hybrid-graphics-linux team mailing list archive

[Nikunj Vaidya <nikunj.vaidya@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi all,
I am reporting my steps to disable nouveau on my Dell L502x Nvidia 525M
Optimus system running Ubuntu Natty (11.04) amd64.
This is after a few frequent display stalls (particularly when I left the
display to idle and it blanked, it would not restart later).
At times I could restart gdm for recovery and at other times I had to
reboot, recover my root partition and then try again...

I am going to check if stopping nouveau changes this behaviour.

Steps to successfully disable Nouveau (note: all actions are done with
'sudo').
1. Create new file /etc/modprobe.d/black-list.conf with a single line of two
words below,
    blacklist nouveau
2. edit /etc/default/grub line GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT to add the
following string at the end,
    nouveau.nomodeset=0
3. sudo update-grub2
4. sudo update-initramfs -u
    # This updated my /boot/initrd.img file
5. Restart to use the updated image.

I could see that nouveau was not loaded in following ways.

[A] lsmod output changed.
The earlier output had these lines,
[ # These columns are Module, Size and Used_By
nouveau               682322  0
ttm                    76664  1 nouveau
i915                  514985  3
drm_kms_helper         42136  2 nouveau,i915
drm                   227495  6 nouveau,ttm,i915,drm_kms_helper
]
which now became
[
i915                  514985  3
drm_kms_helper         42136  1 i915
drm                   227495  4 i915,drm_kms_helper
]
Note: Modules nouveau, ttm are not present and the drm modules don't show
being used by nouveau -- because it is missing :-)

[B] the 'hwinfo' output changed for "nVidia VGA compatible controller".
They showed nouveau active as,
[
  Driver Info #0:
    Driver Status: nvidiafb is not active
    Driver Activation Cmd: "modprobe nvidiafb"
  Driver Info #1:
    Driver Status: nouveau is active
    Driver Activation Cmd: "modprobe nouveau"
  Config Status: cfg=new, avail=yes, need=no, active=unknown
]
which now became
[
Driver Info #0:
    Driver Status: nvidiafb is not active
    Driver Activation Cmd: "modprobe nvidiafb"
  Driver Info #1:
    Driver Status: nouveau is not active
    Driver Activation Cmd: "modprobe nouveau"
  Config Status: cfg=new, avail=yes, need=no, active=unknown
]

I still find the i915 Hangcheck-timer-elapsed kernel log lines hitting my
kern.log
Like I said before, I continue to suppress that with acpi_call
"\_SB.PCI0.PEG0.PEGP._OFF".

I am not sure if nouveau or this suppress attempt was causing my graphics
stalls -- guess, I'll learn soon :-)
comments and further suggestions are welcome,
nik.. .



On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 11:53 PM, Nikunj Vaidya <nikunj.vaidya@xxxxxxxxx>wrote:

> Great! I need to understand this framework more but this is good news to
> me.
> thanks to you all,
> nik.. .
>
>
> On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 10:29 PM, Bilal Akhtar <bilalakhtar@xxxxxxxxxx>wrote:
>
>> On Monday 20 June 2011 01:13 PM, Nikunj Vaidya wrote:
>>
>>> Oh, a small question.
>>> Can I blacklist nouveau and not try bumblebee yet? I mean, what runs my
>>> graphics with nouveau blacklisted?
>>> I am still catching up with these things...
>>> thanks & regards,
>>>
>>
>> Yup, I had nouveau blacklisted even before Bumblebee came up :)
>>
>>> nik.. .
>>>
>>> On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 1:08 PM, Nikunj Vaidya <nikunj.vaidya@xxxxxxxxx
>>> <mailto:nikunj.vaidya@gmail.**com <nikunj.vaidya@xxxxxxxxx>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>    Thanks Bilal, I'll check the blacklist. I am taking the test plunge
>>>    slowly. Will try bumblebee a little later.
>>>    regards,
>>>    nik.. .
>>>
>>>
>>>    On Mon, Jun 20, 2011 at 11:37 AM, Bilal Akhtar
>>>    <bilalakhtar@xxxxxxxxxx <mailto:bilalakhtar@xxxxxxxxxx**>> wrote:
>>>
>>>        I also have the same system (With 6 GB RAM and i7 and nvidia 540M
>>> ).
>>>
>>>        The fix to the random freeze is simple: Add the line "blacklist
>>>        nouveau" to /etc/modprobe/blacklist.conf .
>>>
>>>        In my case, I'm able to use up the discrete card as well with
>>>        bumblebee, you can try if it works for you.
>>>
>>>        Hope it helps,
>>>
>>>        Bilal Akhtar.
>>>
>>>
>>>        On Monday 20 June 2011 11:28 AM, Nikunj Vaidya wrote:
>>>
>>>            # sudo dmidecode -s system-product-name
>>>            Dell System XPS L502X
>>>
>>>            # sudo dmidecode -s system-version
>>>            Not Specified
>>>
>>>            # lspci -vnnn | perl -lne 'print if
>>>            /^\d+\:.+(\[\S+\:\S+\])/' | grep VGA
>>>            00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation
>>> 2nd
>>>            Generation Core Processor Family Integrated Graphics
>>> Controller
>>>            [8086:0116] (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
>>>            01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: nVidia Corporation
>>>            Device
>>>            [10de:0df5] (rev a1) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
>>>
>>>            Things tried.
>>>
>>>            # For hangcheck_ring_idle error,
>>>            [drm:i915_hangcheck_ring_idle] *ERROR* Hangcheck timer
>>>            elapsed... blt
>>>            ring idle [waiting on 17594, at 17594], missed IRQ?
>>>
>>>            # the following work-around works on my system,
>>>                 pathi915Sem="/sys/module/i915/**__parameters/semaphores"
>>>                 echo "1" | sudo tee $pathi915Sem > /dev/null
>>>
>>>            # Then tried to turn off the NVIDIA, with the ACPI call that
>>>            works on my
>>>            system,
>>>                 sudo insmod acpi_call.ko
>>>                 m="\_SB.PCI0.PEG0.PEGP._OFF"
>>>                 pathAcpiCall=/proc/acpi/call
>>>                 echo $m > $pathAcpiCall
>>>
>>>            # But, after that ACPI call is done, the system tends to
>>>            freeze after a
>>>            short while.
>>>            # Typically the freeze is after some idle time when the
>>>            display has
>>>            blanked; keyboard seems to die after some time.
>>>            # I think I have seen a freeze while working too -- need
>>>            more samples;
>>>            inputs/suggestions are welcome.
>>>
>>>            nik.. .
>>>
>>>
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>>>        --
>>>        Bilal Akhtar - Ubuntu Developer <bilalakhtar@xxxxxxxxxx
>>>        <mailto:bilalakhtar@xxxxxxxxxx**>>
>>>
>>>        IRC Nick: cdbs
>>>
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>>>
>>
>> --
>> Bilal Akhtar - Ubuntu Developer <bilalakhtar@xxxxxxxxxx>
>> IRC Nick: cdbs
>>
>
>