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x server update

Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2009 11:26 pm
by lewispm
I have an Acer Extensa 4420 laptop with a Radeon x1200 video card.

Code: Select all

$lspci
...
01:05.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc RS690M [Radeon X1200 Series]
...
Ubuntu 9.04's x server version causes all versions of the drivers for this card to fail, leaving the generic driver which is not usable for me.

I have installed linux mint 6 to get the latest working version on my computer, but now it says there is an update for xserver-xorg-core available.

Is it safe to upgrade this package? Will the 9.04 xorg server version ever be backported to 8.10, or is it safe to upgrade forever on this version of linux mint?

The installed version is 2:1.5.2-2ubuntu3 and synaptic wants to install 2:1.5.2-2ubuntu3.1, so it seems safe to me. I can't remember what version kills the old radeon cards.

Thanks for the help.

Re: x server update

Posted: Thu Jun 11, 2009 2:17 am
by emorrp1
lewispm wrote:Will the 9.04 xorg server version ever be backported to 8.10, or is it safe to upgrade forever on this version of linux mint?
No, such a major change so low on the application stack won't be backported, which is more for new versions of apps. However that doesn't mean it's safe to upgrade forever, Felicia will only be supported for another year, but that's long enough to let you install mint 9 LTS soon after!
lewispm wrote:The installed version is 2:1.5.2-2ubuntu3 and synaptic wants to install 2:1.5.2-2ubuntu3.1
In this case, it's a reasonably safe upgrade (though it's probably marked as level 4 or lower in mintUpdate, so proceed with caution). The version number after "ubuntu" is just a re-packaging, which means there weren't any major changes, just a couple of bugfixes. It's the major version before the "ubuntu" that you want to look out for, which means a new upstream release, though as I said before that shouldn't happen.

As for the hardware issue (which will be identical in mint), ATI dropped all support for our mobile radeon cards back in February (in windows too), so their proprietary drivers are no longer available, leaving the open-source "radeon" driver in its place (is this what you mean by generic). The good news is that before they dropped support they publicly released the full hardware specs, so the radeon driver should improve rapidly (though I haven't had any problems so far), so keep checking back with new releases (you can try out the live CD to test incompatibilities) to see if the situation has improved. In the meantime, enjoy Felicia!

Re: x server update

Posted: Sun Jun 14, 2009 2:26 pm
by lewispm
thanks for the excellent reply.

I have tried many distros, and this is my second go at mint. I had the version prior to felicia on my acer laptop for about 6 months or so, then I got a wild hare and tried xubuntu 9.04 which is how I discovered the video incompatibility. So I'm back at in the mint mix, and I like it a lot.

Its good to hear the radeon driver will improve. I hope its advertised well so I can switch over asap. I loved the speed of 9.04 especially with ext4.