Bug#463076: xserver-xorg-video-ati: machine freezes when X is stopped or second X started

[Alex Deucher]

On Thu, May 8, 2008 at 7:48 AM, Agustin Martin <agmartin at debian.org> wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 05, 2008 at 09:25:17AM +0100, Bram Senders wrote:
>> On Tue, 2008-02-26 at 23:49 +0000, Roger Leigh wrote:
>> > Hi folks,
>> >
>> > Just another datapoint for this bug.  My Mac Mini has a
>> >
>> > 0000:00:10.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc RV280
>> > [Radeon 9200] (rev 01) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
>> >
>> > and I was also bitten by this bug.  My system locked hard if I tried to
>> > kill X or shutdown the system (which causes kdm to stop X).  It also
>> > locked if I tried to switch to a VT with C-A-Fn.
>> >
>> > Further investigation showed that this worked perfectly if I booted the
>> > system with "video=radeonfb:1680x1050-32 at 60" on the command-line.  I can
>> > now switch VTs at will, as well as start and stop X, shut down the
>> > system, etc. without problems.
>> >
>> > However, booting with "video=ofonly" results in all the problems
>> > mentioned above.
>> >
>> >
>> > Is this the same for the other people suffering from this bug?
>>
>> Yes, I can confirm this.  The only difference is that I have to boot
>> with a lower resolution (1024x768), otherwise my monitor stays blank
>> (even though it is capable of displaying higher resolutions).  I can now
>> switch VTs as well... this has never been possible for me before (after
>> X had started, all VTs always weren't capable of being displayed
>> anymore).
>>
>> So thank you Roger, for this hint!  My Mac Mini has more functionality
>> now ;-)
>
> Just adding that after setting my xorg to use framebuffer in /etc/xorg.conf
> (through the debconf prompt) I can no longer reproduce the problem,
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------
> $ diff -u xorg.conf.20080505151844 xorg.conf
> --- xorg.conf.20080505151844    2008-05-05 15:18:44.000000000 +0200
> +++ xorg.conf   2008-05-05 15:18:44.000000000 +0200
> @@ -29,6 +29,7 @@
>
>  Section "Device"
>        Identifier      "Configured Video Device"
> +       Option          "UseFBDev"              "true"

What version of the driver are you using?  This option no longer
exists on 6.7.19x and newer versions of the ati driver.

Alex