Re: Debian 8 on Late 2005 G5, Graphics Issues

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi,

 

I also have a Powermac G5 Quad and tried with both the Geforce 6600 and Quadro FX4500 video cards and I have successfully gotten it up and running using the nouveau driver along with 2D acceleration on the XOrg desktop. I have compiled many newer kernels and created debian packages for them. Newer 4.0+ kernels also have issues in terms of detecting the nvidia DCB from the FCODE ROM… But there are other workarounds for this to get it up and running. You shouldn't need to use the boot parameter "nouveau.noaccel=1" once you have properly configured your kernel. 

 

In my case, the reason why X does not seem to work with your configuration is twofold:

 

The recent Debian (and Fedora) kernels for PowerPC 64 Bit running on the G5 64bit powermac are configured with a 64Kb kernel pagesize. This works slightly better in terms of performance, however the nouveau driver does not support this size. You must recompile the kernel unfortunately and configure with 4Kb kernel pagesize as this is what nouveau will work with for now.

 

To confirm, run the following command in a shell as root:

“getconf PAGESIZE”

If it returns 65536, you are using a 64Kb pagesize kernel.

Otherwise if it returns 4096, i.e. 4Kb kernel pagesize, check the next item below.

 

The newer nouveau drivers in more recent kernels default to using MSI interrupts, however with the PPC G5, when using  MSI interrupts, the powerpc FCODE rom on Nvidia cards does not correctly set up the MSI address (or vector).

 

To confirm, run the following command in a shell as root:

“cat /proc/interrupts”

 

Look for the nouveau interrupt, if it is using MSI interrupts, you need to disable MSI interrupts either by passing the option to the nouveau module, disable MSI interrupts by passing an option to the kernel command line in yaboot.conf or disable MSI interrupt support in total when compiling a new kernel. If configured correctly, nouveau should be using level or edge interrupts.

 

 

This is what worked for me anyway.

 

Cheers,

Peter

 

[Rick Thomas]

Wow! Thanks Peter!

I’d pretty much given up on getting nouveau graphics working on my G5 (I plan on using it as a headless server anyway, so graphics is not on the critical path).

This gives hope.

Here’s the data on my machine…

> root@bigal:~# getconf PAGESIZE
> 65536

> root@bigal:~# cat /proc/interrupts
> CPU0 CPU1
> 16: 324536 15894 MPIC 1 0 Level keywest i2c
> 18: 764 102621 MPIC 1 10 Level 0001:03:0c.0
> 25: 159 375469 MPIC-U3MSI 8 Edge eth0
> 27: 1 4 MPIC 1 27 Level keywest i2c
> 38: 29521 89263 MPIC 1 38 Level 0001:03:0d.0
> 39: 11 12 MPIC 1 39 Level firewire_ohci
> 48: 0 0 MPIC 1 48 Edge SMU message
> 53: 1621617 666640 MPIC 1 53 Edge SMU doorbell
> 63: 10 27 MPIC 1 63 Level ehci_hcd:usb1, ohci_hcd:usb3, ohci_hcd:usb4
> 70: 113 148 MPIC 1 70 Level ehci_hcd:usb2, ohci_hcd:usb5, ohci_hcd:usb6
> 251: 13836 368 MPIC 1 251 Edge ipi call function
> 252: 122217 108015 MPIC 1 252 Edge ipi reschedule
> 253: 0 0 MPIC 1 253 Edge ipi tick-broadcast
> 254: 0 0 MPIC 1 254 Edge ipi debugger
> LOC: 1186599 1736402 Local timer interrupts for timer event device
> LOC: 259 130 Local timer interrupts for others
> SPU: 78 46 Spurious interrupts
> PMI: 0 0 Performance monitoring interrupts
> MCE: 0 0 Machine check exceptions
> HMI: 0 0 Hypervisor Maintenance Interrupts

> root@bigal:~# lspci | grep -i vga
> 0000:0b:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation NV43 [GeForce 6600 LE] (rev a2)

> root@bigal:~# uname -a
> Linux bigal 4.0.0-2-powerpc64 #1 SMP Debian 4.0.5-1 (2015-06-16) ppc64 GNU/Linux

Interpreting the “/proc/interrupts” data is not obvious to me. Can you help?

Thanks!
Rick

PS: Do you have a ‘.deb’ for your re-compiled kernel? Or could you point me to a good description of what I would do to compile one of my own? Thanks in advance!

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[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Rick,

You have a 64Kb pagesize kernel. Don't waste your time trying to get nouveau working on it for now.

You need a 4Kb pagesize kernel.

Also, I bet with a newer kernel, i.e. what you seem to be using, the nouveau module will fail to load as it cannot find the DCB block. I would be curious to see your dmesg log as well.

You can force nouveau to load a bios from a file, I used an x86 bios just so it can extract a DCB block... but lets not complicate things for now.

For starters, To me it looks like the nouveau driver has not been loaded. What kernel options have you got appended on yaboot?

You would be better off not appending any options to yaboot.conf and blacklisting nouveau for now.

Ill look into making a 4Kb pagesize kernel as a deb package. The 4.0+ version kernels require extra mucking around (for the DCB issues)...

Is a kernel from the 3.18 series ok? Where can I upload a deb package?

Cheers,

Peter

[Boris Reinhard]

Hello Peter,

amazing thx for pointing this out, we need to preserve and document this information as detailed as possible.

Based on the details you mentioned someone could add information to the ppc faq and known issues/ workaround intructions, but it might be best if you did it yourself, seeing as you came up with the workaround and know the details behind it and likely could describe things more thoroughly. Also a bug report on it could help, always good to know whats causing issues and where exactly so it may be fixed at a later time.

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PowerPCKnownIssues  (should absolutely be in here)

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PowerPCFAQ (could be added in here as well but this page is a lot less recent and not as helpful)

Grüße
boris

[Peter Saisanas]

I agree Boris.
In my opinion, i think it is best to have something running out of the box for users to have working with little effort to keep interest alive in the platform.

On my dev drive currently i am building a deb package of the latest 3.18 kernel. I have based the kernel config off the latest Debian kernel config in Jessie. I have changed as minimum as possible to make it suitable specifically for most Powermac G5 users as a starting point straight after a fresh install.

I have other leaner and meaner kernel configs that i have tweaked over a few months. I hope the LCS hangs together on the quad till i get around rebuilding it!

With the deb kernel package i am currently building, i will install on a spare drive with a fresh Debian Jessie install.
Hopefully it will work with as minimum fuss to get users with XOrg desktops running.

Can you suggest a place where i can upload a kernel deb package for other users to freely download and test? Id like to make sure that it works for most people and not just my machine before i spend the time documenting things.

Cheers,
Peter

[Boris Reinhard]

Sounds like a plan!

Well I have good experience with google drive's file hosting, seems to work well, easy to use, reliable, for smaller projects their free hosting should suffice so for a fairly small crowd like ours it's plenty I guess.

I think we could count on files staying available there.

[Boris Reinhard]

Other hosting options that might be useable are dropbox (which until recenlty still had a ppc OSX client (not that it's really needed), or mega.nz, the latter tho insists on writing files from JavaScript directly to disk which causes issues in every browser other than chrome (certainly problematic on older ppc macs where really mostly firefox is an option https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=832732 even tho this says it's fixed), so mega likely would be ill advised for our usage scenario.

[Boris Reinhard]

Hey, thx Peter!

I have no G5 system to currently test this on myself (briefly had a single core G5 PowerMac sadly it's mainboard got damaged when the PSU blew).

Am 29.06.2015 15:00 schrieb "Peter Saisanas" <psai...@gmail.com>:

Hi Boris,

As promised, I have attached a Google Drive link for a 64 BitG5 Powermac 3.18.16 kernel and headers deb packages for Debian Jessie.

This kernel is based off the default Debian Jessie kernel config, but basically optimised for G5 processors, with 4kb kernel pagesize and msi interrupts disabled. This is basically what nouveau requires to enable XOrg 2d acceleration.

I have installed this on a fresh Debian Jessie install and seems to work ok, i have quickly set this up but i can improve it further.
The kernel image and header deb files should be saved somewhere and as root install the deb files. it will complain about a module link when installing but disregard it, it will install the vmlinux & initrd images in boot. Create a new entry in yaboot.conf and test it out.
Im curious if is solves the nouveau issues for Powermac G5 11.2 owners.

Please give feedback and i will try to update documentation.

As always, i accept no responsibility for data loss.
Try it out only if you know what you are doing.

Link Below:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8pqd5Ots1vffmY5ZnpGUDg4UGNnVFk2M05tQUtEUUkwUmhmQWdLMWpfZGVraDIxSFltb1k&authuser=0

Cheers,

Peter

[Boris Reinhard]

Peter I would suggest opening a topic over here:

http://ubuntuforums.org/forumdisplay.php?f=328

there you would get attention of enthusiasts and hardware owners a like. There are also some Amiga folks around that might be interested to test on their compatible hardware.

If you do make sure the topic is exact and catchy, something like nouveau 3d accel G5 fix or some such.

Also a new message on the devel mailing list more of interest to kernel devs and more technical/ possibly linking to an existing or newly created bug report might also gather more attention on the dev side of things.

[Brock Wittrock]

Wherever you do place this pre-compiled kernel, I'll gladly test it on my dual core G5 with an FX4500.  I've beating my head against the wall on this one for the past couple of weeks.  I'm nowhere near knowledge on the matter though, so basically just feeling in the dark and doing a lot of reading online. :)

What you said makes perfect sense though.

As far you know though, this does not apply to 32-bit PPC?

Brock

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Brock


The link is below and has been up for a few hours:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8pqd5Ots1vffmY5ZnpGUDg4UGNnVFk2M05tQUtEUUkwUmhmQWdLMWpfZGVraDIxSFltb1k

As promised, above is a Google Drive link for a 64 Bit G5 Powermac

3.18.16 kernel and headers deb packages for Debian Jessie.
This kernel is based off the default Debian Jessie kernel config, but

basically optimised for G5 processors, with 4kb kernel pagesize and MSI

interrupts disabled. This is basically what nouveau requires to enable
XOrg 2d acceleration.
I have installed this on a fresh Debian Jessie install and seems to work
ok, i have quickly set this up but i can improve it further.
The kernel image and header deb files should be saved somewhere and as
root install the deb files.

it will install the vmlinux & initrd images in boot. Create a new
entry in yaboot.conf and test it out.
Im curious if is solves the nouveau issues for Powermac G5 11.2 owners.

Please give feedback and i will try to update documentation.

P.S. after installing, load the i2c-powermac module to automatically
start windfarm to quieten the machine.
Im pretty sure the 32 bit kernels AFAIK are already using 4kB pagesizes.
Regarding the MSI interrupts, im sure it mostly affects the Powermac G5
11.2 Dual Core PCI-E owners most but maybe also the single core AGP /
PCI-X G5's as well.

By the way, use the XFCE desktop, it seems Cinnamon doesn't start-up
correctly.


Cheers & Good luck!

Peter


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[Rick Thomas]

On Jun 28, 2015, at 11:58 PM, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Ill look into making a 4Kb pagesize kernel as a deb package. The 4.0+ version kernels require extra mucking around (for the DCB issues)...
>
> Is a kernel from the 3.18 series ok? Where can I upload a deb package?
>

If the 3.18 series will work with the packages from a current “Sid” installation, I’ll give it a try.

Rick

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[Peter Saisanas]

It should, i don't see why it wouldn't.
The package will install an additional kernel for you, just add an entry
in yaboot.conf.

It works pretty good, im typing this with the jessie kernel image made
as we speak!

Cheers,
Peter

Archive: https://lists.debian.org/559251A4...@gmail.com

[Peter Saisanas]

Rick,
You cant get nouveau working with your current kernel. Period.
It doesn't matter what kernel options or module options you pass, nouveau with acceleration just doesn't currently work with a 64kb pagesize kernel.

You are falling back to the openfirmware framebuffer. I have told you to disable nouveau because it just wont work with your current kernel config for xorg, but for the console it doesnt matter.

Please install the kernel deb package for 3.18.16 i have provided from the link i have given previously.
It has been configured to work immediately without requiring any kernel options appended and even doesnt require an xorg config.

The beauty of KMS!

After installing the kernel deb files, create a new kernel boot entry in yaboot.conf and run "ybin -v" afterwards. Make sure you re-enable nouveau by taking it off the blacklist and only add modules "snd-aoa-i2sbus" and "i2c-powermac" to /etc/modules. This should get audio along with windfarm running. Update your initrd by running "update-initramfs -u".

Reboot to the 3.18.16 kernel you just installed. It should just work!

If you are hell bent on getting the latest kernel running, i can try building the absolute latest stable kernel. The most recent one i have tried successfully  is 4.0.2 but if you want something even newer, ill look into it.

Cheers,
Peter

Install the kernel

On 30/06/15 19:23, Rick Thomas wrote:

On Jun 30, 2015, at 1:09 AM, Rick Thomas <rbth...@pobox.com> wrote:

You would be better off not appending any options to yaboot.conf and blacklisting nouveau for now.

I’ll give that a try!

Here’s what happens when I blacklist kernel module nouveau and set the append in yaboot.conf to just plain “ ro”.  I’m attaching /var/log/dmesg and /var/log/Xorg.0.log incase they have clues.  I notice some mentions of “nouveau” in the Xorg.0.log file.  Is this expected?

Thanks!
Rick

[Rick Thomas]

Hi Peter,

I get it. What you describe is in the plans — and thanks very much for the detailed directions; it’s pretty much what I had planned to do myself, but it’s always nice to have confirmation. Actually, even better, I plan to re-install with stock-out-of-the-box Jessie plus your tweaked kernel. The only reason I had Sid installed at all was my search for a working nouveau.

The reason for the previous test was because it was easy to do and I (mis-)interpreted you as wanting to know how that particular combination worked out in my case. Sorry for the noise!

Now that we have a working theory as to why nouveau fails, I’m happy to use a supported stable (Jessie) system with a slightly tweaked kernel — rather than an avowedly unstable setup with a stock kernel that doesn’t have a prayer of working.

In the long run, somebody (with better kernel coding skills than me) needs to fix the nouveau driver to work with 64K pagesize. However, I suspect that will be considerably harder than configuring the current kernel to use 4K pagesize, as a short-term workaround.

I’ll definitely report on how things work on my hardware with your kernel, but it will have to wait til after the weekend. 4th of July == US Independence Day == lots of neighborhood/family/etc parties and celebrations == no time for playing with computers.

I’m looking forward to sending a report soon!
Rick

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[Peter Saisanas]

Awesome.
Thanks Rick.

FYI, i have also built a 4.0.7 kernel deb package as well.
But nouveau will not correctly read the nVidia DCB from Open Firmware as
per pre 4.0.0 kernel versions.
So i guess for now lets try and get some more systems up and running
with kernel 3.18.16 and Debian Jessie and get some critical mass.

The nouveau issue with kernel page sizes other than 4kB affects other
arch's as well, e.g. SPARC64. Its not a new issue. But getting people
interested to fix it is as difficult as getting people interested in
fixing current versions of mesa to work with big endian machines.

But lets get 2d working before worrying about 3d.

Cheers,
Peter

Archive: https://lists.debian.org/559295...@gmail.com

[Milan Kupcevic]

On 06/30/2015 05:56 AM, Peter Saisanas wrote:
[...]

> You cant get nouveau working with your current kernel. Period. It
> doesn't matter what kernel options or module options you pass,
> nouveau with acceleration just doesn't currently work with a 64kb
> pagesize kernel.
>
> You are falling back to the openfirmware framebuffer. I have told
> you to disable nouveau because it just wont work with your current
> kernel config for xorg, but for the console it doesnt matter.

[...]

CC: debian...@lists.debian.org

Peter,

Could you please submit a bug report[0] and explain the problem. If
Debian kernel maintainers are not aware of this problem we will have the
same issue in the next Debian release. They might be able to fix it for
Debian 8.2.

Thanks,

Milan

[0] www.debian.org/Bugs/Reporting

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Milan,

I have submitted the following Debian bugs:

Bug#790690: linux-image-3.16.0-4​-powerpc64: powerpc64 & 64Kb kernel pagesize not working with nouveau

Bug#790694: linux-image-3.16.0-4​-powerpc64: nouveau driver and msi interrupts

Regarding the issue mentioned with vanilla 4.0.7 kernel and nouveau not detecting the NVidia DCB block in the openfirmware FCODE rom, where should I report this?

Sorry, I haven't reported a bug for over 10 years. Forgive me!

Cheers,

Peter

[Brock Wittrock]

Peter,

I did a fresh install of Jessie with LXDE and then installed the kernel image and headers you uploaded on my G5 (11,2) with a Quadro FX4500 Nivida card.  After adding an entry in yaboot.conf and running sudo ybin -v, I rebooted successfully to the login screen without having to pass in any yaboot parameters to disable acceleration.  As also explained, the G5's fans did spin up and out of control after a couple of minutes, but loading the i2c-powermac module resolved that issue.

I can also now use both 20" Apple Cinema Displays side by side, whereas before I could only have them mirror each other. Trying to place one monitor to the left or right of the other caused me to be logged out of my session.

Let me know if you need any more information about the process or my system and configuration.

By the way, I happened to notice a G5 page size bug is noted on the Nouveau websites under their DRM To DOs.
http://nouveau.freedesktop.org/wiki/ToDo/

Anyways, I'm super stoked the 2D driver is working.  Now if I could only get 3D acceleration!

Thanks,.

Brock

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Brock,

That's great news! Hopefully a few more people are willing to try this out.
I set the compiler flags to be tuned specifically for the Power 4 /
PPC970 (G5) cpu's with altivec so its unlikely to be suitable for any
other powerpc64 based machines.

Perhaps someone else with a PCIe GeForce 6600 / 7800 along with feedback
from the AGP / PCI-X Powermac G5's would be great.

Yes, i have reported the issues to Debian kernel maintainers via the
bugs noted earlier in the hope they might change the default kernel
config or have an alternative pre-compiled deb package to workaround the
nouveau bugs.

But really, the three items below need to be reported to the nouveau
developers to properly fix. My job is keeping me pretty busy at the
moment so if someone else has a moment to spare, please report to
nouveau devs.

That note about the pagesizes on the nouveau website has been there for
a long time... hopefully someone else can nicely ask someone over there
if they can consider looking into a fix for this finally at minimum for
pre nv50 generation nVidia gpu's as we really should be using the 64kB
kernel pagesizes?

More worrying is that it seems in the new 4.0.0+ kernels, it seems they
possibly have removed the support for reading out the nVidia DCB block
from the FCODE rom, this is a worry as it used to work....

The MSI interrupt issue can be worked around as described earlier, this
one isn't a dealbreaker but i think it may be something to get the
nouveau developers to consider as this can affect other machines which
have dodgy BIOS' and FCODE roms which have the msi flag set in pci
config space but no address configured, surely this must be an invalid
config....

Cheers,
Peter

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[Brock Wittrock]

Hello Peter,

I might actually have a 6600 and 7800 laying around so if I can I post results of those as well, but it may be just a couple of days.

Of the three issues I will start with the first. I will touch base with the nouveau developers and see if they can revisit the issue soon and offer my help in any way.

I am not an experienced graphics developer but I've been doing a lot of reading of the nouveau driver documentation as well as Linux graphics in general so I'm at least trying to learn what I can as I don't want to see support for this great Mac model go into the sunset just yet. No better way than to just dive right in.

Thanks,
Brock

Sent from my iPhone

Archive: https://lists.debian.org/C4E85F73-CECE-4ABF...@gmail.com

[Rick Thomas]

On Jun 30, 2015, at 3:48 AM, Rick Thomas <rbth...@pobox.com> wrote:

> I’ll definitely report on how things work on my hardware with your kernel, but it will have to wait til after the weekend. 4th of July == US Independence Day == lots of neighborhood/family/etc parties and celebrations == no time for playing with computers.
>
> I’m looking forward to sending a report soon!
> Rick

Hi Peter,

I installed your 3.18… kernel. I get a black screen.

Here’s what “journalctl -b | grep -C5 nouveau ” says. I hope it help. Note the error from nouveau about “Invalid ROM contents”. Is that expected?

Thanks!
Rick

[Rick Thomas]

Thanks Peter!

I’m sure I’ve got the 3.18 kernel. I confirmed that with “uname -a” after the boot. Your yaboot stanza looks exactly (in the relevant particulars) like mine. And, yes, I did “ybin -v” and checked to make sure the output looked right.

The ppdev and parport_pc anomalies have been there all along. I don’t think they have anything to do with this problem, though.

The only thing I can think of that might be related (and possibly causing the “Invalid ROM” message) is that the base system is Sid, not Jessie. The default kernel is

> rbthomas@bigal:~$ uname -a

> Linux bigal 4.0.0-2-powerpc64 #1 SMP Debian 4.0.5-1 (2015-06-16) ppc64 GNU/Linux

So there may be remnants of that lying around that confuse the issue when running with your kernel…

Didn’t you mention you had some trouble with the firmware blob in Sid?

I’ll be interested to look at your dmesg and xorg logs. I’m not getting to anything involving xorg — the black screen happens before I get to the login prompt. I have /etc/X11/default-display-manager set to “/bin/false" to prevent X from starting up automatically. When I want to start X, I do a manual “startx” from a text console.

Enjoy!
Rick

PS: I’m planning to install a plain-vanilla, fresh-out-of-the-box, Jessie then add your kernel, and I’ll report back on that.

Re, the FCODE ROM: Where can I read-up (RTFM, but what FM?) on the nouveau module parameters?

Thanks!

On Jul 8, 2015, at 1:04 PM, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Rick,
> I should probably start a new thread for reports....
>
> Seems odd to me that systemd is attempting to load modules ppdev, parport_pc along with snd-powermac...
>
> Are you sure you are booting up with my actual compiled kernel and initrd?
>
> Please confirm your /etc/yaboot.conf file has entries for the image and initrd, see below.
>
> image=/boot/vmlinux-3.18.16-powerpc64
> label=linux
> read-only
> initrd=/boot/initrd.img-3.18.16-powerpc64
> append=""
>
> Ensure you have saved the yaboot.conf and then run "ybin -v" to apply the changes to your boot loader.
>
> I have attached a dmesg log from my system. note my audio hardware isn't working (hardware fault), so disregard the issues with snd-aoa-onyx.
>
> I have also attached my xorg log for reference.
>
> The nouveau driver attempts to scan for the nVidia DCB block (within a typical VGA bios or FCODE ROM via alternate methods, it seems to perform this scan automatically, but if curious, refer to the "NvBios" nouveau module parameter.
>
> Let me know how you go.
>
> Cheers,
> Peter

> <dmesg.log><Xorg.0.log>

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[Herminio Hernandez Jr]

The "Invalid ROM" is an error that appears once KMS is working. I shows up on G4 machines as well.

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[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Rick,

Interesting..... Someone else has got it running on jessie using a Quadro FX4500 as well.
I have a 6600 with 256Mb VRAM in my possesion and it seemed to work with this as well.

Regarding detection of the nVidia DCB, the main thing to be concerned for now is that you see something like this in dmesg:

[   15.056167] nouveau  [   VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] using image from OpenFirmware
[   15.056193] nouveau  [   VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] BIT signature found
[   15.056199] nouveau  [   VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] version 05.70.02.16.00

I suppose this means that nouveau has detected a valid nVidia DCB block from the OpenFirmware device tree, i.e. within the FCODE ROM of the nVidia GPU ROM for now i feel this is all you should be concerned with.

The DCB block describes the nVidia GPU card to the driver, which configures it accordingly i suppose.
Google is your friend, read up on it if interested.

If i recall, your card was a 6600?
So it probably has a different version number, but as long as you see in dmesg something to the effect of :

nouveau  [   VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] BIT signature found

along with a corresponding version number below, you should be ok.

My hunch is that the nouveau driver has multiple methods of extracting the DCB block from the VGA BIOS / FCODE ROM. Refer to the link below regarding the NvBIOS module parameters:

http://nouveau.freedesktop.org/wiki/KernelModuleParameters/

NvBios: Specify VBIOS source as one of OpenFirmware/PRAMIN/PROM/ACPI/PCIROM/PLATFORM, or a filename passed to request_firmware

As you can see, nouveau goes through the various methods automatically trying to detect a valid DCB block, in our case it OpenFirmware is the correct method.
As it goes through the other various methods automatically, it wont find it on our machines.... And thats why you get an invalid rom message!

Dont know what kernel version is used in sid, but in newer vanilla kernels, i.e. 4.0.0+, i recall even trying to force the detection of the NvBIOS to use OpenFirmware method fails. so it cant find a DCB Block.
So something has changed in the nouveau driver or in the powerpc arch to stop it from working anymore.

Ill tell you more in another thread to work around this... note, not a fix, just a hack!

Please give full dmesg log dumps next time, grepping stuff doesnt give me all the stuff id like to know.

For starters, i dont know exactly what sort of H/W you got!

Cheers,

Peter

 

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Rick,

Hmmm, You have a USB to RS-232 converter along with a USB3 PCIe card? Is
this correct?

Do you happen to have anything displayed on the screen after yaboot
executes the kernel? I.e. the OpenFirmware framebuffer console?

It seems that early on, the Debian config tries to setup a console on
tty0, now i dont have any serial ports in my machine, but you seem to
have a USB-serial converter, could the console be automatically
redirected to your USB serial port by any chance?

I noticed this line:
usb 7-1: FTDI USB Serial Device converter now attached to ttyUSB0,
taking a stab in the dark here, but your usb serial adapter has been
given the dev node ttyUSB0. Could the tty0 node automatically be linked
to the first detected serial port (in your case ttyUSB0) and have the
serial console being spat out on this device?

This is a long shot, but could the USB3 PCIie card be screwing around
with the PCI resources by any chance? No mention of resource re-mapping,
but just in case!

Thats the only thing that stands out to me as It actually looks like it
should work!

Good luck
Cheers,
Peter

On 09/07/15 17:07, Rick Thomas wrote:
> OK,
>
> Here’s the output of commands “lspci”, “dmesg”, and "journalctl -b”
>
> Let me know if there’s anything else I can provide…
>
> Hope it helps!
>
> Rick

>
> On Jul 8, 2015, at 5:04 PM, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Please give full dmesg log dumps next time, grepping stuff doesnt give me all the stuff id like to know.

>> For starters, i don’t know exactly what sort of H/W you got!

>


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[Rick Thomas]

The USB to RS-232 Serial Device is there so I can use the G5 as a serial console for a SheevaPlug. I can temporarily remove it and see what happens. I have a similar hookup on a G4 mac mini with no problems…

As far as what happens after yaboot executes the kernel: Yes, I have the usual scrolling messages for several seconds. Then it stops and goes black.

The messages go by way too fast to get any idea of what’s going on when the darkness descends. Is there some kind of systemd parameter I can set to slow that down?

I just tried unplugging the USB serial cable (removing the PCI USB cards themselves is more work — I’ll try that later) but no go. Scrolling messages for a couple of seconds then black.

Next step is to reinstall the whole system with plain-vanilla Jessie then install your kernel. If there’s something in Sid that’s causing this, now would be a good time to know about it…

I’ve ordered an inexpensive ATI based video card. If all else fails I’ll install that…

Enjoy!
Rick

Archive: https://lists.debian.org/E2E75BBB-A20D-4416...@pobox.com

[Peter Saisanas]

What about trying the other dvi connector?

[Rick Thomas]

Good point! I'll do that as soon as I get home!

On Jul 9, 2015, at 1:15 PM, Peter Saisanas wrote:

> What about trying the other dvi connector?

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[Rick Thomas]

Changing to the other DVI connector and rebooting got me a working video screen.

When I logged in and ran “startx” I got a desktop with the expected stuff, though the colors are kind of odd.

I’m attaching the output of commands “dmesg”, “journalctl -b” and the contents of /var/log/Xorg.0.log in case they help.

Enjoy!
Rick

Archive: https://lists.debian.org/66F2BACD-C16E-439C...@pobox.com

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Rick,

Getting there!
What DE are you using just out of curiosity?

Dont know much about the cinema displays, what sort of colour issues have you got?

Could it be something to do with the cinema display itself?

Send a pic if you got one.. im curious!

There seems to be a linux utility called acdcontrol to control the cinema display.
Maybe useful if it is the display calibration.

Regards,

Peter

On Fri, Jul 10, 2015 at 4:14 PM, Rick Thomas <rbth...@pobox.com> wrote:

Ooops!  Here are the attachments!   )-:

[Rick Thomas]

Is there a debian package that provides acdcontrol?

I googled it and, from the sourceforge page, it looks like it only sets the brightness of the backlight. From the looks of the display (see the pictures in previous email) I don’t think the problem is backlight brightness. It looks like the color balance is wrong. But I’m not a graphics driver expert…

Rick

On Jul 10, 2015, at 12:04 AM, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com> wrote:

> There seems to be a linux utility called acdcontrol to control the cinema display.
> Maybe useful if it is the display calibration.

Wheezy with xfce4 and lighted gives a normal screen without any of the flakiness in this Jessie. I don’t know if that’s important…

Rick

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[Rick Thomas]

It’s still Sid. I haven’t taken the time to reinstall with Jessie yet. But it’s in the works!

If I generate an xorg.conf (Shut down X, run “Xorg -configure”) can you help me with the changes?

Thanks!
Rick

On Jul 10, 2015, at 4:12 AM, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Is this sid or jessie your running?
> Im running jessie and i dont have the issues your having with some of the icon colours being mixed up. Sorry, im not really sure exactly why your config is doing this!
>
> In saying this, I have seen this similar colour effect before and my guess is you are starting to see the big endian issues with mesa / dri and colour formats being incorrect, 3d hw acceleration wouldn't be able to work and perhaps it is falling back on software rasterisaton for some effect of xfce maybe????
>
> An interesting test perhaps would be to attempt to run glxgears and see if it uses software rendering and if so, do you have the same colour effects you are noticing on the desktop!
>
> Perhaps in this case you could try and experiment by creating an xorg.conf and disabling the glx or xrender extension. Thats what i would try maybe theres some issue with some alpha transparency effect used in xfce. Just guessing!
>
> Not sure if there is a deb pkg for acdcontrol.
>
> Im not too sure about the 3d side of things with linux.
>
> But im sure there are others that know more about the 3d side of things than me!
>
> My quad is really in need of a rebuild as the lcs is starting to show some signs of overheating and maybe leaking. No doubt from all the kernel compiles i have done have given it quite a workout!
> Cheers,
> Peter

>
>
>
>


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[Herminio Hernandez Jr.]

What version of xorg-core are you running? The latest 1.17.2-1 should have fixed that.

Sent from my iPhone

Archive: https://lists.debian.org/3B677FD8-3AF6-4302...@gmail.com

[Rick Thomas]

I checked…
Package: xserver-xorg-core
State: installed
Automatically installed: yes
Version: 2:1.17.1-2
Archive: now

So I did an update && upgrade && reboot and now…
Package: xserver-xorg-core
State: installed
Automatically installed: yes
Version: 2:1.17.2-1
Archive: now

And guess what! Desktop colors are normal again! Whoopie!

Thank you Herminio! Thank you Peter! (-: (-: (-:
This list is tops!

Gratefully,
Rick

On Jul 10, 2015, at 2:35 PM, Herminio Hernandez Jr. <herminio.h...@gmail.com> wrote:

> What version of xorg-core are you running? The latest 1.17.2-1 should have fixed that.

PS: Any idea what the problem was? It would be great to know what got fixed.

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[Herminio Hernandez Jr.]

Awesome

Sent from my iPhone

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[Ala de Dragón]

Hi Peter. :D

Maybe I'm confussed because there are a few post about this problem.

2015-06-29 23:55 GMT+02:00, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com>:
(...)

> The link is below and has been up for a few hours:
>
> https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8pqd5Ots1vffmY5ZnpGUDg4UGNnVFk2M05tQUtEUUkwUmhmQWdLMWpfZGVraDIxSFltb1k
>

I downloaded and installed this two packets.

My mac is a G5 late 2005, with:

# lspci | grep -i vga
0000:0a:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation NV43
[GeForce 6600] (rev a2)


root@debian:~# uname -a
Linux debian 3.16.0-4-powerpc64 #1 SMP Debian 3.16.7-ckt11-1+deb8u3
(2015-08-04) ppc64 GNU/Linux


> As promised, above is a Google Drive link for a 64 Bit G5 Powermac
> 3.18.16 kernel and headers deb packages for Debian Jessie.
> This kernel is based off the default Debian Jessie kernel config, but
> basically optimised for G5 processors, with 4kb kernel pagesize and MSI
> interrupts disabled. This is basically what nouveau requires to enable
> XOrg 2d acceleration.

(...)

root@debian:~# cat /proc/interrupts | grep nouveau
26: 1 0 MPIC-U3MSI 9 Edge nouveau

Thant seems ok, isn't it?

root@debian:~# getconf PAGESIZE
65536

and here comes my problems. This has to be 4kb if I'm correct. So if
you packed it correctly why I'm getting this values?... is what I'm
wondering to myself. I can't figure out.

on the other hand noveau is complaining about rom, so I suspect that I
will need to do the trick: put the i386 video rom and load it by hand.
This are the logs:

root@debian:~# journalctl | grep nouveau
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: fb: switching to nouveaufb from OFfb NVDA,Displ
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DEVICE][0000:0a:00.0] BOOT0
: 0x043100a4
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DEVICE][0000:0a:00.0]
Chipset: NV43 (NV43)
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DEVICE][0000:0a:00.0] Family : NV40
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0]
checking OpenFirmware for image...
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] ...
checksum invalid
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0]
checking PRAMIN for image...
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] ...
signature not found
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0]
checking PROM for image...
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] ...
signature not found
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0]
checking ACPI for image...
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] ...
signature not found
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0]
checking PCIROM for image...
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau 0000:0a:00.0: Invalid ROM contents
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] ...
signature not found
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0]
checking PLATFORM for image...
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] ...
signature not found
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] using
image from OpenFirmware
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0] BIT
signature found
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ VBIOS][0000:0a:00.0]
version 05.43.02.75.00
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ PMC][0000:0a:00.0] MSI
interrupts enabled

(I don't like this line....)

nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ PFB][0000:0a:00.0] RAM type: DDR1
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ PFB][0000:0a:00.0] RAM
size: 256 MiB
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ PFB][0000:0a:00.0]
ZCOMP: 378880 tags
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ PTHERM][0000:0a:00.0] FAN
control: toggle
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ PTHERM][0000:0a:00.0]
internal sensor: no
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ CLK][0000:0a:00.0] 20:
core 300 MHz shader 300 MHz memory 500 MHz
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ CLK][0000:0a:00.0] --:
core 300 MHz shader 300 MHz memory 500 MHz
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau 0000:0a:00.0: Using 32-bit DMA via iommu
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] VRAM: 252 MiB
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] GART: 512 MiB
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] TMDS table version 1.1
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] DCB version 3.0
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] DCB outp 00:
01000100 00000028
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] DCB outp 01:
03000102 00000000
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] DCB outp 02:
04011210 00000028
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] DCB outp 03:
02111212 02000100
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] DCB outp 04:
02011211 0020c070
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] DCB conn 00: 1030
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] DCB conn 01: 2130
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ I2C][0000:0a:00.0]
detected TMDS transmitter: sil164
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] 0x14C5: Parsing
digital output script table
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] MM: using M2MF for
buffer copies
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] Setting dpms mode 3
on TV encoder (output 4)
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau [ DRM] allocated 1280x1024
fb: 0x30000, bo c000000162469180
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau 0000:0a:00.0: fb0: nouveaufb
frame buffer device
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: nouveau 0000:0a:00.0: registered panic notifier
nov 14 09:27:27 debian kernel: [drm] Initialized nouveau 1.1.2
20120801 for 0000:0a:00.0 on minor 0
nov 14 09:38:58 debian kernel: nouveau E[ DRM] GPU lockup -
switching to software fbcon
nov 14 09:39:13 debian kernel: nouveau E[Xorg[574]] failed to idle
channel 0xcccc0001 [Xorg[574]]
nov 14 09:39:28 debian kernel: nouveau E[Xorg[574]] failed to idle
channel 0xcccc0001 [Xorg[574]]
nov 14 09:39:43 debian kernel: nouveau E[Xorg[574]] failed to idle
channel 0xcccc0000 [Xorg[574]]
nov 14 09:39:58 debian kernel: nouveau E[Xorg[574]] failed to idle
channel 0xcccc0000 [Xorg[574]]


So, I just installed it in a clean jesie installation with xfce so. I
need to compile the sources by hand or need to place the sources for
running you kernel. Please tell me the trick, I just want to tranform
the big metal junk over my table in a running computer.
Thanks a lot :D

--
"El cielo es para los dragones
lo que el agua es para las ninfas"

[Ala de Dragón]

I answer to my self:

I checked now that it is not your kernel loaded.
I change the yaboot and let you know....
cheers!!

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi,
It looks like you are not booting from the 3.18.16 kernel.
If you have installed the packages, you need to create an entry for the
new kernel by editing /etc/yaboot.conf and once saved run ybin -v.

Also, i have built a 4.3.0 kernel deb package.

Aside from the newer kernel, it also has a nouveau pageflip patch for
drm and pre nv50 class gpu's.
Also, it has i2c-powermac built in to the kernel, so it should
automatically start the appropriate windfarm driver for fans / cooling
and snd-aoa sound driver for your machine.

MSI interrupts are enabled again in this kernel, but still wont work
with nouveau and powermac 11.2 for now

Once installing the kernel and modifying yaboot, you need to create a
module option file in /etc/modprobe.d and save file as nouveau.conf with
the following single line below:

options nouveau config="NvMSI=0"

Once file is saved, you need to update your initrd for kernel 4.3.0,
apply the change by running the following command:

update-initramfs -u

Reboot and if all goes well, you should be booting with kernel 4.3.0 and
lightdm login should pop up.

Up to you, but If you switch to sid repositories, mesa 11.0.5 is
available and you should be able to get OpenGL working with nouveau and
your particular GPU.

Google drive link for kernel debs below:

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B8pqd5Ots1vfT2puX09CYjEwcFk&usp=sharing

Please let me know how you go.

Regards,
Peter

[Rick Thomas]

Thanks for doing this, Peter!

I have a powermac 11,2 machine, currently running your 3.18.16 kernel. Would this new 4.3.0 kernel work with it? If so, I can give it a try.

Enjoy!
Rick

[Peter Saisanas]

Just to clarify,
I meant it should also work for Powermac G5's with AGP graphics (64 bit cpu's only).

On Mon, Nov 16, 2015 at 10:10 AM, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com> wrote:

It sure is for for our machines, i.e. the Powermac G5 11.2 (i.e. with PCIe).

It should also work for the Powermac's with AGP graphics as well, (cant remember if i left AGP enabled)

Please give it a try, just remember to disable MSI interrupts by passing the module option as described. Let me know how it goes, as i can tweak the config where appropriate!

Also, if you are on the sid repositories, try mesa 11.0.5 out. Hopefully you will have a pleasant surprise with OpenGL!

Good Luck :)

[Peter Saisanas]

It sure is for for our machines, i.e. the Powermac G5 11.2 (i.e. with PCIe).

It should also work for the Powermac's with AGP graphics as well, (cant remember if i left AGP enabled)

Please give it a try, just remember to disable MSI interrupts by passing the module option as described. Let me know how it goes, as i can tweak the config where appropriate!

Also, if you are on the sid repositories, try mesa 11.0.5 out. Hopefully you will have a pleasant surprise with OpenGL!

Good Luck :)

On Mon, Nov 16, 2015 at 10:00 AM, Rick Thomas <rbth...@pobox.com> wrote:

[Ala de Dragón]

2015-11-15 21:23 GMT+01:00, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com>:
(...)
>

> Please let me know how you go.
>
> Regards,
> Peter
>

Next weeckend will try this. Last time I touched yaboot I was unable
to boot. So I reinstaled and this moment I'm using debian 7 stacked
Xorg and Old NV driver.
I install squeeze, them upgrade to whezzy. I use this because is the
only way I get yaboot properly configured.

if I update the yaboot file adding a few lines, I get error telling me
that the " scasi-blahblah-part2 can't be found. In my system the hard
disk partitions are linked to "sata-blahblah-part2"
Any change of the file makes my system unbotable. I must be carefull.
So until the weeckend I can't be more precisse. Maybe along the weeck
I can spend sometime.



I will let us know how goes my experience.



Regards.

[Jonni O'Gorman]

Hi all,

I followed peter's guide and successfully installed debian8 with updated kernel and MATE desktop, however my hard drive soon became corrupted so I ma back to square one with a hunk of metal I am still trying to trun intop a functioning computer... worked well for a whie though...

jonny

--

jogideas.com

[Rick Thomas]

Hi Peter,

I finally got around (very sorry for the long delay!) to testing your 4.3 kernel on my G5.
But I ran into a snag: The 4.3.0 kernel doesn’t seem to have MD (raid) configured in.
Is there a reason for that? Could you build one that does?

Thanks!

Rick


On Nov 15, 2015, at 12:23 PM, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com> wrote:

[luigi burdo]

Warning guys on the 4.3 kernel im facing a strange bug on quad g5

"Problem Loading in-kernel X.509 Certificate (-74)" 

i read someware it is fixed in 4.3.3  (i hope in the 4.3.3)

The issue make the system not loading .

Luigi

> Subject: Re: Debian 8 on Late 2005 G5, Graphics Issues
> From: rbth...@pobox.com
> Date: Mon, 28 Dec 2015 21:08:46 -0800
> CC: debian-...@lists.debian.org
> To: psai...@gmail.com

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Rick,

The only kernel i have in my google drive link that is more or less a
typical Debian kernel config with tweaks was the initial 3.18.16 kernel
i originally had available. IIRC, should be in the google shared drive
link "Debian Jessie 8.1 PPC64 Kernel".
Link for this particular folder mentioned below.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8pqd5Ots1vffmY5ZnpGUDg4UGNnVFk2M05tQUtEUUkwUmhmQWdLMWpfZGVraDIxSFltb1k

For my own test kernels, i have tweaked the configs, typical things that
i have changed are move some drivers from kernel modules to be built in
the monolithic kernel (to save from manually enabling the module) to
removing redundant modules for myself, (since i don't use raid on the
PMAC, i don't have MD module enabled amongst many other modules as it
slows down kernel compile times). Typical Debian kernels have
practically all possible modules enabled.

The google drive link with my own test kernels and my own particular
kernel config (note: may have MD module missing amongst other modules
unfortunately).
Link for this particular kernel test folder mentioned below.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8pqd5Ots1vfT2puX09CYjEwcFk

Note the different google drive folder names.

Currently I am on stretch repos and I have just built a fresh 4.4.0-rc7
with my own kernel config, i have enabled the MD module in this build.
It seems to compile and build fine, the kernel monolith itself boots
fine, however it has an issue loading the initrd and therefore cant load
ANY modules. I think i'm having issues with the toolchain. I believe the
version of binutils currently in stretch is the issue.

See this post for the toolchain issues i seem to be facing:
https://lists.debian.org/debian-powerpc/2015/12/msg00017.html

I don't have much spare time right now, but when spare time is
available, ill attempt more kernel builds and keep them close to a
typical Debian kernel config if possible.

Sorry, i hope i haven't confused anybody!

Regards,
Peter

[Rick Thomas]

Hi Peter,

> On Dec 30, 2015, at 12:25 PM, Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I don't have much spare time right now, but when spare time is available, ill attempt more kernel builds and keep them close to a typical Debian kernel config if possible.

That would be great. I’m testing things as I have time, myself, so I know how you feel. Please let me know when you have something you’d like me to test.

One other feature I use that you might be tempted to config out would be LVM2. Is that a problem?

Thanks again,
Rick

PS: Some day when you have some spare time [*], could you teach me how to build my own kernels? Long ago, in a galaxy far far away, in the early 1980’s, I worked on UNIX(tm) kernels for AT&T, but I’ve forgotten pretty much everything I ever knew about it and anyway the intervening years have brought many changes. I’d really love to bring my skills up to date!

[*] Yeah, I know — spare time? What’s that?!!!

[Lennart Sorensen]

If you downgrade to binutils from jessie it should work fine. binutils in
stretch and sid currently is hopeless for powerpc kernel building.

> I don't have much spare time right now, but when spare time is available,
> ill attempt more kernel builds and keep them close to a typical Debian
> kernel config if possible.
>
> Sorry, i hope i haven't confused anybody!

--
Len Sorensen

[Clive Menzies]

Hi Peter et al

I've had G4s in the past and have recently acquired a Late G5 from Chris through this list. He'd installed Wheezy which worked fine but having re-familiarised myself with powerpc on the desktop, I decided to upgrade to Jessie and hit the graphics issue which Chris had warned me about (and there seem to be some sound issues too but first things first).

I'm going to have to sort this in my spare time but if I can help testing kernels etc., happy to.

In this context, reading back through the threads I see that Peter has rolled some 4.* kernels. Any suggestions as to which one I try first and any particular messages in the thread I should pay attention to?

Thanks

Clive

-- 
Clive Menzies
Political Economist
+44 (0) 7836 601378

[Aidan Sciortino]

I had some sound issues on my g5. By adding the correct kernel modules I solved the problem.

--

Aidan Sciortino

Inventor

Engineer

Dreamer

[Rick Thomas]

On Feb 5, 2016, at 2:43 PM, Clive Menzies <cl...@clivemenzies.co.uk> wrote:

> In this context, reading back through the threads I see that Peter has rolled some 4.* kernels. Any suggestions as to which one I try first and any particular messages in the thread I should pay attention to?

If your G5 is a "PowerMac11,2" like mine, then Peter's "4.4.0-rc7-powerpc64" kernel works well for me with the "VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation NV43 [GeForce 6600 LE] (rev a2)" graphics card.

Enjoy!
Rick

[Clive Menzies]

Thanks Rick

That is the machine exactly :-)

Are you running sid or jessie?

Regards

Clive

[Clive Menzies]

On 06/02/16 10:16, Clive Menzies wrote:
> On 06/02/16 07:26, Rick Thomas wrote:
>> If your G5 is a "PowerMac11,2" like mine, then Peter's
>> "4.4.0-rc7-powerpc64" kernel works well for me with the "VGA
>> compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation NV43 [GeForce 6600 LE] (rev
>> a2)" graphics card.
>>
>>
>

Thanks Rick, Peter

That worked!

It seems to be delivering the same functionality as on Wheezy

If you want any information, let me know

[Rick Thomas]

On Feb 6, 2016, at 2:16 AM, Clive Menzies <cl...@clivemenzies.co.uk> wrote:

> On 06/02/16 07:26, Rick Thomas wrote:
>> On Feb 5, 2016, at 2:43 PM, Clive Menzies <cl...@clivemenzies.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>>> In this context, reading back through the threads I see that Peter has rolled some 4.* kernels. Any suggestions as to which one I try first and any particular messages in the thread I should pay attention to?
>> If your G5 is a "PowerMac11,2" like mine, then Peter's "4.4.0-rc7-powerpc64" kernel works well for me with the "VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation NV43 [GeForce 6600 LE] (rev a2)" graphics card.
>>
>>
>
> Thanks Rick
>
> That is the machine exactly :-)
>
> Are you running sid or jessie?

Stretch.

In the sources.list, I have jessie, jessie/updates, jessie-updates, jessie-backports, and stretch repositories; all with main, non-free, and contrib activated.

HTH!
Rick

[Clive Menzies]

Thanks

At present, I've just got jessie and will probably stick with it until I
find it limits functionality. I used to run sid but I'd break my system
every so often - not great for productivity :-)

Having got X and xfce working, I've now added a second DVI monitor but
it seems to have knocked out the original Mac monitor.

Both xfce4 settings and xrandr recognise there are 2 monitors but the
Apple (DVI-I-2) monitor doesn't receive signal

clive@silvermachine:~$ xrandr
Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1680 x 1050, maximum 4096 x 4096
DVI-I-1 connected 1280x1024+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y
axis) 338mm x 270mm
1280x1024 60.02*+
1152x864 75.00
1024x768 85.00 75.08 60.00
832x624 74.55
800x600 85.06 75.00 60.32
640x480 85.01 75.00 60.00
720x400 70.08
DVI-I-2 connected 1680x1050+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y
axis) 433mm x 270mm
1680x1050 59.88*+

trying to force it with xrandr makes no difference
clive@silvermachine:~$ xrandr --output DVI-I-1 --mode 1280x1024
--output DVI-I-2 --mode 1680x1050 --right-of DVI-I-1

Peter, is there a specific kernel parameter required?

Regards

Clive

[Clive Menzies]

[Clive Menzies]

Sorry Rick if this is the third time but Icedove started screwing around
and sending messages from the wrong address which isn't registered with
the list. See below.

[Rick Thomas]

On Feb 6, 2016, at 9:36 AM, Clive Menzies <cl...@clivemenzies.co.uk> wrote:

> At present, I've just got jessie and will probably stick with it until I find it limits functionality. I used to run sid but I'd break my system every so often — not great for productivity :-)

I'm not sure -- Peter will know -- but the 4.4 Kernel may require Stretch.

> Having got X and xfce working, I've now added a second DVI monitor but it seems to have knocked out the original Mac monitor.

You're out of my depth now... Sorry!

Rick

[Richard Kuenz]

Hello ,

some day ago i tried to install Stretch PPC using Installer-Alpha 4 -
but it always finished off when tryxing to install Software Packages.
Why is that so?
Do i need to use always the latest installers (in this case Alpha-5 i
guess)?
Jessie installed fine , though.
I bought also a Radeon x800 xt as replacement for NVidia 5200 FX , so i
am wondering how this will change my Linux experience on G5 Powermac to
the better.


Thanks

Rich

Rick Thomas schrieb:

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Clive,

Glad you got your G5 up and running!

Regarding my config, currently am running 4.5.0-rc2 kernel, xfce desktop
and on Debian stretch (testing) repo's.

As a side note, on the testing repo's, the only package that I
personally have noticed that has broken and affected me recently is
binutils, i.e. binutils versions currently >2.25-5 are not capable of
building kernels correctly (the kernel modules within the initrd seem to
not be built correctly). Aside from that you get much newer packages
than jessie. Also, Mesa and 3D hardware accel should now work with
nouveau and PPC (well it works for me anyway)!

Sid is basically the absolute bleeding edge Debian repo. Not surprised
that things break regularly!
But if you feel comfortable doing bug reports every now and then and can
help contribute to Debian, perhaps the testing repo is more for you
(which is for the future stretch release). Of course, the choice is yours!

Now, regarding your issue!
You made me connect a second LCD to my G5 and try out the dual display
functionality! :)
With the version of xfce currently in stretch (testing repo's), all I
had to do was use the built in features of xfce and use the built in
control panel in Applications >> Settings >> Display.
Ensure that the checkbox is ticked for "Configure new displays when
connected". I then logged out of xfce and then logged back in and it
just worked. Detected extra screens and allowed me to change the layout
as desired.

The version of xfce in jessie is an earlier release with older packages,
so it may not be as simple and easy.
Fortunately, Brock W. who is on the mailing list has posted a blog on
the PowerPC Liberation page which should hopefully do the trick.
Note: I believe that this was for LXDE desktop while running jessie. So
it may or may not apply for xfce that currently is in jessie.

Link Below:
http://powerpcliberation.blogspot.ca/2015/08/g5-simple-dual-monitor-setup.html

As i mentioned earlier, this might not be required if you are using the
xfce version currently in stretch, but as always, YMMV.

Hope it makes sense!

Regards,
Peter

[Rick Thomas]

On Feb 6, 2016, at 1:06 PM, Richard Kuenz <csae...@uibk.ac.at> wrote:

> Hello ,
>
> some day ago i tried to install Stretch PPC using Installer-Alpha 4 - but it always finished off when tryxing to install Software Packages. Why is that so?
> Do i need to use always the latest installers (in this case Alpha-5 i guess)?
> Jessie installed fine , though.
> I bought also a Radeon x800 xt as replacement for NVidia 5200 FX , so i am wondering how this will change my Linux experience on G5 Powermac to the better.
>
>
> Thanks
>
> Rich
>

> Rick Thomas wrote:
>> Stretch.
>> In the sources.list, I have jessie, jessie/updates, jessie-updates, jessie-backports, and stretch repositories; all with main, non-free, and contrib activated.
>> HTH!
>> Rick
>

Hi Rich,

I haven't tried installing Stretch directly on my G5. I got where I am by installing Jessie and upgrading to Stretch and adding Peter's kernel that fixes the NVidea video driver problems.

I don't know if the Radeon card will help you. I haven't tried it. Maybe there's someone else on the list who has?

Enjoy!
Rick

[Clive Menzies]

On 06/02/16 20:52, Peter Saisanas wrote:
> Regarding my config, currently am running 4.5.0-rc2 kernel, xfce
> desktop and on Debian stretch (testing) repo's.
>
> As a side note, on the testing repo's, the only package that I
> personally have noticed that has broken and affected me recently is
> binutils, i.e. binutils versions currently >2.25-5 are not capable of
> building kernels correctly (the kernel modules within the initrd seem
> to not be built correctly). Aside from that you get much newer
> packages than jessie. Also, Mesa and 3D hardware accel should now work
> with nouveau and PPC (well it works for me anyway)!

Thanks Peter

It sounds worth upgrading to stretch.

>
> Sid is basically the absolute bleeding edge Debian repo. Not surprised
> that things break regularly!
> But if you feel comfortable doing bug reports every now and then and
> can help contribute to Debian, perhaps the testing repo is more for
> you (which is for the future stretch release). Of course, the choice
> is yours!

I found sid a great learning experience on my G4 a few years ago but I
don't have the time to spend breaking and fixing my system at present
and so testing is a better option.

> Now, regarding your issue!
> You made me connect a second LCD to my G5 and try out the dual display
> functionality! :)
> With the version of xfce currently in stretch (testing repo's), all I
> had to do was use the built in features of xfce and use the built in
> control panel in Applications >> Settings >> Display.
> Ensure that the checkbox is ticked for "Configure new displays when
> connected". I then logged out of xfce and then logged back in and it
> just worked. Detected extra screens and allowed me to change the
> layout as desired.

It's strange because xfce sees both monitors as does xrandr but the
signal just doesn't seem to get the screen working although the desktop
behaves as though both are active. I'll upgrade and then see where I get
to, with the later kernel.

>
> The version of xfce in jessie is an earlier release with older
> packages, so it may not be as simple and easy.
> Fortunately, Brock W. who is on the mailing list has posted a blog on
> the PowerPC Liberation page which should hopefully do the trick.
> Note: I believe that this was for LXDE desktop while running jessie.
> So it may or may not apply for xfce that currently is in jessie.
>
> Link Below:
> http://powerpcliberation.blogspot.ca/2015/08/g5-simple-dual-monitor-setup.html

I'll check this out before trying the upgrade

>
> As i mentioned earlier, this might not be required if you are using
> the xfce version currently in stretch, but as always, YMMV.
>
> Hope it makes sense!

Sure does and thanks again :-)

Regards

Clive

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Richard,

In my opinion, the best way to install Debian would be to just install
using a Jessie release.
When installing, ensure you install an SSH server in addition to be able
to login via another computer if you happen to have display issues
(which you probably will).

I believe the stretch release currently has issues with the included
default installed kernel (probably due to the version of binutils it has
been built with). So personally I would just install Jessie, then
install a kernel perhaps from ones that I have available.

Afterwards you can upgrade to stretch by changing repositories, but just
keep booting with the kernel I have provided.

If you happen to still have the nVidia FX5200 installed, I can step
through the procedure for you.

Install Jessie and ensure you can ssh in to the G5.

Specifically Install the 4.5.0-rc2 kernel I have configured for you.
(Actually this kernel config should work for most Powermac G5's (11.2 or
7.3 or 7.2), i.e. AGP or PCIe with nVidia GPU's with the bare minimum
of tinkering required). If all goes well that is!

I have set it up so it should hopefully require NO kernel parameters or
tinkering, i.e. fans should automatically work, nouveau should
automatically work, sound should automatically work. The required
modules that previously needed to be forced to be loaded are built in to
the kernel, msi interrupts are disabled in the kernel and kernel is
built with 4kB pagesize as currently needed by nouveau.

Link for kernel image (no need to install the kernel headers in your case):
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8pqd5Ots1vfdlNtUFh6dGhiR1U

copy the kernel image deb file to your hdd.

install the kernel using the command:
sudo dpkg -i linux-image-4.5.0-rc2-powerpc64_2_powerpc.deb

Once installed you need to edit yaboot.conf

Use the following command:
sudo nano /etc/yaboot.conf

Append the following text exactly as listed at the end of the file:

image=/boot/vmlinux-4.5.0-rc2-powerpc64
label=test
read-only
initrd=/boot/initrd.img-4.5.0-rc2-powerpc64
append=""

Save yaboot.conf

Apply yaboot config with following command:

sudo ybin -v

Reboot your G5 and when prompted, ensure you enter "test" for the label
in yaboot bootloader.

I have tried to make this as simple as possible.
Hopefully if all goes well, it should just work without ANY tinkering
afterwards!

If any issues or tweaks are required, please let me know and I and
others will try our best to help you out!

Good Luck!

Regards,
Peter

[Gabriel Paubert]

On Sun, Feb 07, 2016 at 07:52:37AM +1100, Peter Saisanas wrote:
> Hi Clive,
>
> Glad you got your G5 up and running!
>
> Regarding my config, currently am running 4.5.0-rc2 kernel, xfce
> desktop and on Debian stretch (testing) repo's.
>
> As a side note, on the testing repo's, the only package that I
> personally have noticed that has broken and affected me recently is
> binutils, i.e. binutils versions currently >2.25-5 are not capable
> of building kernels correctly (the kernel modules within the initrd
> seem to not be built correctly).

I'm also affected by this. I think that the problem will be fixed by:

http://lkml.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/1602.0/05322.html

Hopefully there will be soon an upload of fixed binutils to testing.
Otherwise I'll have to compile and install binutils myself.

Gabriel

[Peter Saisanas]

It probably affects everyone trying to build a BE 64bit PPC kernel,
perhaps others as well.
I don't have a Power 8 running LE 64bit...
But If anyone would like to donate one and pay my power bill, by all
means ill give it a try :)

Its a bit of a chore downgrading to binutils 2.25-5 every time I build a
kernel.
Not sure how versions of binutils > 2.25-5 ever left the sid repo and
into testing.

Would be great if testing repo's downgraded to binutils 2.25-5 :)
But then again, only the hardcore devs running sid then would probably
notice the bugs.

Alas, It has been reported quite a while ago.... Just wait and see for
the fix I guess!

Cheers,
Peter

[Gabriel Paubert]

On Sun, Feb 07, 2016 at 09:35:21AM +1100, Peter Saisanas wrote:
> It probably affects everyone trying to build a BE 64bit PPC kernel,
> perhaps others as well.

Oops, I read too quickly the patch headline, the fix is not for
binutils, it is for the kernel. And it is a one liner, trivial to apply
by hand.

It's a bit late for rc3, but I expect it will be in rc4.

> I don't have a Power 8 running LE 64bit...

Neither do I. And would not run in LE anyway.

> But If anyone would like to donate one and pay my power bill, by all
> means ill give it a try :)
>
> Its a bit of a chore downgrading to binutils 2.25-5 every time I
> build a kernel.

The compilers I have installed insist on binutils >2.25.90, so I'd have
to also downgrade all the compilers. Not an option...

Cheers,
Gabriel

[Clive Menzies]

I upgraded to stretch - did a plain upgrade and rebooted all fine and then did a dist-upgrade but system is now unbootable.

It seems to barf on:
Begin: Running /scripts/local-block.... done
Begin: Running /scripts/local-block.... done
Begin: Running /scripts/local-block.... done
which repeats about 20 times and then says something about dropping into a shell but fails with:

Can't access tty: job control turned off
(initramfs) cursor stops here but no keys seem to work

Have I got to reinstall Jessie from scratch and try the upgrade again or is there a way out of this?

[Brock Wittrock]

I'm in the same boat and unfortunately haven't found the time to sail my way out of it just yet. What I do know is if I boot with an old 3.18 kernel I have, everything works out okay again. I believe it was mentioned already that this could be related to the issue with binutils being used to build the newer kernel you are trying to boot from that came with Stretch. 

I downloaded Peter's 4.5.0-rc2 kernel, installed it, and updated my yaboot.conf but still the same issue. But honestly I could have missed something when configuring my system to boot from his newer kernel. Planning to look at that again here this evening and peruse some logs to see what pops out at me. 

If nothing else I will re-install Jessie, download and install Peter's 4.5.0-rc2 kernel, and then complete the upgrade to stretch and continue booting from that same kernel. Will post my results when I can. 

Thanks,

Brock

Sent from my iPhone

[Clive Menzies]

On 07/02/16 02:32, Brock Wittrock wrote:

I'm in the same boat and unfortunately haven't found the time to sail my way out of it just yet. What I do know is if I boot with an old 3.18 kernel I have, everything works out okay again. I believe it was mentioned already that this could be related to the issue with binutils being used to build the newer kernel you are trying to boot from that came with Stretch. 

I downloaded Peter's 4.5.0-rc2 kernel, installed it, and updated my yaboot.conf but still the same issue. But honestly I could have missed something when configuring my system to boot from his newer kernel. Planning to look at that again here this evening and peruse some logs to see what pops out at me. 

If nothing else I will re-install Jessie, download and install Peter's 4.5.0-rc2 kernel, and then complete the upgrade to stretch and continue booting from that same kernel. Will post my results when I can. 

Thanks Brock

I decided to bite the bullet and do a fresh jessie install; I was thinking of doing the same as you. If I make progress before you, I'll let you know.

Regards

Clive

[Rick Thomas]

Don't forget: If you want to boot the 4.5 kernel every time by default, you have to add a line to /etc/yaboot.conf
default=test
following the line
enablecdboot

And don’t forget to do
sudo ybin -v
to apply the new config

Also, if you want to know what kernel is running, you can type
uname -r

HTH!
Rick

[luigi burdo]

work on mate 15,10 too with nouveau on 7800gtx 512mb Quad g5

no 3d but work

ah no snd-powermac module (forget about? ;-))

Luigi

> Subject: Re: Debian 8 on Late 2005 G5, Graphics Issues
> From: rbth...@pobox.com

> Date: Sat, 6 Feb 2016 23:06:18 -0800
> CC: csae...@uibk.ac.at; psai...@gmail.com
> To: debian-...@lists.debian.org

[Clive Menzies]

Hi Brock

Upgrading to stretch from a fresh jessie install with 4.5.0-rc2 kernel installed worked fine. :-)

xfce4 display settings is recognising both monitors but the second (which is different resolution to the mac screen) still won't come up. But at least the non-booting problem is solved.

I'm going to mess around with xrandr to try to get dual head working.

[Rick Thomas]

On Feb 7, 2016, at 6:49 AM, Clive Menzies <cl...@clivemenzies.co.uk> wrote:

> Upgrading to stretch from a fresh jessie install with 4.5.0-rc2 kernel installed worked fine. :-)
>
> xfce4 display settings is recognising both monitors but the second (which is different resolution to the mac screen) still won't come up. But at least the non-booting problem is solved.
>
> I'm going to mess around with xrandr to try to get dual head working.

Hi Clive, That's great to hear!

Just out of curiosity, does the non-mac monitor work when it's the only one plugged in? I.e. remove the mac monitor and see what happens.

Enjoy!
Rick

[Peter Saisanas]

snd-powermac is not built in for a reason..

snd-aoa is the newer driver and supports the G5's better.
snd-aoa and snd-powermac modules conflict and to save from people
blacklisting modules, i removed the older snd-powermac from the build
config.
snd-aoa should work straight away. if it doesn't, check if something has
been blacklisted previously.

Regards,
Peter

[Clive Menzies]

Hi Rick

It seems to be related to the DVI port; DVI-I-1 works but DVI-I-2
doesn't. When I swap the monitors around it's the non-mac one which works.

$ xrandr
Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1680 x 1050, maximum 4096 x 4096

DVI-I-1 connected primary 1680x1050+0+0 (normal left inverted right x

axis y axis) 433mm x 270mm
1680x1050 59.88*+

DVI-I-2 connected 1280x1024+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y

axis) 338mm x 270mm
1280x1024 60.02*+
1152x864 75.00
1024x768 85.00 75.08 60.00
832x624 74.55
800x600 85.06 75.00 60.32
640x480 85.01 75.00 60.00
720x400 70.08

So xrandr sees both but no signal gets to DVI-I-2

I'm trying out various xrandr settings but I suspect it's something
kernel related. Maybe there's a boot parameter that needs to be passed.

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Clive,
Do you happen to have an xorg.conf? if so, please remove it.
Xorg should probe for your screens and not need an xorg.conf.
It shouldn't need any kernel parameters passed.... But stranger things
have happened!

Please post your xorg.0.log, just curious to see if the edid is read
correctly.

FYI, I tried it with a Quadro FX4500 and a flashed GeForce 7800 and D.H.
seemed to work.

I used a Dell 24" LCD @ 1900x1200 together with an old Philips 20" @
1680x1050 and it worked... For me anyway....

I should have an old GeForce 6600 laying around. I believe you mentioned
this is GPU you have?
If you like, I can try it out when i get a spare moment as well to see
if it works on my end.

It may end up being something specific with the GeForce 6600.

Keep us posted.

Regards,
Peter

[Clive Menzies]

On 07/02/16 21:34, Peter Saisanas wrote:
> Do you happen to have an xorg.conf? if so, please remove it.
> Xorg should probe for your screens and not need an xorg.conf.
> It shouldn't need any kernel parameters passed.... But stranger things
> have happened!

Thanks for your help Peter

No. There's no xorg.conf

> Please post your xorg.0.log, just curious to see if the edid is read
> correctly.

Attached as a text file

>
> FYI, I tried it with a Quadro FX4500 and a flashed GeForce 7800 and
> D.H. seemed to work.
>
> I used a Dell 24" LCD @ 1900x1200 together with an old Philips 20" @
> 1680x1050 and it worked... For me anyway....
>
> I should have an old GeForce 6600 laying around. I believe you
> mentioned this is GPU you have?
> If you like, I can try it out when i get a spare moment as well to see
> if it works on my end.
>
> It may end up being something specific with the GeForce 6600.
>

That would be great but it seems strange it wouldn't just work,
particularly as both xfce and xrandr see both monitors. What is odd is
that in the xfce display settings there are options to activate and make
both monitors master and to discover monitors but the "apply" button is
greyed out.

Regards

Clive

[Peter Saisanas]

Hi Clive,

Thought I should create a specific thread with your issue.

I just tested a spare GeForce 6600 I had laying around and the dual head display behaviour is definitely not working.

Whereas with the Quadro FX4500 it works fine (xrandr and D.H.).
So it is an issue specifically affecting the GeForce 6600 (maybe others as well).

As you described with the 6600, it seems to detect the second display head, (i.e. it reads the EDID correctly) but there is no digital output when connecting a second display via the DVI-I interface (digital).

I don't have a spare DVI-A to VGA adapter, but just curious if it may work better with a VGA display on the second head?

I have been able to force a digital output on the second head by appending the following to the kernel command line:

append="video=DVI-I-2:D"

However it then seems to think the second head is a DFP (LVDS) LCD panel (i.e. a laptop).
Unfortunately, also using the mentioned appended kernel command, the second head display is quite bad, (wrong colours, incorrect geometry and graphical corruption). But the output does get enabled.

So in other words, I don't think it is an xrandr issue at all.

Perhaps the issue is is either the nouveau driver doesn't configure the second head correctly for this particular GPU family (GeForce 6600 or NV43) or the Apple OEM FCODE rom used in the GeForce 6600 is has incorrect parameters configured in the DCB?

Link below to understand what the DCB is:
ftp://download.nvidia.com/open-gpu-doc/DCB/1/DCB-4.0-Specification.html

I know that others may say "but it works fine in OSX"...
However Apple has written their own drivers so they may have their own workaround implemented directly in their own driver.

This is a bit of a shame as this particular GPU is the most common one supplied with the Powermac G5 11.2 (DC) machines...

If the issue is the DCB in the FCODE rom, there may be a magical appended kernel command to workaround the problem.

Otherwise, perhaps we can try to patch a GeForce 6600 GPU VGA BIOS and load it from a file so nouveau uses this patched VGA BIOS instead of extracting it from the original FCODE rom from the OF device tree.

Of course, this is on the assumption that the D.H. issue is indeed because of the incorrect DCB parameters in the GeForce 6600 Apple OEM FCODE rom and not nouveau specifically with NV43.

Any takers?

Regards,
Peter




   

[Clive Menzies]

Thanks Peter

I'm pretty sure we have adaptors and so I'll try a VGA tomorrow.

It's been a while since I've played with powerpc - how and where to I
append the kernel parameter? Is it in yaboot or elsehwere?

I'll explore DCB from the link when I have time and try to get my head
around all this.

As an aside, I don't have sound or flash working yet - gnash doesn't
seem to work and swf-dec is not in stretch. Can anyone point me in the
right direction?

[Peter Saisanas]

> It's been a while since I've played with powerpc - how and where to I
> append the kernel parameter? Is it in yaboot or elsehwere?

Append the kernel parameters within the /etc/yaboot.conf file
A typical yaboot boot entry with the mentioned appended kernel
parameters applied would like like below:

image=/boot/vmlinux-4.5.0-rc2-powerpc64
label=linux
read-only
initrd=/boot/initrd.img-4.5.0-rc2-powerpc64
append="video=DVI-I-2:D"

Just make sure that as always if any changes are made to
/etc/yaboot.conf, you must run the following command afterwards to
actually apply the changes to the bootloader:

sudo ybin -v

> I'll explore DCB from the link when I have time and try to get my head
> around all this.

Up to you, I only included the link if you wanted to know more.
Basically it is the nVidia way of describing the video card options and
features to the driver, be it nvidia proprietary or nouveau.
All of these parameters are stored in the VGA BIOS or in our case the
FCODE rom.

> As an aside, I don't have sound or flash working yet - gnash doesn't
> seem to work and swf-dec is not in stretch. Can anyone point me in the
> right direction

If you happen to be running the 4.5.0-rc2 kernel I built, it should work
out of the box, assuming that no snd-aoa modules happen to be previously
blacklisted.
I recall a quirk with sound and it seemed that the built in speaker is
always muted by default the first time snd-aoa driver is used!
Not sure if anyone else has noticed this?

Either way, in a console run alsamixer and check that the master and pcm
output is not muted and increase the levels.... It should work (i hope)!

If sound still doesn't work, please post your dmesg log when using the
4.5.0-rc2 kernel.

Regards,
Peter

[Clive Menzies]

On 10/02/16 19:33, Peter Saisanas wrote:
>> It's been a while since I've played with powerpc - how and where to I
>> append the kernel parameter? Is it in yaboot or elsehwere?
> Append the kernel parameters within the /etc/yaboot.conf file
> A typical yaboot boot entry with the mentioned appended kernel
> parameters applied would like like below:
>
> image=/boot/vmlinux-4.5.0-rc2-powerpc64
> label=linux
> read-only
> initrd=/boot/initrd.img-4.5.0-rc2-powerpc64
> append="video=DVI-I-2:D"
>
> Just make sure that as always if any changes are made to
> /etc/yaboot.conf, you must run the following command afterwards to
> actually apply the changes to the bootloader:
>
> sudo ybin -v

Thanks Peter

Progress of sorts and a satisfactory outcome so far:

Appending the line as instructed activated the second screen :-)
although the graphics aren't great - readable but very fuzzy text and a
multicoloured rainbow effect on the desktop background.

However, attaching a VGA monitor with an adaptor gives better graphics
on the second screen (which it still sees as DVI-I-2); I had to remove
the appended line to get the screen activated - and then it just worked.
Although I had "mirror screens" unchecked in xfce settings, it mirrored
the screens but I could achieve a contiguous desktop with AR&R (and
probably xrandr but I was being lazy).

I'm limited to 1024x768 resolution (on the VGA monitor) which is not
great but better than using the DVI monitor.

clive@Pandora:~$ sudo xrandr
Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 2704 x 1050, maximum 4096 x 4096
DVI-I-1 connected primary 1680x1050+1024+0 (normal left inverted right x

axis y axis) 433mm x 270mm
1680x1050 59.88*+

DVI-I-2 connected 1024x768+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y
axis) 0mm x 0mm
1024x768 60.00*
800x600 60.32 56.25
848x480 60.00
640x480 59.94

I'll move on to sound now.

Regards

Clive

[Clive Menzies]

On 10/02/16 19:33, Peter Saisanas wrote:

As an aside, I don't have sound or flash working yet - gnash doesn't seem to work and swf-dec is not in stretch. Can anyone point me in the right direction

If you happen to be running the 4.5.0-rc2 kernel I built, it should work out of the box, assuming that no snd-aoa modules happen to be previously blacklisted.
I recall a quirk with sound and it seemed that the built in speaker is always muted by default the first time snd-aoa driver is used!
Not sure if anyone else has noticed this?

Either way, in a console run alsamixer and check that the master and pcm output is not muted and increase the levels.... It should work (i hope)!

If sound still doesn't work, please post your dmesg log when using the 4.5.0-rc2 kernel.

Thanks Peter

alsa-utils wasn't installed - so installed it and #dpkg-reconfigure alsa-base seems to have done the trick

Just flash left to go...

[Clive Menzies]

Thanks Rich

I'll try these.

Regards

Clive

On 11/02/16 22:43, Richard Kuenz wrote:

I don't think there is Flash available, neither Skype.

You would have to use another solution, i think.

On Youtube, normally i use 

Iceweasel + Greasemonkey Add-on +ViewTube Script

http://isebaro.com/viewtube/?ln=en

plus, i like very much 

MPV player + Youtube-Viewer (by Trizen).

Starting with Jessie, MPV is available.

On Wheezy you would need to compile it yourself

https://nyxi.eu/blog/2014/01/19/compiling-mpv-in-Wheezy-2014/

cheers

rich

[Chris Wareham]

Hi Clive,

YouTube should just work these days, since it falls back to using a HTML5
player. If it's not doing
that automatically then you can go to the following page to check:

https://www.youtube.com/html5?gl=GB

I think you may need some extra gstreamer plugins installed if it show you don't
have full support
for the required formats.

I wouldn't bother with the Gnash or Lightspark plugins that attempted to create
open source
equivalents of the the Flash plugin. I found them very buggy and incomplete even
when they were
under active development.

Cheers,

Chris

[martin...@seznam.cz]

Hello Peter,

yesterday I installed your compilled kernel 3.18.16 on Powermac G5 Quad + Nvidia QuadroFx 4500.
Everything OK, thank you very much.
In next few days I will check other kernels and mesa drivers.

Martin

---------- Původní zpráva ----------
Od: Peter Saisanas <psai...@gmail.com>
Komu: alade...@gmail.com
Datum: 15. 11. 2015 21:42:16
Předmět: Re: Re: Debian 8 on Late 2005 G5, Graphics Issues

Hi,
It looks like you are not booting from the 3.18.16 kernel.
If you have installed the packages, you need to create an entry for the
new kernel by editing /etc/yaboot.conf and once saved run ybin -v.

Also, i have built a 4.3.0 kernel deb package.

Aside from the newer kernel, it also has a nouveau pageflip patch for
drm and pre nv50 class gpu's.
Also, it has i2c-powermac built in to the kernel, so it should
automatically start the appropriate windfarm driver for fans / cooling
and snd-aoa sound driver for your machine.

MSI interrupts are enabled again in this kernel, but still wont work
with nouveau and powermac 11.2 for now

Once installing the kernel and modifying yaboot, you need to create a
module option file in /etc/modprobe.d and save file as nouveau.conf with
the following single line below:

options nouveau config="NvMSI=0"

Once file is saved, you need to update your initrd for kernel 4.3.0,
apply the change by running the following command:

update-initramfs -u

Reboot and if all goes well, you should be booting with kernel 4.3.0 and
lightdm login should pop up.

Up to you, but If you switch to sid repositories, mesa 11.0.5 is
available and you should be able to get OpenGL working with nouveau and
your particular GPU.

Google drive link for kernel debs below:

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B8pqd5Ots1vfT2puX09CYjEwcFk&usp=sharing

Please let me know how you go.

Regards,
Peter

[Clive Menzies]

On 12/02/16 09:18, Chris Wareham wrote:
> Hi Clive,
>
> YouTube should just work these days, since it falls back to using a HTML5
> player. If it's not doing
> that automatically then you can go to the following page to check:
>
> https://www.youtube.com/html5?gl=GB
>
> I think you may need some extra gstreamer plugins installed if it show you don't
> have full support
> for the required formats.
>
> I wouldn't bother with the Gnash or Lightspark plugins that attempted to create
> open source
> equivalents of the the Flash plugin. I found them very buggy and incomplete even
> when they were
> under active development.
>

Many thanks Chris

and for the machine which is great.

Regards

Clive

[Richard Kuenz]

HTML5 is very bothering i think because it consumes a lot of energy.

you can disable automatic playback of it by going to


in firefox

type


about:config (in statusbar)


then click "OK"


search for "webm" (again in statusbar)


disable automatic playback webm content or so.



id try to use


firefox + greasemonkey + viewtube (by sebaro script) instead.


then u can use mplayer or vlc plugin to playback video - that should
work better.


there is also a greasemonkey port for seamonkey on sourceforce but i did
not find it installable.

strangely enough i found last time greasemonkey not installable on
powerpc g5 machine. i dont know why, though. please someone try this out


thanks


richard

http://isebaro.com/viewtube/?ln=en
https://github.com/sebaro/ViewTube

[Clive Menzies]

On 12/02/16 09:18, Chris Wareham wrote:

> Hi Clive,
>
> YouTube should just work these days, since it falls back to using a HTML5
> player. If it's not doing
> that automatically then you can go to the following page to check:
>
> https://www.youtube.com/html5?gl=GB
>
> I think you may need some extra gstreamer plugins installed if it show you don't
> have full support
> for the required formats.
>
> I wouldn't bother with the Gnash or Lightspark plugins that attempted to create
> open source
> equivalents of the the Flash plugin. I found them very buggy and incomplete even
> when they were
> under active development.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Chris
>

Hi Chris

I've got these and grepped apt-cache gstrreamer for mozilla/html but
couldn't find anything. Any idea of what may be missing? There seem to
be loads of them.

clive@Pandora:~$ dpkg -l | grep gstreamer
ii gstreamer0.10-alsa:powerpc 0.10.36-2
powerpc GStreamer plugin for ALSA
ii gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs:powerpc
0.10.36-2 powerpc GStreamer plugin for
GnomeVFS
ii gstreamer0.10-plugins-base:powerpc
0.10.36-2 powerpc GStreamer plugins
from the "base" set
ii gstreamer1.0-libav:powerpc 1.6.3-1
powerpc libav plugin for GStreamer
ii gstreamer1.0-plugins-base:powerpc
1.6.3-1 powerpc GStreamer plugins
from the "base" set
ii gstreamer1.0-plugins-good:powerpc
1.6.3-1 powerpc GStreamer plugins
from the "good" set
ii gstreamer1.0-x:powerpc 1.6.3-1
powerpc GStreamer plugins for X11 and Pango
ii libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-0:powerpc
0.10.36-2 powerpc GStreamer libraries
from the "base" set
ii libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-0:powerpc
1.6.3-1 powerpc GStreamer libraries
from the "base" set
ii libgstreamer0.10-0:powerpc 0.10.36-1.5
powerpc Core GStreamer libraries and elements
ii libgstreamer1.0-0:powerpc 1.6.3-1
powerpc Core GStreamer libraries and elements
ii libreoffice-avmedia-backend-gstreamer
1:5.0.5~rc1-1 powerpc GStreamer backend
for LibreOffice

Thanks

Clive

[Clive Menzies]

Thanks Rich

I had vlc but not browser-plugin-vlc

gecko-mediaplayer isn't in stretch but I installed it from jessie.

Still no joy on youtube videos. spinning disc in the middle of the frame as though the stream is trying to download. Same result with html5.

However, I disabled html5 according to your earlier instruction and hey presto - youtube plays :-)

you can disable automatic playback of it by going to

in firefox

type

about:config    (in statusbar)

then click "OK"

search for "webm" (again in statusbar)

disable automatic playback webm content or so.

Many thanks

Clive



On 12/02/16 13:24, Richard Kuenz wrote:

plus i would install also vlc-browser-plugin or similar for the distro you use. if you install vlc it probably gets installed automagically

hope this helps clive

rich


Am Feb 12, 2016 um 2:13 PM schrieb Clive Menzies <cl...@clivemenzies.co.uk>:

Thanks Richard

Regards

Clive

On 12/02/16 13:04, Richard Kuenz wrote:

you need gecko-mediaplayer

Clive Menzies schrieb:

[Richard Kuenz]

Only thing is, with these solution you block out "Subtitles" option or "
captions or CC . this is as far as i know only possible with flash or
html5. correct me please if i am wrong

thanks

rich

Clive Menzies schrieb:

>
> Thanks Rich
>
> I had vlc but not browser-plugin-vlc
>
> gecko-mediaplayer isn't in stretch but I installed it from jessie.
>
> Still no joy on youtube videos. spinning disc in the middle of the frame
> as though the stream is trying to download. Same result with html5.
>
> However, I disabled html5 according to your earlier instruction and hey
> presto - youtube plays :-)
>

> /you can disable automatic playback of it by going to//
> //
> //in firefox//
> //
> //type//
> //
> //about:config (in statusbar)//
> //
> //then click "OK"//
> //
> //search for "webm" (again in statusbar)//
> //
> //disable automatic playback webm content or so.
>
> /Many thanks/
>
> /Clive/
> /

[Chris Wareham]

Hi Clive,

Here's what I have on my Jessie machine:

$ dpkg -l "gstreamer*plugins*"|grep "^ii"|awk '{print $2 "\t" $3}'
gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad:i386 0.10.23-7.4
gstreamer0.10-plugins-base:i386 0.10.36-2
gstreamer0.10-plugins-good:i386 0.10.31-3+nmu4+b1
gstreamer1.0-plugins-bad:i386 1.4.4-2.1+b1
gstreamer1.0-plugins-base:i386 1.4.4-2
gstreamer1.0-plugins-good:i386 1.4.4-2
gstreamer1.0-plugins-ugly:i386 1.4.4-2+b1

Chris

[Clive Menzies]

Thanks Chris

I think I'll stick to gecko-mediaplayer for the time being.

Regards

Clive

[luigi burdo]

Confirmed working on Quad G5 with RadeonHD too .
I can see again 1080p youtube video in html5!

Luigi

> Date: Fri, 12 Feb 2016 16:18:54 +0100
> From: csae...@uibk.ac.at
> To: cl...@clivemenzies.co.uk
> CC: debian-...@lists.debian.org
> Subject: Re: Powermac G5 - youtube video - SOLVED

[Herminio Hernandez Jr.]

Awesome!

Sent from my iPhone

[Riccardo Mottola]

Hi,

On 02/12/16 12:52, Richard Kuenz wrote:
>
> HTML5 is very bothering i think because it consumes a lot of energy.

I found out that too HTML5 playback is almost unusable even on the
fastest 1.6GHz G4 under mac where Graphics is already better than linux
(TenFourFox) and also on a dual-core Intel Core, while you can still
playback youtube with flash on WindowsXP with an old 1.6Ghz Centrino. As
I was able on the PowerMac when flash PPC still existed.
HTML5 players gives us finally Flash freedom, but apparently consume
4-5x CPU power.

Riccardo

[Richard Kuenz]

Hello Riccardo,

on Powermac G4 you should install Osx Leopard. Then you can use Safari Extensions.

Just install Quicktime 7.7.1 and use ClicktoPlugin Safari extension. Go to the settings . Click playback with "Quicktime" instead of "HTML5" and the wonder starts. Unfortunately it does not work with tiger.
It is better to use Webkit for Leopard than Safari, actually.

Other solution, if you want to rely on TenFourFox, then install "QTE" - Quicktime Enabler for TenFourFox, it is an add-on that let's you open via RightClick YouTube and other Files through Quicktime. It is not so fast than ClickToPlugin and not so charming, but hey, it works, and TenFourFox should be quite secure.

With these you should be able to watch videos propably even better than under Linux on your Powerbook G4 or Powermac G4


Other very great solution is "YouView" by MrGeckoMedia. Here you probably need also Perian installed. If you use OsX Leopard you could also install the Safari Extension for it to use instead of. Thats a cool program!


Hope this helps - Another reason to still love your Powerbook G4!


Rich

[Richard Kuenz]

This here is for Facebook


https://68kmla.org/forums/index.php?/topic/23619-flash-version-16-for-powerpc/

[Richard Kuenz]

Very necessary on Powerbook G4 - FanControl!

http://jurriaandevos.nl/control-ibook-g4-temperature-with-g4fancontrol/

[Darren Sutton]

Hello Peter,

First, thank you for all of the work you've put into getting these G5's
to run linux. I would not have gotten so far without your work.

I have tried to use your 3.18.16 and 4.5.0-rc2 kernel but I have a
problem in both cases: my screen is covered in wiggly, dancing
distortion. I am using MATE and can see the desktop behind all the
distortion. When I boot up, the display is fine until about 12 seconds
after the yaboot prompt. I believe nouveau cannot read my card's vbios
(fx5200) and this is causing the display distortion. Once nouveau loads,
the monitor flickers, then the distortion starts. Using the stock jessie
kernel results in the same distortion, but I cannot see the desktop
behind it. The distortion is repeatable.

When checking PCIROM, nouveau reports 'Invalid ROM contents' and then
later reports 'unknown input clock frequency'. I suppose that nouveau
cannot read the DCB, so it does not know how to use my graphics card? I
believe others have had this problem in the past, but I cannot find a
work around. If you have any advice, I would be glad to hear it!

Thanks again,

Darren

iMac G5 1.8 Ghz
2g ram
fx 5200