[Intel-gfx] Trouble with dell latitude E6420

[Georg Grabler]

Hello,

Sorry to "hijack" this thread, but I'd like to know if it is probably
the same problem I am experiencing on the same machine, see:
https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=35812

Just because I seem to be sooo alone out there with that problem :-(.

Thanks,
Georg

On Tue, Jun 26, 2012 at 10:05 PM, Daniel Vetter <daniel at ffwll.ch> wrote:
> On Tue, Jun 26, 2012 at 03:08:32PM -0400, Giacomo Comes wrote:
>> I have a dell latitude E6420 with Sandybridge Mobile (GT2).
>> Since I got it (about one year ago), it has been a nightmare to run linux on it.
>> At the beginning I installed openSUSE 11.4 (kernel 2.6.37.6) and the laptop
>> would freeze almost immediately. After that I waited for newer kernels in order to
>> see if things would improve. They did improve indeed and finally with kernel 3.0
>> I was able to run linux (openSUSE 11.4) without laptop freeze or screen issue.
>> Unfortunately, the only kernel that works with my laptop is 3.0. Newer kernel
>> (3.1, 3.2, 3.3 and 3.4) do not work.
>> This is what happen if I run kernel 2.6.39, 3.1, 3.2, 3.3 and 3.4:
>> The laptop boot and does the boot process fine. At the end of the boot process X
>> starts and here the problem appears (about 50% of the times):
>> the screen goes black on the left side (about 2/3 of the whole screen) with white
>> stripes to the right side (the remaining 1/3).
>> The laptop is not dead: I can remotely login or I can perform a clean shutdown
>> if I press the power button, but the screen is totally dead.
>> Another strange issue is that after a bad boot (with the black screen) at the
>> next reboot the screen will start to flicker. The flickering will last some time
>> and it will become less intense as the time goes until it will disappear completely.
>> The funny thing is that the intensity of flicker depends on how long I keep the
>> black screen. If, after the boot process, the black screen appears and I reboot
>> the laptop immediately, then the flicked is moderate and it disappear after
>> 1 or 2 minutes. If I keep the black screen for 1 minute or more, then after the
>> reboot the flicker is very intense and it takes much more to fade.
>>
>> Right now I run openSUSE 12.1 on the laptop, but I had to perform the following
>> trick: because openSUSE 12.1 ships with kernel 3.1, in order to make openSUSE run on my
>> laptop I have the options:
>> 1) downgrade to kernel 3.0 (I use 3.0.7)
>> 2) recompile the openSUSE kernel 3.1 replacing the directory drivers/gpu/drm/i915
>> with the content of the same directory from kernel 3.0 source tree.
>>
>> I choose the second option as I can run the latest openSUSE kernel with patches
>> and fixes.
>>
>> I have searched google to see if other users have my same problem and
>> I have found few references to a problem similar to mine:
>>
>> http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/intel-gfx/2011-March/009822.html
>> http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/linux/kernel/1474140
>> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-intel/+bug/794474
>>
>> But in none there is a mention on how to fix the problem.
>>
>> Is there any chance to improve the intel kernel driver to make it work
>> for my laptop as it was in kernel 3.0?
>
> Sure, we're always working to fix odd bugs ;-)
>
>> I can provide any information/testing as needed.
>
> A few things for you to do, pretty much random order:
> - Can you try out the latest drm-intel-next-queued branch from the
>  drm-intel git repo at:
>
> http://cgit.freedesktop.org/~danvet/drm-intel
>
>  This is the basic step to ensure that we haven't fixed your bug already
>  in the latest code.
> - Please attach xrandr --verbos and full dmesg when booting with
>  drm.debug=0xe (take a working kernel, doesn't matter that much).
> - If you can, please bisect which commit exactly introduced the regression
>  betwen 3.0 and 3.1. That usually helps a _lot_ in tracking down these
>  bugs.
>
> Yours, Daniel
> --
> Daniel Vetter
> Mail: daniel at ffwll.ch
> Mobile: +41 (0)79 365 57 48
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