AMD 5350/Kabini video driver problems

[wh7qq]

I am doing a fresh Linux Mint 17.1 Xfce install on an AMD5350/Kabini on an ASUS AM1M-A mobo. All went well until I tried to install the proprietary driver for AMD graphics using the Driver Manager. When the fglrx driver installed, the screen went black and I had a dead system...could not bring up a terminal or even do a RSEIUB. I cannot find any config files in /etc/X11 or in /usr/share/ to delete using a live system. Is there any way to recover this install?

[wh7qq]

Everything is ok up to installing the AMD drivers...then it dies. One other minor problem...pm-suspend does not work, either from gui or console. It shuts down but wakes up w/o video.

[roblm]

I just finished building a new system two days ago. I had contemplated using a quad core APU based on the newer AMD Kabini APU platform verses the older Richland
APU platform. The low power usage of the Kabini APU was very enticing. I decided not to use the Kabini APU because of the greater potential for problems since it may still be too
new for satisfactory Linux support. The GPU on your Kabini is a Radeon HD 8400 and on mine is a HD 8570D.

At the black screen can you enter the virtual console tty1 by pressing Ctrl+Alt+F1? If you can, then use these commands :

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sudo service mdm stop
sudo apt-get remove fglrx

If that doesn't work, then at the GRUB boot menu select Recovery Mode. If no menu shows, then hold down the Shift key while starting. In the menu, select
“root - drop to root shell prompt”. When asked for the root password, just type your user password. Then change the file permissions to read and write by typing:

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mount -o remount,rw /	

Then type:

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apt-get remove fglrx 

Then type “reboot”

You'll go back to the Recovery Mode menu. Don't click anything, just wait about 7 seconds for the reboot.

You'll have to keep using the radeon driver, try installing the fglrx-updates driver, try installing the AMD Catalyst 14.6 Beta driver or try using a discrete graphics card.

[wh7qq]

@robim: Thanks for the response and sorry I am late getting back...out of town without a computer for a few days. My system was completely unusable after trying to load the fglrx drivers. I was unable to access the console by any means (ctl-Alt F1...F6) and rebooting left me in the same condition. I have been round and round with this system and now it is working but oddly, no grub menu screen appears when booting. I am loath to mess with it now...had a horrible time getting the right bios settings in this UEFI abortion... but I do not recommend this combination (Asus MA1M-A and AMD 5350) for Linux installs at this point. There is another problem as well...the "Log Out" does not work...screen remains but gets dead slow...which may tie to the implementation of sleep modes in this UEFI (curse) bios.

[roblm]

I have been round and round with this system and now it is working but oddly, no grub menu screen appears when booting. I am loath to mess with it now...had a horrible time getting the
right bios settings in this UEFI abortion...

I assume you did a reinstallation and are using the radeon driver now? If you can't get into Recovery Mode by holding down the Shift key, then try repeatedly tapping the key while starting. For me that
didn't even work on my new system with an SSD drive since it boots up so quickly. Use this command in the Terminal to open the GRUB file:

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sudo /etc/default/grub

Add a hash mark (#) to the beginning of this line if you want the GRUB menu to be displayed at each startup.

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GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=0

If you want it to remain hidden, then change the value to 1 or higher. This will be the seconds that the menu will be available to access. You still may have to repeatedly tap the Shift key.

Then update GRUB with this command:

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sudo update-grub

Once Recovery Mode is available, then you can reverse the changes from installing drivers, if there are startup problems. Probably the AMD Catalyst driver only has a chance of working. Or continue using
the radeon driver, which is adequate for most users.

Is UEFI mode set in the BIOS now or Legacy Mode?

[wh7qq]

@robim: Thanks for the hints on GRUB...will plug those "#" in. I think I have the bios in the non-UEFI mode now...not sure. Hard to keep track of all the thrashing about I do in trying to sort out things. The bios interface is confusing in spite of or because of all the fancy stuff...this old codger yearns for the good old days of text mode bios.