# linux-2.6.33-rc2 and Nouveau

## regomodo

Has anybody got their system to work with 2.6.33-rc2 on Nvidia hardware?

I can get mine to boot with KMS on my 8800GT but I cannot get the X-server up. It crashes all v-output even in tty.

I believe there's something additional needed but i've no idea what, all I see in the tree (with the sunrise overlay) is

 *Quote:*   

> x11-base/nouveau-drm
> 
> x11-drivers/xf86-video-nouveau
> 
> x11-libs/libdrm_nouveau
> ...

 

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## ppurka

From what I have read on the net, you need to download some firmware from the fedora site and place it in /lib/firmware.

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## Gusar

ppurka is correct, for now "firmware" (it's not really firmware, but programs that handle context switching) is still needed, until the nouveau devs manage write their own programs.

The package is here: http://people.freedesktop.org/~pq/nouveau-drm/nouveau-firmware-20091212.tar.gz

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## hvengel

From my reading it appears that this is not needed for users with NV4x (6000 and 7000 series) cards.  But the OP has an NV5x card so he needs the firmware.  The plan is to eventually make all of the cards work the way the NV4x cards do now.

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## regomodo

 *Gusar wrote:*   

> ppurka is correct, for now "firmware" (it's not really firmware, but programs that handle context switching) is still needed, until the nouveau devs manage write their own programs.
> 
> The package is here: http://people.freedesktop.org/~pq/nouveau-drm/nouveau-firmware-20091212.tar.gz

 

I extracted that file into /lib/firmware/nouveau/ 

No dice unfortunately. I get different colours but it's corrupted to f*$k still.

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## justinkb

nouveau regressed for me... i used to be able to get kernel modesetting enabled on my laptop with it... (in .31 with drm-next etc patched in from some other branches), but now that no longer works (black screen, machine boots further but i can't see anything)

i would wait till it's matured a bit more (out of staging)

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## chithanh

Black screen after DRM initialized KMS probably means that framebuffer console is missing in the kernel.

Firmware is not needed for the packages in Sunrise atm. Only if you use the live ebuilds from the x11 overlay or the nouveau/linux-2.6 kernel from upstream, then firmware must be placed in /lib/firmware (in kernel image/initramfs if nouveau drm is built-in).

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## Paczesiowa

one month ago, I was able to use 2.6.33 (rc version) with xf86-video-nouveau-9999 and mesa-9999 from x11 overlay and I even could play openarena (but it was a bit slow with gf4mx), now 2.6.33 is out and I cannot start X, I always get no screens found (I tried 2.6.33 with nouveau, 2.6.32 with nouveau-drm from x11, git version of ddx driver and snapshot from portage). anyone has it working with 2.6.33?

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## depontius

I've been running with nouveau for a while now, first on patched kernels and then on the 2.6.33-rc series.

I have the firmware in /lib/firmware/nouveau, but everything is symlinked back into /lib/firmware.  I don't know which is really needed for the driver, but keeping it in its own subdirectory will make housekeeping easier, but having the symlinks makes it accessible in the parent directory.

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## Paczesiowa

what versions of xf86-video-nouveau, libdrm, xorg-server and kernel do you use? anything special in xorg.conf?

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## depontius

 *Paczesiowa wrote:*   

> what versions of xf86-video-nouveau, libdrm, xorg-server and kernel do you use? anything special in xorg.conf?

 

Yikes, now you've got me just a bit worried.

For the kernel I've run 2.6.31+patches and several 2.6.33-rc kernels.  Just the other day I went to gentoo-sources-2.6.33, and have been happy with all of the above.

For xorg-server, I'm running stable, I believe 1.6.5, and that's part of the problem being dredged up, now.  Nothing special in xorg.conf, other than to specify nouveau instead of nv or nvidia.

The other stuff is problematic.  I'm running the x11 overlay, and I believe I'm now running a snapshot of libdrm and xf86-video-nouveau that no lonter exist.  Worse yet, I believe the current xf86-video-nouveau requires xorg-server-1.7.x, and I seem to remember that the nouveau and libdrm no longer work with 2.6.33, but need some stuff that comes out on 2.6.34.

In other words, I'm not sure what what is working so well for me can be duplicated.  I don't even know that I could pass you a source tree, because of the way the "-9999" ebuilds work - fetching straight from cvs/svn/git/etc.  What I could do is quickpkg what I've got, if you'd like to try that.  It's built for amd64, I believe "march=native" on a Core2-duo processor.  If this stuff were to fall apart or any of it get lost, I think I'd be in trouble.  I began having trouble with nvidia-drivers back around 2.6.31 or 2.6.32.  For some reason, X would come up once per build, then never again.  I think part of the problem was that this is a Thinkpad sitting in a dock, and the external display is hooked up to the DVI port.  I never dug into it harder, because nouveau has worked so well.

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## Paczesiowa

oh well, 3 more months of nv then. or maybe 2 weeks and trying with 2.6.34-rc1

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## furanku

Yes, see here for details what happened, the DRM interface in 2.6.33 is incompatible with actual user-space driver code. As nouveau is currently a fast moving target I think, it's nothing which you can keep working and up to date with simple, occasional emerges without running into troubles like the described one.

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## depontius

I generally like to keep fully up to date, but as some point I saw things moving quickly, recognized that I was lucky to be running well, and started leaving it alone - except for the kernel, staying within the 2.6.33-rc series.  Now that gentoo-sources-2.6.33 is out, I've gone back there from vanilla-sources.  

I'll revisit the mess when 2.6.34 is out - except that the new stuff will require xorg-server-1.7, but maybe I'll go there, too.

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## alacheesu

To those struggling with the in-kernel nouveau, I just want to say that the out-of-kernel nouveau-drm in portage works well. If you're running ~amd64 you can just emerge the current libdrm, nouveau-drm and xf86-video-nouveau and you should be good to go. I had a lot less trouble going that path.

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## Paczesiowa

I have the same problem with those modules from nouveau-drm (they used to work in .31 a few months ago), besides it only works for <=.32 right? it won't compile with .33 because it already has those files?

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## alacheesu

 *Paczesiowa wrote:*   

> I have the same problem with those modules from nouveau-drm (they used to work in .31 a few months ago), besides it only works for <=.32 right? it won't compile with .33 because it already has those files?

 

nouveau-drm works fine with .33, that's what I'm using. Just deselect the nouveau driver in the kernel config if you want to use nouveau-drm. As far as I can tell, the in-kernel nouveau and nouveau-drm are both in /lib/modules/2.6.33-gentoo, but in different subdirs. It doesn't seem like removing the nouveau driver and rebuilding the kernel will remove the in-kernel nouveau.ko from that dir, so you could end up loading the wrong module if you have both.

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## Slippery Jim

 *chithanh wrote:*   

> Black screen after DRM initialized KMS probably means that framebuffer console is missing in the kernel.

 

I usually build my kernels modular, and boot with an initrd, and I had the same problem starting recently. I think that nouveau used to pull in fbcon as a module dependency when I built my initrd, but now I have to add it manually, or I'm in the dark. Life on the bleeding edge, eh?

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