AMD/ATI RV250/M9 on Mint KDE 18.3 fails to start SOLVED

[rcdawson]

I have an antique, 32 bit laptop that runs Mint KDE 17.3 without a problem, but will not boot with Mint KDE 18.3.

It will boot and run perfectly if I interrupt boot and add "nomodeset xforcevesa" to the Linux line.

System: Host: LCLaptop Kernel: 4.10.0-38-generic i686 (32 bit gcc: 5.4.0) Desktop: KDE Plasma 5.8.8 (Qt 5.6.1)
Distro: Linux Mint 18.3 Sylvia
Graphics: Card: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] RV250/M9 GL [Mobility FireGL 9000/Radeon 9000] bus-ID: 01:00.0
Display Server: X.Org 1.18.4 drivers: ati,vesa (unloaded: fbdev,radeon) Resolution: 1400x1050@60.00hz
GLX Renderer: Gallium 0.4 on llvmpipe (LLVM 4.0, 128 bits)
GLX Version: 3.0 Mesa 17.0.7 Direct Rendering: Yes

I attempted to find an alternate driver using the KDE driver manager, but no alternatives were offered.

Any suggestions on what driver would work, where I might find it, and how to install it would be appreciated? Failing a suitable driver, how can I modify the boot process permanently, so that I don't have to interrupt it to add "nomodeset xforcevesa" every time I boot?

Thank you.
Richard

[deepakdeshp]

https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1613132

[rcdawson]

Perfect. Thank you.
Richard