Gentoo Linux ATi FAQ

1. Hardware Support

Almost every ATI board is supported by xorg-x11, at least for the 2D accelerated features. The 3D support is provided either by the DRI project, which is already present inside the xorg-x11, or by closed source drivers provided by ATI.

GPU	Common Name	Support
rage128	Rage128	xorg DRI
r100	Radeon7xxx, Radeon64	xorg DRI
r200, r250, r280	Radeon8500, Radeon9000, Radeon9200	xorg DRI, ATI DRI
r300, following	Radeon 9500 - 9800	xorg 2D, ATI DRI

I have an All-In-Wonder/Vivo board. Are the multimedia features supported?

The multimedia features are actually supported by the GATOS project , the gatos drivers will be merged in the xorg tree shortly.

I'm not using an x86. What are my options?

You have almost the same x11 support on ppc or alpha platform but you can't use the ATI closed source drivers. That means that you can't use the r300 3d features at all. If you have such a board and you want it supported by x11, you should contact ATI and ask them to open the specs.

I have a laptop. Is my "mobility" ATI model supported?

It should be but you may have a configuration issue due to the OEM PCI id that such chips may have. In most cases you may have to write the configuration file yourself or use the xorgconfig.

2. Installation

Packages

The xorg-x11 ebuild provides the X11 implementation. The kernel modules required by DRI are provided by the 2.6.x kernels, if you are still using the 2.4.x you should emerge the x11-drm ebuild, and ati-drivers provides the ATI closed source X drivers and kernel modules, for 2.4 kernels and 2.6 ones.

Important: Your kernel must have agpgart support and not have the DRM modules compiled in.

Code Listing 2.1: Installing drivers (for 2.4 systems)

// If you want just the Rage128 drivers and modules installed with x11
# VIDEO_CARDS="rage128" emerge x11-drm
// To have just the Radeon support
// (r100, r200, r250, but not r300 yet)
# VIDEO_CARDS="radeon" emerge x11-drm
// To install the ATI closed source drivers
// (r200,r250 and r300 only)
# emerge ati-drivers
// To install just X11 but not install
// any kernel module
# emerge xorg-x11

Code Listing 2.2: Installing just xorg (for 2.6 systems)

// If you want to install xorg-x11
# emerge xorg-x11
// To install the ATI closed source drivers
// (r200,r250 and r300 only)
# emerge ati-drivers

Configuration

It is suggested the use of xorgcfg, xorgconfig or directly by using the Xorg auto configuration option:

Code Listing 2.3: Autoconfiguring X

# X -configure

For more information on how to get a basic xorg.conf configuration file, please refer to the Gentoo Desktop Documentation Resources.

Note: Users of the ati-drivers can also use fglrxconfig.

Important: PPC users could use the Xautoconf stand alone configurator by emerging the Xautoconf ebuild, but isn't required.

The contents of this document are licensed under the Creative Commons - Attribution / Share Alike license.

Updated October 25, 2004

Luca Barbato
Author

Jorge Paulo
Editor

Tiemo Kieft
Editor

Summary: This FAQ should help users avoid some common installation and configuration issues related to DRI and x11 for ATI boards.