Setting up Xorg when using LVM

[johngalt]

Hi, all,

I'm trying to work my ay through Xorg setup after a abre metal install on a Lenovo ThinkPad Edge E545 (AMD A6 5350M w/ integrated Radeon HD 8450G, 8 GB RAM, 180 GB SSD). I've installed Gentoo using LVM on the SSD (but not LUKS), and built the install using the 17.1 multilib-strict desktop profile. Kernel boots fine to login.

I'm now at https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Xorg/Guide#Kernel_modesetting and I'm trying to find the setting to enable the modesetting. After some searching, I found that the [url="https://cateee.net/lkddb/web-lkddb/DRM_RADEON_KMS.html"]cateee page for that kernel entry[/url] shows that that setting apperaed in kernels 2.6.33–2.6.39, 3.0–3.8 (but cateee hasn't been updated in a while). The link at cateee under defined in --> the current setting I do see in kernel, userptr - but I'm not sure if that means I should enable it now or not.

Also, since I am using LVM, and thus need an initramfs, I have a feeling I'll need to do more to get this working correctly.

But if I can get my way through this laptop, it'll give me a good basis for another laptop (Dell Inspiron 15 (3521) with an Intel Celeron 1007u CPU, integrated Intel graphics, and that will finally get me to my desktop. All three are LVM / 17.1 dekstop profile machines,.

Also, I'm here to learn, so background info and 'theory' will be great - if I can understand the process of what I need to do, and where I need to make changes from what I see invariouos wiki articles, I'll be able to more easily adapt for the next two machines.
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[NeddySeagoon]

johngalt,

A few pointers. You need either the Radeon or AMDGPU set up. There is some overlap and I'm not sure where your GPU falls.

If you build the kernel part of the driver into the kernel, you must also build the required firmware into the kernel.
If the kernel driver is a module but not in your initrd, it will be loaded after root is mounted. The firmware needs to be in /lib/firmware.
If its modular and in the initrd, the firmware needs to be there too.

Another point. You need some other console driver too or you won't get anything on the console until the kernel driver loads.
If you have a bit missing, that might be never.

I have root on LVM on raid5. My initrd is hand rolled and kernel agnostic, its only the userspace tools. I have the amdgpu dirver built into my kernel but it took several attempts to get the fimware right.
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Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

[johngalt]

Yup. I aggregated knowloedge from many different pages, including the Radeon wiki page, to finally get a working setup for the Radeon firmware blobs directly into the kernel. It took a lot of reading and cross-checking before I finally found the correct way to do it all. The setup for nVidia graphics cards (using nouveau) and especially for Intel integrated graphics makes me leery, a bit - but I'll see - maybe it really *is* that simple.

I'm slugging my way through the X setup now, about to test and see whether I've gotten everytihng set up correctly or not.

Based on what you said, is the antithesis true? Meaning, if I make the firmware !modular but built-in to the kernel as well as the relevant video driver kernel config entries all set to "Y" versus "M, do I need to manually build it into the initramfs, or does genkernel handle that for me when I build the initramfs using the instructions on the LVM wiki? I *think* it does, as it definitely says it looks for and finds the curent kernel .config every time I have run it - and both laptops are definitely getting display output during boot (beyond grub - I see all the dmesg output scrolling by on boot), so that tells me I've done something right for a change, no?

Another thing to learn - how to 'inspect' my initramfs and see what is included.

The hits just keep on coming - but I like it this way - more knowledge.
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[NeddySeagoon]

johngalt,

I've never used genkernel since I hate the autoblackmagic for anything.

Your initrd is in one of two formats. If its really an initramfs, its a cpio archive of other cpio archives.
You can take it apart with cpio ... maybe recursively.

If its an old fashioned initrd. its a compressed file containing an ext2 filesystem.
You can decompress it and mount it with -o loop.

The former is more likely today. Experiment is the spice of life. Only one method will work.

For all things that need firmware, the firmware must be available when the kernel code initialises.
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Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

[johngalt]

re: atuo(black)magically doing things - yeah, that's one of the reasons I started with Gentoo so many years ago and one of the primary reasons I have come back to it. I prefer to be in control of what my machine loads - if I want full hardware scanning on boot every time I boot, I can always go back to WinX for that. Although, at this point in my life, I'm more likely to, instead, use the Live DVD and create the persistent partition mentioned to save my changes as persistent through reboots. Unless I ma required to at work in the future, I don't foresee me having a Windows bare metal install again.

But, it's still baby steps for me, as I'm not one of those people who have been using Linux extensively for the past decade (or 3), so the vast majority of this is a new learning process for me, albeit without as steep of a learning curve as it would be for a true new user of Linux. For one, I've already been exposed to it before, although it was a vastly different beast then. For another, I was also a cl junkie in the old DOS days on my Tandy 1000 EX, so I'm extremely comfortable with cli, which helps a lot when tackling this install for a first time.

I used genkernel because the LVM wiki said to, and also because I honestly did not know (until later reading) that I could do all this manually (from, of all things, yet another post here in the forums, detailing the steps required). From everything I have read, it is, indeed, a cpio of cpios. Once I get the basics tackled, I'll be taking on new projects, and a manual initramfs will definitely be one of them.

Speaking of helpful posts, my list of bookmarked posts that I have found helpful is growing almost exponentially as I read something that I know will help me out later on even if I am unable (or unwilling, I suppose) to make use of the information presented now, and when including various wiki pages, wiki guides, and related material, I have a nice little book for getting me started.

The best part, though, is that I've also been keeping a few running text file with the various commands that I am using, in the order that I use them, complete with file edits (make.conf, various package.use files, etc.) to help me streamline the process, all saved to my Google drive periodically, so I have easy access to them, and don't ahve to open 7 different tabs just to get one feature working on my next go around (EFI and X are 2 great examples of needing multiple references in order to get things working correctly).
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