XServer modprobe: FATAL: Module mach64 not found. 14.04.1. 12.04 worked great

[Mike Ferreira]

System is now Server 14.04, with a minimal X install (openbox, etc...) and package xserver-xorg-video-mach64 was installed and is the newest version.

I just upgraded that server from 12.04LTS Server. Before the upgrade, it had worked fine using startx to boot an instance of X for doing maintenance.

Did a release upgrade (today) to 14.04 and it's now broke. XLog has that same exact message. Diving into it right now to check it out (see why it broke).

Other users on the forum are also having this problem:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2241397&p=13132193

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04
Package: xserver-xorg-video-mach64 6.9.4-1build1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-36.63-generic 3.13.11.6
Uname: Linux 3.13.0-36-generic i686
ApportVersion: 2.14.1-0ubuntu3.4
Architecture: i386
Date: Mon Sep 29 16:26:16 2014
InstallationDate: Installed on 2013-04-05 (542 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu-Server 12.04.2 LTS "Precise Pangolin" - Release i386 (20130214)
ProcEnviron:
 TERM=linux
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: xserver-xorg-video-mach64
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to trusty on 2014-09-29 (0 days ago)

[Mike Ferreira (mafoelffen)]

Remember that without xserver coming up, if you want info, back traces or logs, that it will be from the command line from that server.

[Mike Ferreira (mafoelffen)]

xorg.0.log file from that server:

[Mike Ferreira (mafoelffen)]

From lspci:

00:03.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Rage XL PCI [1002:4752] (rev 27) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
        Subsystem: Compaq Computer Corporation Proliant Rage XL [0e11:001e]
        Flags: bus master, stepping, medium devsel, latency 64
        Memory at f6000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
        I/O ports at 2400 [size=256]
        Memory at f5ff0000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
        [virtual] Expansion ROM at 80000000 [disabled] [size=128K]
        Capabilities: <access denied>

[Mike Ferreira (mafoelffen)]

This was my usual install script (attached).

Notice the comments at the minimum install of the XServer Core. Used to install and work fine --withoutrecommends. Now I have to remove that flag from it... and let it install full. There most be another dependency there "somewhere" now. (not sure yet where.)

But removed my X install (remove from the last line going backwards) and re-installed with this updated script... and it works fine now.

-- Closed?

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Dave Gilbert (ubuntu-treblig)]

Yep, just hit the same problem. It looks like the kernel doesn't have that module configured. I solved the problem
by removing xserver-xorg-video-mach64 and xserver-xorg-video-ati (and xserver-xorg-video-all) and it seems to work on whatever it's fallen back on.

[Dave Gilbert (ubuntu-treblig)]

The problem seems to be that there was a series of security problems with the kernel module and it was dropped from the upstream kernel:

   http://dri.freedesktop.org/wiki/ATIMach64/?highlight=%28CategoryHardwareChipset%29

so I think what needs to happen until someone fixes the kernel is to remove xserver-xorg-video-mach64 from xserver-xorg-video-all, so that it doesn't get installed; this gets you fallback that seems to work OK - except it can't detect multiple monitors; so it works OK on the LCD of this laptop and it works OK if I plug an external monitor and boot with it; but it can't switch between them.

Dave

[Timo Aaltonen (tjaalton)]

​​​​this driver has been removed from Ubuntu, closing the bugs