Questions about hardware and drivers
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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Sun Mar 22, 2015 1:17 pm
G'day! I'm having trouble with what I believe is the i915 driver in Betsy Every so often, black bars form across the background, and icons disappear in Firefox.
According to
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fred@mark14:62 ~ $ inxi -Gx
Graphics: Card: Intel 82915G/GV/910GL Integrated Graphics Controller
bus-ID: 00:02.0
Display Server: X.Org 1.16.4 drivers: intel (unloaded: fbdev,vesa)
Resolution: 1366x768@59.79hz
GLX Renderer: Mesa DRI Intel 915G x86/MMX/SSE2
GLX Version: 2.1 Mesa 10.3.2 Direct Rendering: Yes
fred@mark14:62 ~ $ sudo lshw -C video
[sudo] password for fred:
*-display
description: VGA compatible controller
product: 82915G/GV/910GL Integrated Graphics Controller
vendor: Intel Corporation
physical id: 2
bus info: pci@0000:00:02.0
version: 04
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pm vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom
configuration: driver=i915 latency=0
resources: irq:16 memory:cfe80000-cfefffff ioport:c800(size=8) memory:d0000000-dfffffff memory:cfe40000-cfe7ffff
I'm using the i915 driver. I need to know how to get and install a different version of the driver in the hopes that it will solve my issue. And if you think I'm barking up the wrong tree, please tell me. I've never had graphics problems before, so I'm kind of lost.
Thanks!
I have screenshots here:
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.p ... 03#p996303
Last edited by
Fred Barclay on Wed Jun 17, 2015 9:20 am, edited 1 time in total.

"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
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richyrich
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by richyrich » Sun Mar 22, 2015 2:12 pm
Intel drivers are built into the kernel . . so you may want to try upgrading the kernel.
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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Sun Mar 22, 2015 2:21 pm
Thanks--any idea how? To this date I've only installed kernels from Debian .deb files--never compiled them, so I'm unsure how to do it, and I can't find the 3.18 i386 kernel on the Debian website. Of course, Jessie and LMDE use the 3.16 kernel.
Strangely, I upgraded my old LMDE to 3.16 kernel and never had this trouble. So maybe it's more than just a kernel issue.


"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
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richyrich
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by richyrich » Sun Mar 22, 2015 2:50 pm
I'm not running LMDE, but doesn't Mint Update have the kernel upgrade option? Mint Update > Menu > View > Linux Kernels
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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Sun Mar 22, 2015 5:00 pm
No--neither does it have the Driver Manager that 17.x has

.
Two areas that are sadly missing.

"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
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richyrich
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by richyrich » Sun Mar 22, 2015 5:35 pm
Two debian resources for you . . I have used the liquorix kernel in previous debian installs, they are top quality builds.
https://wiki.debian.org/HowToUpgradeKernel
Liquorix Kernel
Liquorix is a distro kernel replacement built using the best configuration and kernel sources for desktop, multimedia, and gaming workloads.
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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Sun Mar 22, 2015 11:52 pm
Agh! Liquorix didn't work.
I verified that I was using the Liquorix kernel via uname -a.


"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Wed Mar 25, 2015 4:08 pm
I have vesa and fbdev drivers unloaded (as per "inxi -Gx"). If I could figure out how to load one or both of them, and they work, I'd be willing to kiss the Intel driver good-bye.
I've tried uninstalling xserver-xorg-video-intel, and hoped that would force the others to load, but they seem strangely resistant to cooperating. (Much like Betsy at the moment.)
I'm actually a bit mystified as to all this--Debian Jessie ( and Sid) never gave me this trouble with the desktop. Why Mint?

"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
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cli-86
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by cli-86 » Thu Mar 26, 2015 11:54 am
Fred Barclay wrote:I have vesa and fbdev drivers unloaded (as per "inxi -Gx"). If I could figure out how to load one or both of them, and they work, I'd be willing to kiss the Intel driver good-bye.
I've tried uninstalling xserver-xorg-video-intel, and hoped that would force the others to load, but they seem strangely resistant to cooperating. (Much like Betsy at the moment.)
I'm actually a bit mystified as to all this--Debian Jessie ( and Sid) never gave me this trouble with the desktop. Why Mint?
im no expert on this but mint lmde doesnt get as much attention as the likes of mint cinnamon,mate,kde (rebecca) etc i think, im currently trying to find out how to update the kernel to latest 4.0 rc if i can get it sorted i will post the procedure for you that might help

!
are you running 32bit or 64bit? you could maybe try the mate flavour as cinnamon can be tedious lol
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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Thu Mar 26, 2015 10:05 pm
Thanks! I'll try almost anything--I really want to get Betsy working!
I did try MATE--same issues.


"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
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cli-86
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by cli-86 » Fri Mar 27, 2015 10:36 am
Fred Barclay wrote:Thanks! I'll try almost anything--I really want to get Betsy working!
I did try MATE--same issues.

are you running 64bit or 32 bit of the lmde 2 os?
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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Fri Mar 27, 2015 10:42 am
32-bit.
My processor is pae-capable, so on my first Betsy installation I installed the 686-kernel as per the instructions in the release notes, but I have just wiped and reinstalled it (I'd made so many changes out of desperation that tracking down the bug would be seriously hampered) and left the default kernel.
Still the same problems.

"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
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cli-86
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by cli-86 » Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:00 am
Fred Barclay wrote:32-bit.
My processor is pae-capable, so on my first Betsy installation I installed the 686-kernel as per the instructions in the release notes, but I have just wiped and reinstalled it (I'd made so many changes out of desperation that tracking down the bug would be seriously hampered) and left the default kernel.
Still the same problems.
if you dont mind me asking what processor are you using? have you tryed 64 bit os?
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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:17 am
Intel Celeron M.
I've an old machine, and it's 32-bit only.
"Inxi -Fx" returned this on CPU
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CPU: Single core Intel Celeron M (-UP-) cache: 1024 KB
flags: (nx pae sse sse2) bmips: 3395 clocked at 1697 MHz
My machine is the HP Pavilion s7410n.
if you dont mind me asking...
Ask away!


"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
- Albert Einstein
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cli-86
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by cli-86 » Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:26 am
Fred Barclay wrote:Intel Celeron M.
I've an old machine, and it's 32-bit only.
"Inxi -Fx" returned this on CPU
Code: Select all
CPU: Single core Intel Celeron M (-UP-) cache: 1024 KB
flags: (nx pae sse sse2) bmips: 3395 clocked at 1697 MHz
My machine is the HP Pavilion s7410n.
if you dont mind me asking...
Ask away!

just trying to do some searching for you as i can learn as im going along aswell

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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Fri Mar 27, 2015 12:40 pm
Just found something interesting in the GLX version:
LMDE Betsy:
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GLX Version: 2.1 Mesa 10.3.2 Direct Rendering: Yes
Debian Sid:
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GLX Version: 2.1 Mesa 10.4.2 Direct Rendering: Yes
I've had absolutely no graphics troubles in Sid (or Jessie), just Betsy, so I'm wondering if I could somehow upgrade the GLX (whatever that is.)

"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
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richyrich
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by richyrich » Fri Mar 27, 2015 1:14 pm
Mesa is a level 4 update, so you will need to activate the level 4 in Mint Update to see if there is an update available. (Might as well check the level 5 while you are at it.)
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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Fri Mar 27, 2015 2:56 pm
I did that and applied all updates as one of my first steps in the first installation.

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cli-86
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by cli-86 » Fri Mar 27, 2015 3:13 pm
Fred Barclay wrote:Just found something interesting in the GLX version:
LMDE Betsy:
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GLX Version: 2.1 Mesa 10.3.2 Direct Rendering: Yes
Debian Sid:
Code: Select all
GLX Version: 2.1 Mesa 10.4.2 Direct Rendering: Yes
I've had absolutely no graphics troubles in Sid (or Jessie), just Betsy, so I'm wondering if I could somehow upgrade the GLX (whatever that is.)
https://sites.google.com/site/easylinux ... amon-first this will show you how to select level 5 updates this might help you

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Fred Barclay
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by Fred Barclay » Fri Mar 27, 2015 4:03 pm
Sorry--I DID select and apply level 4 and level 5 updates.
More and more this is looking like a Mint problem instead of a base (Debian) problem. I just changed the /etc/apt/sources.list.d/trusted or whatever (I don't recal the exact name at the moment, but it was the sources.list file
inside the sources.list.d directory) from Jessie to Sid (I left the Betsy repositories alone) I then ran
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sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade[/i] and upgraded my system. Rebooted, ran FireFox for a few minutes, and sure enough, the black bars formed on the background.
This is what was upgraded [list]The following packages will be upgraded:
aspell bash binutils busybox-static cabextract cgmanager console-setup
console-setup-linux dmraid dpkg-repack ecryptfs-utils
evolution-data-server-common geoip-database gnome-menus groff-base
grub-common grub-pc grub-pc-bin grub2-common hardening-includes hexchat
hexchat-common icedtea-7-plugin icedtea-netx icedtea-netx-common
icedtea-plugin keyboard-configuration kmod libarmadillo4 libaspell15
libc-bin libc-dev-bin libc6 libc6-dev libcamel-1.2-49 libcgmanager0
libdmraid1.0.0.rc16 libecal-1.2-16 libecryptfs0 libedataserver-1.2-18
libegl1-mesa libegl1-mesa-drivers libevdev2 libfreetype6 libfreexl1 libgbm1
libgcrypt20 libgl1-mesa-dri libgl1-mesa-glx libglapi-mesa libgnome-menu-3-0
libgusb2 libhdf4-0-alt libhdfeos5-ruby1.9.1 libhdfeos5-ruby1.9.1-dbg
libhyphen0 libkmod2 liblogging-stdlog0 libmarkdown2 libmpc3 libmpfr4
libparted2 libpython3.4 libpython3.4-minimal libpython3.4-stdlib libsane
libsane-common libsidplay1 libslv2-9 libspandsp2 libsqlite3-0 libssl1.0.0
libtdb1 libteamdctl0 libtevent0 libtiff5 libwayland-egl1-mesa libxatracker2
libxml2 locales multiarch-support ntfs-3g openjdk-7-jre
openjdk-7-jre-headless openssh-client openssl parted python-gdbm
python-imaging python-libxml2 python-lxml python-pil python-pyinotify
python-tdb python3.4 python3.4-minimal rdesktop reiserfsprogs ruby-hdfeos5
ruby-hdfeos5-dbg sane-utils simple-scan sudo tdb-tools unattended-upgrades
unrar wget whois xfonts-100dpi xfonts-75dpi xfonts-base
xserver-xorg-video-vmware xtrans-dev[/list]
If I haven't mentioned it before, I have some screenshots [url=http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=218&t=192276]here.[/url]

"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
- Albert Einstein