Driver for Radeon HD 4000 Series

[pdmptsjtsj]

Hi, I installed Mint Sylvia on my 2010 Imac. I added nomodeset to /etc/default/grub to avoid a black screen after booting.
But now after startup I get the message that Mint is running in software rendering mode, without video hardware acceleration which result in high cpu usage (and a warm back of my Imac).
The output of inxi -Gx is:

Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] RV730/M96-XT [Mobility Radeon HD 4670]
bus-ID: 01:00.0
Display Server: X.Org 1.18.4 drivers: fbdev,ati (unloaded: vesa,radeon)
Resolution: 1920x1080@77.00hz
GLX Renderer: Gallium 0.4 on llvmpipe (LLVM 4.0, 128 bits)
GLX Version: 3.0 Mesa 17.0.7 Direct Rendering: Yes

I have already learned from other forum posts that my graphic card is cheap and prehistoric. What could be the best option for me to resolve this issue?

[Hoser Rob]

You don't specify much but I suspect you're running Cinnamon because you get the "running in software rendering mode". Unfortunately this is the wrong choice for a 2010 machine with AMD 4xxx graphics.

There aren't any closed binary Linux drivers for that card or any others older than the 5xxx series (or maybe 6xxx now) and haven't been for a few years. The open source driver (radeon) is the only one there is, Installing drivers for older releases WILL bork your video.

That bit in your inxi report saying "GLX Renderer: Gallium 0.4 on llvmpipe" does indicate that you don't have any 3D hardware accel. Cinnamon requires this just by itself, even if you supposedly disable effects. It's just not meant for old machines.

My suggestion would be to back up data and do a clean reinstall of a lighter Mint DE version like Mate or Xfce. And you'll want to go into desktop settings and disable ALL effects ... with no 3D hardware accelerated video the eye candy is out.

Some may tell you to just install Mate over your existing Cinnamon install biut NO knowledgeable users do this. Having another DE in the same install will just likely break things.

[pdmptsjtsj]

Thanks. I am indeed running Cinnamon.

[pdmptsjtsj]

Ok, so I understood that I could work around the problem by installing Mate, which boils down to not having hardware acceleration, which will keep on loading my CPU when running graphic software of games (also in Mate).
So please forgive me for looking for another solution. I looked a bit further and found an alternative (mesa 3D driver) to llvmpipe. I found Oibaf https://launchpad.net/~oibaf/+archive/u ... cs-drivers, which is made for Ubuntu but from what I understood this shouldn't pose a problem. Does this make a chance of resolving the issue?

[Minterator]

Here's what I get in 18.3 without any proprietary driver.

Code: Select all

$ /usr/lib/nux/unity_support_test -p
OpenGL vendor string:   X.Org
OpenGL renderer string: Gallium 0.4 on AMD ARUBA (DRM 2.49.0 / 4.10.0-42-generic, LLVM 4.0.0)
OpenGL version string:  3.0 Mesa 17.0.7

Not software rendered:    yes
Not blacklisted:          yes
GLX fbconfig:             yes
GLX texture from pixmap:  yes
GL npot or rect textures: yes
GL vertex program:        yes
GL fragment program:      yes
GL vertex buffer object:  yes
GL framebuffer object:    yes
GL version is 1.4+:       yes

Unity 3D supported:       yes

Code: Select all

$ inxi -G
Graphics:  Card: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Trinity [Radeon HD 7640G]
           Display Server: X.Org 1.18.4 drivers: ati,radeon (unloaded: fbdev,vesa)
           Resolution: 1366x768@60.06hz
           GLX Renderer: Gallium 0.4 on AMD ARUBA (DRM 2.49.0 / 4.10.0-42-generic, LLVM 4.0.0)
           GLX Version: 3.0 Mesa 17.0.7