G43 on Linux

[hornetster]

Not sure if this is the correct forum, please advise gently if not... :-)

Have recently purchased an ASUS motherboard with onboard Intel Express G43 graphics. Running Suse Linux 11 X64, and can't seem to get the correct driver(?) installed. Have also tried in the X86 version, with same results. Are there updated drivers for this chip around anywhere, or forums to advise how to get this working?

Any help/advice appreciated! Thanks, John.

[7oby]

G43 support has been added to the xf86-video-intel drivers since version 2.4.0:

http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg-announce/2008-July/000621.html

Any recent Linux distribution is supposed to include drivers. E.g. you can boot a x86_64 Ubuntu Intrepid LiveCD and it should work since the driver is uptodate:

http://packages.ubuntu.com/intrepid/xserver-xorg-video-intel

I didn't find the support database quick enough for OpenSuse 11 to check which version of the driver they are shipping. The current version of this driver is 2.4.2 and 2.5.0 will be released tomorrow (see here).

Version 2.5.0 will offer GEM support, which is a memory manager for GPU memory. GEM support should work fine, but might not yet be as stable as the former memory manager. I'm mentioning this because some distributions may have included intermediate intel drivers with GEM support, which might have the one or other bug left. I case you have problems stick to the 2.4.2 intel driver.

[hornetster]

Have been trying to chase this up further, and yes it appears that support for the G43 is supposed to be added to the driver, but it appears that it is not working very well....? I have both Suse V11 (with updated kernel-default: V2.6.27.2-2.1 and xorg-x11-driver-video V7.4-19.3; xorg-x11-driver-video-32bit V7.4-19.3) and Ubuntu Intrepid 8.10 (beta) with latest updates installed, and neither will work for me. Have to downgrade to the VESA driver on both platforms to be able to log in.

Any suggestions for what I could try, or where I could get further info??

Thanks, John

[7oby]

From what you posted I can't really tell, which intel video driver is used in the Suse V11 distributions. However since you also tried Ubuntu Intrepid 8.10, I know that at least one time you tried 2.4.2.

The changelog of 2.5.0 doesn't reveal anything related to a major fix for the G43. Except maybe the "Fix broken stolen memory counting on G4X". If you can get a hand on a 2.5.0 driver, it's worth a try. However I don't think any distribution has this one already contained. The 2.5.0 driver also brings GEM (but only used with 2.6.28-rc1 and up kernel), but don't worry about it: If it fails already now, it will also fail with GEM.

I'm pretty sure you'll see the failing reason if you look at /var/log/Xorg.0.log.

I also do know that intel tests their drivers especially for the recent G4x chipsets. They do test the x86 version more than the x86_64 version - however both should work. Since all intel driver developers read the Xorg mailing list, you may go ahead an post your issue there. They should be able to come up with a distribution which contains G43 driver support (although - as I said any distribution >= 2.4.0 intel driver is supposed to):

http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/xorg

I suggest before doing that post to the forum of your favorite distribution incl. your Xorg.0.log.