretty shoked to find that after I enabled compiz it froze completely in a few minutes of working. No ctrl alt del or ctrl alt backspace would work only a button shutdown. Now I am using no desktop effects and it's a pitty.

Can you advice what else info is needed perhaps I can help more... .

realthor, please see https://wiki.ubuntu.com/X/Quirks#ATI%20AGP%20Mode%20Quirk and file a new bug with Xorg.0.log attached.

We're closing this bug since it is has been some time with no response from the original reporter. However, if the issue still exists please feel free to reopen with the requested information. Also, if you could, please test against the latest version of Ubuntu, since this confirms the bug is one we may be able to pass upstream for help.

Just wanted to report that my problem ( which was similar to this one, but not the same) went away in Intrepid and I am now enjoying Compiz on my ATI Radeon 9600 without any problems. So thank you to all the contributers who are ironing out the ATI issues! I am enjoying my Linux more and more!

Hi Bryce and all,

I'm very sorry that I am reporting so late on this but I didn't have the time to upgrade to Intrepid on my Thinkpad.
Now that I did, I am sorry to report that the freezing problem still exist.

BUT there is a workaround for anyone who's affected (pointed ou to me by Alex Deucher):
You need to set AGP mode to 1 in your Xorg configuration file.

Just add this line to the Section "Device" of your /etc/X11/xorg.conf

 Option "AGPMode" "1"

I have added my xorg.conf for reference.

Unfortunately, it seems there can not be done much about this problem by Ubuntu.
Quoting Alex Deucher:
"There are just too many combinations of agp cards and chipsets that only work at specific settings (some only work at 1x, others only work at 4x or 8x, etc.). We've tried both defaults in the driver, but someone's combination always breaks."

I have the same problems with a
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc RV350 [Mobility Radeon 9600 M10]
I have not yet tested the AGPMode 1 option.

Nick, can you please see https://wiki.ubuntu.com/X/Quirks#ATI%20AGP%20Mode%20Quirk and post the required information here? You probably have given most of the information already, but since this bug report has gotten so long and untidy it would be nice if we could get just the needed information in one block.

jcdutton and all you others, please also see the wiki page and file your own bugs. This bug report only tracks Nick's issue, and your comments here will be kind of lost when we close the report.

For unresolved AGPMode issues, we would like separate bug reports for each card/motherboard combination, so don't hesitate to file your own report.

We're closing this bug since it is has been some time with no response from the original reporter. However, if the issue still exists please feel free to reopen with the requested information. Also, if you could, please test against the latest development version of Ubuntu, since this confirms the bug is one we may be able to pass upstream for help.

Actually I think we have enough info now to do a quirk.

I made test packages for Jaunty in my PPA https://edge.launchpad.net/~tormodvolden/+archive/ppa (-ati and -radeon packages version 6.10.99.99+git20090218.9a108f0a-0ubuntu0tormod2) which you can test - without using AGPMode in xorg.conf of course. Please confirm that it works, and we will push the change upstream and get it into Jaunty.

Nick, did you get a chance to try my test packages?

Sorry, the laptop is mainly my wife's. I do not have Jaunty installed on it.

You can also test 1:6.10.99.99+git20090218.9a108f0a-0ubuntu0tormod2~intrepid for Intrepid.

Patch applied upstream http://cgit.freedesktop.org/xorg/driver/xf86-video-ati/commit/?id=8f7c17a6b77ca368f067c2acb803cc8f9ef19351

Fixed in Jaunty with 1:6.11.0+git20090310.945ccbbd-0ubuntu1

Just wanted to tell that I have exactly the same experience with ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 on current Jaunty Beta with all current updates installed.
Without compiz the radeon-driver seems to run fine.

cljk, then you have to file a new bug, see the wiki page mentioned above.

Is it really the right way to workaround this bug with quirks?

As far as I understand, a quirk changes the default behavior for a specific combination of hardware so that such notebook-models use a certain agp-mode by default.

For my acer this is AGP1x, other modes result in freezes or corrupted graphics. By default, Ubuntu selects AGP4x which is correct because it is the best mode supported by the hardware.
It supports AGP4x and runs fine with fastwrites enabled on Windows XP.

So the problem is not that Ubuntu selects an unsupported AGP mode, the problem is that the highest mode supported by the hardware does not work with Ubuntu.

Are there realy no hints where the real problem is?

kede, I have asked the same but concluded that AGP is black magic. Some proprietary drivers seem to get away with it, but I think the problem is the hardware does not fully comply with the AGP specifications and only the manufacturers know how. I was hoping AMD/ATI opening up would help with this, but almost all their resources (logically) goes towards newer hardware using PCI-E etc.

I can confirm this is fixed in Karmic. See my comment on fd.o

Unfortunately, it just froze on me using Openoffice. Sorry, still not fixed.

10.10 has the problem, 10.04 did not seem to have exhibited the same issue.