What is xfree-drm?

raid517 · l33t Joined: 06 Mar 2003 Posts: 946

Hi well Gentoo is installed and running smoothly - and I finally decided to install X. However, when I installed it, it said "This version of Xfree is not compatible with the ati-drivers.xyz (I can't quite recall the numbering but I do know they were the most recent ati propriatory drivers). If you are using them you must unmerge them (emerge unmerge ati-drivers) and emerge xfree-drm."

Or at least that's what I think it said, as straight afterwards I ran startx and GLX gears and then I lost the message. When I tried to emerge xfree-dri I got an error message saying "Error X11-base/xfree-drm-4.3.0r6 failed, Function src-unpack, line93 exit code 0. Please set at least one video card in VIDEO_CARDS. Use is depreciated. Possible Video_Cards options are matrox, 3DFX, rage128, radeon, sis etc...)." What is xfree-drm (or whatever the correct name is for it) and will this mean that the propriatory ati-drivers will work on my Radeon 9500 Pro graphics card? When I run GLX gears I get a message about 'extension xfree-dri missing on display 0.0'. What does this mean? Any advice anyone can offer will be very welcome.

Thanks in advance,

Q

angill · Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2003 7:20 pm Post subject:

the response you recieved from emerge xfree-drm was because you didn't specify which card you were trying to load. use this :

raid517 · l33t Joined: 06 Mar 2003 Posts: 946

Thanks, that's very helpful. The Gentoo forums (especially the people) really are amazing.

I will give this a go just as soon as KDE stops compiling (which at this rate looks like it might be sometime next year).

I don't suppose anybody knows what GLX Gaers is complaining about when it says 'missing 'dri extension on display 0.0.' do you? I mean I have 'dri' enabled in my XF86Config file, but the message still doesn't go away.

Also, I'm not entirely happy with the idea that I can't use the ATI drivers, what version of XFree can I use so that my machine will be compatable (Radeon 9500 Pro) and what should I specify to emerge it?

Thanks in advance.

Q

Ben2040 · Guru Joined: 07 May 2003 Posts: 445 Location: UK

Hi

Once you have emerged the xfree DRM drivers, they will give you DRI in X without having to change anything else. At least, thats whats suppose to happen. If it doesn't work just search the forums for xfree radeon 9500. There is a really good thread going in the DE section here that may be of use to you.

Ben

raid517 · l33t Joined: 06 Mar 2003 Posts: 946

Thanks guys that worked.

What features should I enable disable in the kernel if I want to enable ati-driver support? Also I'm still not clear about what version of xfree I need to emerge and what the command are to do so if I want ati's propriatory drivers to work...

Is the process of using the ati drivers reversable? It's just that I recall trying once before and simply telling Xfree to use the generic radeon drivers didn't fix it.

Thanks again...

Q

PS

It would be cool if someone could just make a single 'how to' sticky for radeon drivers so that peeps didn't have to read through tons of pages just to be no clearer about the process inviolved. Just a thought, but it would be cool...

raid517 · l33t Joined: 06 Mar 2003 Posts: 946

Yeah I'm on that thread too. I emerged the dri drivers, but I still get that error message "'extension xfree-dri missing on display 0.0'... so no body there or here so far seems to know what it means... If anyone does and can help me resolve it, please let me know.

Q