Noodle melted - xorg.conf maybe?

Khannie

So.....I'd been running ubuntu on my htpc with mythtv. It was ok, but performance wasn't what it should have been. In particular, high def x264 files weren't playing properly. So...I wiped it and installed gentoo with evilwm (I don't think it's possible to have a more lightweight WM).

It's great....except....it's terrible.

First off, I've only specified 1280x720@60Hz (through a modeline) in the xorg.conf file. The thing is, it's definitely not at 1280x720. The projector it's attached to says that it's at 750p @ 50Hz. Any attempt to play a video and the top 1/3rd looks fine, but the bottom half is in absolute ribbons. It looks like really bad tearing, but actually there's quite a bit of flickering in general.

The modeline that I had used (with a vga cable) in ubuntu is out of range for some weird reason. I'm using a dvi -> hdmi cable now.

Any suggestions? The binary ati driver is not an option. 9100IGP support ended with an driver that does not support the current version of xorg.

Oh, here's my xorg.conf: (It's in a state of flux, but this is what I just tested with).

Section "Module"
        Load  "i2c"
        Load  "bitmap"
        Load  "ddc"
        Load  "dri"
        Load  "drm"
        Load  "extmod"
        Load  "freetype"
        Load  "glx"
        Load  "int10"
        Load  "type1"
        Load  "vbe"
EndSection


Section "Files"
    FontPath   "/usr/share/fonts/misc/"
    FontPath   "/usr/share/fonts/Type1/"
    FontPath   "/usr/share/fonts/100dpi/"
    FontPath   "/usr/share/fonts/75dpi/"
EndSection

Section "ServerFlags"

EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier  "Keyboard1"
    Driver      "kbd"
    Option "AutoRepeat" "500 30"
    Option "XkbRules"   "xorg"
    Option "XkbModel"   "pc105"
    Option "XkbLayout"  "ie"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier  "Mouse1"
    Driver      "mouse"
    Option "Protocol"    "Auto" # Auto detect
    Option "Device"      "/dev/input/mice"
    Option "ZAxisMapping"   "4 5 6 7"
EndSection


Section "Monitor"
        Identifier  "My Monitor"
        DisplaySize     160 90
#semi-working
#    Modeline  "1280x720" 74.160 1280 1352 1392 1648 720 725 730 750 -hsync +vsync
#
        Modeline "1280x720" 74.100 1280 1720 1760 1976 720 731 736 750 -hsync +vsync

EndSection


Section "Device"
    Identifier  "** ATI Radeon (generic)               [radeon]"
    Driver      "radeon"
    #VideoRam    32768
    # Insert Clocks lines here if appropriate
    Option      "AGPMode" "4"
    Option      "MonitorLayout" "TMDS, NONE"
    Option      "DDCMode" "on"
    Option      "PanelSize" "1280x720"
    Option      "VideoOverlay" "off"
    Option      "OpenGLOverlay" "off"
    Option      "AccelMethod" "exa"
EndSection

Section "Extensions"
    Option "Composite" "enable"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
    Identifier  "Screen 1"
    Device      "** ATI Radeon (generic)               [radeon]"
    Monitor     "My Monitor"
    DefaultDepth 24
    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       24
        Modes       "1280x720"
    EndSubsection
EndSection

Section "ServerLayout"
    Identifier  "Simple Layout"
    Screen "Screen 1"
    InputDevice "Mouse1" "CorePointer"
    InputDevice "Keyboard1" "CoreKeyboard"
EndSection

Section "DRI"
    Mode 0666
EndSection

humbert

Have you tried proprietary ati drivers?

Khannie

Can't use the ati drivers. Support for my card ended with version <x> which only supports up to xorg 7.0. That's gone from the gentoo repositories. Current lowest is 7.2.

I have made some progress in that it's at 720p @ 60Hz, but it seems very very flickery. Even for a low end avi (which is only using 5-10% of the cpu). Real tearing. It's like it could use some double buffering or something.

humbert

I know nothing about MythTv but is there some reason you have compositing enabled?

I've found video playing with compositing window managers awful and that's with full graphics acceleration.

Khannie

Ehm, there may be a reason that I can't remember. I'll boot and try switching it off and see if that makes a difference.

Khannie

Well....I got it sorted. For anyone else who's googling, I'll add the details:

projector: Panasonic AE700
graphics card: ATI 9100 IGP (came integrated with asus pundit)
problem: screen flicker
solution: Swap out dvi->hdmi cable and use vga->vga

It's working like a charm over vga. Looks like the linux ati open source drivers aren't supporting hdmi very well at the moment. I downloaded the latest source tarball for the drivers (6.7.197 as of writing) but still no joy.

pid()

Cheers for the info Khannie.