[SOLVED] Restart Graphics Drivers with a Keyboard Shortcut?

[SpookyNoodle]

Hi all!

My system is pretty old, I haven't had the funds to upgrade it or do a new build in a long time, and for a little over a year, I've been dealing with crashes: on Windows, whatever game or program I was running would freeze up, then the screen would go black, then my normal desktop environment would appear, except that whatever program I was previously running would be totally blank, and windows would greet me with a little dialog box saying "There was a graphics timeout, and we've restarted the graphics drivers." This whole process would take anywhere from 15 to 45 seconds, from the first freeze to when I had control again and could re-start the central effect program.

Now, after my switch to Mint, things are mostly running better, but that hasn't stopped the crashes, although, now they appear quite different. I get a freeze, and then various stages of frozen decay, before I'm greeted by a login screen. It takes the same amount of time, it's just that the results are different.

Now, I'm not asking you guys to solve this or anything, I know that the only real way to solve the problem is to get a new graphics card. I've already tried updating the drivers, rolling back the drivers, playing on minimal settings, and all of those options on both Windows and Mint. But I couldn't afford anything in November 2019, I certainly can't afford a new graphics card in the middle of the current micro chip shortage, so it's just an inconvenience I'm going to keep living with, unfortunately.

However, my question is this: is there a way to quickly restart the Mint graphics drivers (preferably in some way that I could set up and execute with a key bind)? When the system logs me out, it also closes all of the programs I had up previously, which is a bit more disruptive than the solution Windows was (purportedly) implementing to fix the freeze. If there isn't anything like that, then that's fine, I just thought I would ask.

EDIT: For those finding this in the future, there isn't a way to really do this in Mint.

Results of inxi:

Code: Select all

System:
  Kernel: 5.4.0-72-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 9.3.0 
  Desktop: Cinnamon 4.8.6 wm: muffin 4.8.1 dm: LightDM 1.30.0 
  Distro: Linux Mint 20.1 Ulyssa base: Ubuntu 20.04 focal 
Machine:
  Type: Desktop Mobo: ASRock model: AB350 Pro4 serial: <filter> 
  UEFI: American Megatrends v: P5.00 date: 07/05/2018 
CPU:
  Topology: 6-Core model: AMD Ryzen 5 1600 bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Zen 
  rev: 1 L2 cache: 3072 KiB 
  flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 sse4a ssse3 svm 
  bogomips: 76653 
  Speed: 1374 MHz min/max: 1550/3200 MHz boost: enabled Core speeds (MHz): 
  1: 1374 2: 1375 3: 1374 4: 1375 5: 1375 6: 1375 7: 1375 8: 1373 9: 1374 
  10: 1375 11: 1375 12: 1375 
Graphics:
  Device-1: AMD Ellesmere [Radeon RX 470/480/570/570X/580/580X/590] 
  vendor: PC Partner Limited driver: amdgpu v: kernel bus ID: 26:00.0 
  chip ID: 1002:67df 
  Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.9 driver: amdgpu,ati 
  unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,vesa tty: N/A 
  OpenGL: renderer: AMD Radeon RX 480 Graphics (POLARIS10 DRM 3.35.0 
  5.4.0-72-generic LLVM 11.0.1) 
  v: 4.6 Mesa 21.0.2 - kisak-mesa PPA direct render: Yes 
Audio:
  Device-1: AMD Ellesmere HDMI Audio [Radeon RX 470/480 / 570/580/590] 
  vendor: PC Partner Limited driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus ID: 26:00.1 
  chip ID: 1002:aaf0 
  Device-2: AMD Family 17h HD Audio vendor: ASRock driver: snd_hda_intel 
  v: kernel bus ID: 28:00.3 chip ID: 1022:1457 
  Device-3: Blue Microphones Yeti Stereo Microphone type: USB 
  driver: hid-generic,snd-usb-audio,usbhid bus ID: 3-3:3 chip ID: b58e:9e84 
  serial: <filter> 
  Device-4: C-Media Audio Adapter (Unitek Y-247A) type: USB 
  driver: hid-generic,snd-usb-audio,usbhid bus ID: 1-7:3 chip ID: 0d8c:0014 
  Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.4.0-72-generic 
Network:
  Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet 
  vendor: ASRock driver: r8169 v: kernel port: d000 bus ID: 25:00.0 
  chip ID: 10ec:8168 
  IF: enp37s0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter> 
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 6.60 TiB used: 634.64 GiB (9.4%) 
  ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: SanDisk model: SD8SBAT256G1122 size: 238.47 GiB 
  speed: 6.0 Gb/s serial: <filter> rev: 3000 scheme: GPT 
  ID-2: /dev/sdb type: USB vendor: Seagate model: Backup+ Hub BK 
  size: 3.64 TiB serial: <filter> rev: D781 scheme: GPT 
  ID-3: /dev/sdc vendor: Western Digital model: WD30EZRZ-00Z5HB0 
  size: 2.73 TiB speed: 6.0 Gb/s rotation: 5400 rpm serial: <filter> 
  rev: 0A80 scheme: GPT 
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 216.77 GiB used: 12.03 GiB (5.6%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda2 
  ID-2: /home size: 2.69 TiB used: 152.64 GiB (5.6%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sdc1 
  ID-3: swap-1 size: 17.14 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) fs: swap dev: /dev/sda3 
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 28.5 C mobo: N/A gpu: amdgpu temp: 33 C 
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A gpu: amdgpu fan: 799 
Repos:
  No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/brave-browser-release.list 
  1: deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/brave-browser-archive-keyring.gpg arch=amd64] https://brave-browser-apt-release.s3.brave.com/ stable main
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-chrome.list 
  1: deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/kisak-kisak-mesa-focal.list 
  1: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/kisak/kisak-mesa/ubuntu focal main
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/lutris-team-lutris-focal.list 
  1: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/lutris-team/lutris/ubuntu focal main
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/official-package-repositories.list 
  1: deb http://mirrors.xmission.com/linuxmint ulyssa main upstream import backport
  2: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal main restricted universe multiverse
  3: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-updates main restricted universe multiverse
  4: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-backports main restricted universe multiverse
  5: deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ focal-security main restricted universe multiverse
  6: deb http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu/ focal partner
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/slgobinath-gcalendar-focal.list 
  1: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/slgobinath/gcalendar/ubuntu focal main
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/spotify.list 
  1: deb http://repository.spotify.com stable non-free
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/teams.list 
  1: deb [arch=amd64] https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/ms-teams stable main
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/vscode.list 
  1: deb [arch=amd64,arm64,armhf signed-by=/etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/packages.microsoft.gpg] https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/code stable main
Info:
  Processes: 323 Uptime: 4h 25m Memory: 15.63 GiB used: 2.31 GiB (14.8%) 
  Init: systemd v: 245 runlevel: 5 Compilers: gcc: 9.3.0 alt: 9 Shell: zsh 
  v: 5.8 running in: terminator inxi: 3.0.38 
  

Results of xrandr:

Code: Select all

Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1920 x 1080, maximum 16384 x 16384
DisplayPort-0 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
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	Timestamp:  13405
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  1920x1080 (0x5b) 148.500MHz +HSync +VSync +preferred
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[kelebek333]

Kernel: 5.4.0-72-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 9.3.0

You can try to install newer kernel series with following command. Then reboot.

Code: Select all

 sudo apt install --install-recommends linux-generic-hwe-20.04

v: 4.6 Mesa 21.0.2 - kisak-mesa PPA direct render: Yes

You have updated mesa packages, but these packages are not related with GPU driver, this packages are includes improvements related with OpenGL etc. support.
Improvements related with amdgpu driver (or Ryzen CPU) comes with newer kernel series. The freezing issue may also be solved with newer kernel series.

[SpookyNoodle]

You can try to install newer kernel series with following command. Then reboot.

I gave it a shot, but this message (and ones very similar to it) were printed during the installation process.

W: Possible missing firmware /lib/firmware/amdgpu/navi12_dmcu.bin for module amdgpu

Is that something I should be worried about, or is it pretty normal?

Improvements related with amdgpu driver (or Ryzen CPU) comes with newer kernel series. The freezing issue may also be solved with newer kernel series.

I would be very impressed if a single kernel update managed to fix such a persistent issue when it's survived dozens of Windows/driver versions, but fingers crossed! I believe in the strange Linux-hacky-voodoo-magic

On a different note, is there some way that I can enable GPU-logging? Maybe it will write stuff to a text file, and then if/when I experience another crash, I can look at it and see what exactly is going wrong ??

[kelebek333]

I gave it a shot, but this message (and ones very similar to it) were printed during the installation process.

W: Possible missing firmware /lib/firmware/amdgpu/navi12_dmcu.bin for module amdgpu

Most likely, these firmware files are added to the system with the update of linux-firmware package and then you will no longer see these outputs. Also, these firmware files are not related to your device. For this reason, you can ignore the outputs.

On a different note, is there some way that I can enable GPU-logging? Maybe it will write stuff to a text file, and then if/when I experience another crash, I can look at it and see what exactly is going wrong ??

You can use the gnome-logs application for logs. Amdgpu driver can be filtered from Hardware tab.

[SMG]

I believe in the strange Linux-hacky-voodoo-magic

There have been a lot of issues noted with first gen Ryzen processors and freezing issues on Mint. I do not know if that might be related to the issue you are seeing.

Solutions for computers with Ryzen processors with the first gen Zen chipset are mentioned in this post. Read through it and the subsequent posts as well as the links for some tips that may help. The issues seen seem to be power-state related issues and the person in that thread changed his/her power supply idle control to get the system stabilized. Quite a few people have found success doing that. I do not know if that was a recommendation for Windows installs for first gen Ryzens.

I believe at least some of those tips are also included in this web page Fix system freezing trouble with AMD Ryzen CPU's.

[SpookyNoodle]

Well, I applied the steps from the article you linked, but this doesn't really answer my question: is there a way to force a graphics driver restart?

[SMG]

Well, I applied the steps from the article you linked, but this doesn't really answer my question: is there a way to force a graphics driver restart?

One can restart X Server which loads/manages the graphics drivers with Ctl-Alt-Backspace, but that will shut down any open programs. I am not aware of any way of reloading the driver without restarting that which controls the driver (which is what I understand your question to be).

The graphics driver for your card comes from the kernel. I do not know the specifics of the amdgpu driver in reference to the particular AMD card you have, so I do not know if the newer drivers in the newer kernel you just installed impact your card.

[SpookyNoodle]

One can restart X Server which loads/manages the graphics drivers with Ctl-Alt-Backspace, but that will shut down any open programs. I am not aware of any way of reloading the driver without restarting that which controls the driver (which is what I understand your question to be).

Yeah, that basically cuts to the core of it, I'm trying to restart the thing that translates processes into a display, without actually shutting down those processes, which it sounds like Mint can't do. That's totally fine, I just figured I'd ask in case there was some neat work-around or hack that I could try.

I've applied the suggestions that people have made, like updating the kernel and adjusting settings to match my Ryzen processor, and I haven't had any crashes yet, so I guess we'll see. I'm gonna mark this one as [SOLVED], since my question about a quick restart has been answered. Thanks all!