KWin+Radeon+Latest Kernel AMD64 Constantly Crash

[OmniUni]

I am using Kubuntu 10.10 AMD64, fully up-to-date. Everything works well, except for my graphics card. I have a Radeon X1250, and whenever I try to load the KWin desktop effects, things crash. Before the last kernel update, they would run for maybe 1-5 minutes before crashing, but with the latest update, X is crashing before they even initialize. Graphics acceleration is working well, and in fact things run (though slowly) using XRender.

I do not know where to begin in reporting this bug. I can confirm that I'm not the only one; see: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1594240

I am going to see if it is only a problem on AMD64 systems, but would like to see this fixed. I will try to wait for a few days before installing 32 bit to help troubleshoot if need be.

---
Architecture: i386
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.10
DkmsStatus:
 rt3090, 2.3.1.7, 2.6.35-22-generic, i686: installed
 rt3090, 2.3.1.7, 2.6.35-23-generic, i686: installed
InstallationMedia: Kubuntu 10.10 "Maverick Meerkat" - Release i386 (20101007)
MachineType: Micro-Star International U210
Package: xserver-xorg-video-ati 1:6.13.1-1ubuntu5
PackageArchitecture: i386
ProcCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.35-23-generic root=UUID=7c4346bd-4986-4286-80be-c8bd9eaa2659 ro nomodeset quiet splash
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.35-23.40-generic 2.6.35.7
Tags: maverick maverick
Uname: Linux 2.6.35-23-generic i686
UserGroups: adm admin cdrom dialout lpadmin plugdev sambashare
dmi.bios.date: 07/14/2009
dmi.bios.vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
dmi.bios.version: 080015
dmi.board.asset.tag: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.board.name: MS-1241
dmi.board.vendor: MSI
dmi.board.version: Ver 1.000
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.chassis.type: 10
dmi.chassis.vendor: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.chassis.version: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAmericanMegatrendsInc.:bvr080015:bd07/14/2009:svnMicro-StarInternational:pnU210:pvrVer1.000:rvnMSI:rnMS-1241:rvrVer1.000:cvnToBeFilledByO.E.M.:ct10:cvrToBeFilledByO.E.M.:
dmi.product.name: U210
dmi.product.version: Ver 1.000
dmi.sys.vendor: Micro-Star International
system:
 distro: Ubuntu
 codename: maverick
 architecture: i686
 kernel: 2.6.35-23-generic

[OmniUni (omniuni)]

I booted the 32 bit live USB, and took a video so you can see the problem. As you can see, performance is actually very good when it is actually working, but the flickering is even worse in person. (The camera kind of blends some of the flickers together)

[Spencer Kingsbury (spencerking10)]

I have the same problem. Screen flickers; kwin wont work. Compiz will, however. At first, kwin worked, then only when using XRender, now not at all. I am using the opensource radeon driver, which worked in previous versions of kubuntu.

output of lspci | grep VGA
01:05.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc RS690M [Radeon X1200 Series]

Does this problem exist in 32 bit? I also am considering either returning to 10.04 or going 32 bit.

[OmniUni (omniuni)]

I'm running 32 bit now, with pre-released updates, and so far, so good. Performance is excellent, so hopefully I won't experience any more crashes. I'll post back here if it does crash again.

[OmniUni (omniuni)]

Never mind. It just crashed on me.

:-/

[Spencer Kingsbury (spencerking10)]

I decided to switch back to 10.04 (Linux Mint 9 KDE actually)--with the nomodeset kernel option, it runs really well. If you dont have data you will miss, or can back up, I would switch! You can get KDE 4.5, with the kubuntu backports ppa (be careful not to break the system though)

[OmniUni (omniuni)]

Yes, I know I could use 10.04, as I have for the last six months, but I would rather see a fix for this. KDE users with Radeon cards in the X series are a decently sized group of people, and it's annoying to upgrade to a new distribution (especially where your card has worked perfectly well in the past) and find that your desktop continually crashes.

Is there some log I can observe to see why X is crashing?

[Paul Chaffey (paul-chaffey)]

Hi,

I have found the crash in the kdm.log file (under /var/logs) and all I see is Segmentation fault, and no other hints.

I guess running kdm would be a bit hard (I am a Hw engineer and not so bright with SW ;) )

Anyone want to take this up ?

[Chris Reinschild (aerosecurity)]

I'm having the same problem.

Kubuntu 10.10 (AMD64), fully updated. Graphics is Radeon HD 3200 with opensource drivers (MSi Wind12 U230). Kwin crashes X when effects are turned on. I found out later that Kwin doesn't crash (as much) when I turn off the blur effect. When testing when blur effect is turned on, opening internet browsers tend to accelerate crashing. With blur effect off, compositing seems to work relatively well (with a slight performance hit, especially when a terminal with transparency is rendering on the screen).

Running "kwin --replace" in a terminal shows (don't know if this is useful or not):
kwin(2307) KWin::CompositingPrefs::detectDriverAndVersion: GL vendor is "Advanced Micro Devices, Inc."
kwin(2307) KWin::CompositingPrefs::detectDriverAndVersion: GL renderer is "Mesa DRI R600 (RS780 9612) 20090101 TCL DRI2"
kwin(2307) KWin::CompositingPrefs::detectDriverAndVersion: GL version is "2.1 Mesa 7.9-devel"
kwin(2307) KWin::CompositingPrefs::detectDriverAndVersion: Detected driver "radeon" , version "20090101"
QInotifyFileSystemWatcherEngine::addPaths: inotify_add_watch failed: No such file or directory
QFileSystemWatcher: failed to add paths: /home/chris/.config/ibus/bus
Bus::open: Can not get ibus-daemon's address.
IBusInputContext::createInputContext: no connection to ibus-daemon
kwin(2307): OpenGL compositing self-check failed, disabling compositing.

However, opening the effects settings, turning off blur effect, and resuming effects will still allow transparency.

Also noticed that when effects are turned off, I also get a lot of flickering graphics. When effects are turned on, the flickering is reduced (if not completely gone). Also noted that when Kwin does crash, it tends to make all the effects in the effects settings disappear, and the window decoration resets back to the default oxygen window decoration.

At the same time, I run Kubuntu 10.10 (AMD64) on my desktop which has a Intel Core Duo 3.16GHz processor, GeForce 9800GT, and kwin runs perfectly with all effects.

[OmniUni (omniuni)]

Still no fix to the problem. I've read that someone fixed it by downgrading to the Karmic version of the graphics driver. This seems like a poor solution. I would like to see this somehow tracked down and fixed! if anyone can give me something to do that will help narrow down what the problem actually is, I would be happy to do so.

[Philip Muškovac (yofel)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. This bug did not have a package associated with it, which is important for ensuring that it gets looked at by the proper developers. You can learn more about finding the right package at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Bugs/FindRightPackage . I have classified this bug as a bug in xserver-xorg-video-ati.

When reporting bugs in the future please use apport by using 'ubuntu-bug' and the name of the package affected. You can learn more about this functionality at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ReportingBugs.

@OmniUni: Can you please run 'apport-collect 663660' so that information about your system is attached to the bug? Thanks.

[OmniUni (omniuni)]

I am cleaning up any changes I made to my system, reverting to the official Ubuntu 10.10 packages (I tried the x-updates PPA to try to fix the problem). I will ensure that the problem is still there, and will collect info on the bug.

[OmniUni (omniuni)]

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[OmniUni (omniuni)]

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[OmniUni (omniuni)]

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[OmniUni (omniuni)]

Reported! Crash happened almost immediately. I reverted to all official Ubuntu packages, and updated everything.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for xserver-xorg-video-ati (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]