# Asus L8400 series/Savage Mx - Where's the acceleration?

## RoadRunner

Hi guys,

I got gentoo running perfectly on my Asus L8400C laptop. The only thing is not working is the winmodem =) but since I don't need it, I don't care. I haven't tested the pcmcia and the ir port, but I also rarely use them. The real problem is trying to have hardware acceleration. Is it possible? are there any decent Savage Mx drivers? Or is there any other solution to have some 3d? 

And yes.. BZflag is that adicting =))

Thanks in advance,

Ricardo Loureiro

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## klieber

 *RoadRunner wrote:*   

> are there any decent Savage Mx drivers? 

 

the savage driver included with XFree86 supports acceleration.  man savage for more details.  (specifically, Option NoAccel)

--kurt

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## RoadRunner

Hi again.

Thanks for the really fast reply! way to go!!

well, I was using the savage driver without the NoAccel option. since in the man page it states that the default is Acceleration enabled, I guess it's not needed.  Here's the glxinfo output:

```

name of display: :0.0

display: :0  screen: 0

direct rendering: No

server glx vendor string: SGI

server glx version string: 1.2

server glx extensions:

    GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_EXT_import_context

client glx vendor string: SGI

client glx version string: 1.2

client glx extensions:

    GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_EXT_import_context

GLX extensions:

    GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_EXT_import_context

OpenGL vendor string: VA Linux Systems, Inc.

OpenGL renderer string: Mesa GLX Indirect

OpenGL version string: 1.2 Mesa 3.4.2

OpenGL extensions:

    GL_ARB_multitexture, GL_EXT_abgr, GL_EXT_blend_color,

    GL_EXT_blend_minmax, GL_EXT_blend_subtract

glu version: 1.3

glu extensions:

    GLU_EXT_nurbs_tessellator, GLU_EXT_object_space_tess

   visual  x  bf lv rg d st colorbuffer ax dp st accumbuffer  ms  cav

 id dep cl sp sz l  ci b ro  r  g  b  a bf th cl  r  g  b  a ns b eat

----------------------------------------------------------------------

0x22 16 tc  0 16  0 r  y  .  5  6  5  0  0 16  0  0  0  0  0  0 0 None

0x23 16 tc  0 16  0 r  y  .  5  6  5  0  0 16  8 16 16 16  0  0 0 None

```

And here's an ectrace of my XF89Config:

```

(...)

    Load       "glx"

(...)

Section "Device"

    Identifier  "Savage Mx"

    Driver      "savage"

    Option      "NoAccel"       "false"

    VideoRam    8192

    EndSection

(...)

```

With this configuration I get 14 fps with glxgears when maximized (screen resolution at 1024x768) and 100 fps with the default window size when we launch glxgears. The funny stuff is, when I use NoAccel true, the values are exactly the same. Isn't this using software acceleration?

Thanks in advance.

Ricardo Loureiro

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## Frain

```
direct rendering: No
```

This means that it's only using software rendering...you could try running 

```
opengl-update xfree
```

I can't tell you more because I haven't got a Savage card and I can't get DRI to work on my box anyways  :Very Happy: 

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## RoadRunner

Thanks for the tip. 

Just did that. It said [OK], restarted X and glxinfo gives the same information. But thanks for the help anyway, beter than staring at it =)

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## klieber

To use DRI, you have to have the Direct Rendering Manager enabled in the kernel (in the character devices section)

--kurt

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## TripKnot

Assuming you have everything else set up correctly, what resolution are you running at?  My Inspiron has 8mb for the Rage Mobility chip and DRI only works when the resolution is 1024x768 or below and not at the default lcd res of 1400x1050.

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## RoadRunner

hmm.. nice info. My laptop has a maximum resolution of 1024x768 and I allways run at that resolution. Will try to lower the resolution and see what result I get.  I have compiled the kernel with DRI enabled, but since there were no drivers available for s3 saavage, I didn't select any drivers. Should I enable the "Build drivers for old (XFree 4.0) DRM" or any other driver even not saying that it's for savage? Btw, my savage Mx has 8Mb, not shared, of  ram. 

Thanks for the help so far.

Ricardo Loureiro

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## marcus

I have the same laptop (and the same video card   :Smile:  ) as RoadRunner. I wondered what framerates I could expect. I got a maximum of 80 fps at 1024x768 when running glxgears. Would that be enough to run Quake or Warcraft3?

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## RoadRunner

you get 80 frames at 1024?? is that fullscreen??? if it is, please tell me what you done to have hardware acceleration enabled.

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## TripKnot

XFree does not currently support DRI on savage based cards.  Until it does your OGL performance will not improve.

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## RoadRunner

yeah, that's what I thought. Well, thanks for the info. at least I won't try again =)

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## marcus

RoadRunner: sorry, I mixed it up. 80 fps was in the standard window. Maximized it was about 12  :Embarassed: 

Anyway, how bad is that? Will I be able to play any 3d games?[/quote]

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## RoadRunner

don't count on it.. even crack attack is slow, and I put extra ram, 320Mb now.. until dri is supported for savage, forget hardware acceleration.. sad but true =(

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## Josuke

there are news about direct rendering for this laptop and savage?

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## RoadRunner

Yes - https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-147440.html, but you should reat the whole thread, specially the last pages.

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## Josuke

thank you...it works perfectly  :Smile: 

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