Dell Studio 1558 Display Driver problem?

English Hardware
1

Hey everyone, I’ve been using openSUSE 12.2 64-bit KDE for the past two weeks or so on my Dell Studio 1558 laptop, and I’ve been having this weird problem with the display.

Basically, if I use the keyboard button to dim the display, but am not careful about how many times I push the button, this happens:
http://paste.opensuse.org/view/raw/82124166
After this happens, I have to restart the computer by holding in the power button.

Usually, I can reproduce this, but not always. Anyone have any idea what is going on here or how to fix it?

On a side note, this was one of the reasons I initially left Ubuntu 11.x, because this thing happened quite frequently. With openSUSE, I’ve accidentally triggered it just twice.

This may be in the wrong forum category, but I am not sure what exactly is the problem or where to put it.

2

Clearly it a graphics issue
But establishing a solution could be tricky.
Does .xsession-errors have any clues?

3

It would be useful if you could tell us what graphics hardware this laptop uses. From a quick search it looks like these come with ‘integrated graphics or optional 512 MB ATI discrete graphics’.

This command could help with the info

/usr/sbin/hwinfo --gfxcard
4

Edit: assuming ATI/AMD hardware (otherwise disregard)

Bug report:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1007765

Comment #71 looks promising with mention of using the ‘acpi_backlight=vendor’ boot parameter:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1007765/comments/71

5

I’ve looked at this file, but its rather lengthy, and I don’t know what exactly to look for.

6

Can you please provide your graphics hardware details and read the bug report I linked to.

7

This is the exact problem I am having! I will give comment 71 a try and report back if I have more problems.

Also, thi is the output of that command:

austin@linux-eyo4:~> /usr/sbin/hwinfo --gfxcard22: PCI 200.0: 0300 VGA compatible controller (VGA)
[Created at pci.319]
Unique ID: B35A.uFYsRMNS0x0
Parent ID: vSkL.QF6OZK9+sWF
SysFS ID: /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:01.0/0000:02:00.0
SysFS BusID: 0000:02:00.0
Hardware Class: graphics card
Model: “ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4500 Series”
Vendor: pci 0x1002 “ATI Technologies Inc”
Device: pci 0x9553 “Mobility Radeon HD 4500 Series”
SubVendor: pci 0x1028 “Dell”
SubDevice: pci 0x0413
Driver: “fglrx_pci”
Driver Modules: “fglrx”
Memory Range: 0xd0000000-0xdfffffff (ro,non-prefetchable)
I/O Ports: 0x2000-0x2fff (rw)
Memory Range: 0xcfef0000-0xcfefffff (rw,non-prefetchable)
Memory Range: 0xcfe00000-0xcfe1ffff (ro,non-prefetchable,disabled)
IRQ: 47 (527547 events)
I/O Ports: 0x3c0-0x3df (rw)
Module Alias: “pci:v00001002d00009553sv00001028sd00000413bc03sc00i00”
Driver Info #0:
XFree86 v4 Server Module: radeonhd
Config Status: cfg=no, avail=yes, need=no, active=unknown
Attached to: #8 (PCI bridge)

Primary display adapter: #22

8

Unless you are familiar with grub, you may need to tell us whether you’re using grub or grub2. The method of adding the kernel boot parameter differs. I can’t promise that it will work for you either, but worth a go. :slight_smile:

9

I am somewhat familiar with grub. I am using grub2, but I’ve been using a pretty basic kde program to make changes to it

10

Use whatever you’re comfortable with. As long as you’re not logging in as root to edit system files. :slight_smile:

BTW, the command to run after making changes to /etc/default/grub is

grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg
11

On 01/11/2013 06:46 AM, wvcaudill2 wrote:
> I have to restart the computer by holding in the
> power button.

next time try:

hold down Ctrl and Alt, and then press the Backspace key TWICE…(i
expect it will beep on the first press, just push it again)

then i would expect the system to cycle and give you a clean log in
screen…

–
dd http://tinyurl.com/DD-Caveat

12

This did not work. I still had to power off the hard way.
Also, adding “acpi_backlight=vendor” did nothing. Except perhaps change the color the screen pixelated to. Any other suggestions?

13

Did you reboot after the change was made?

14

On 01/12/2013 06:16 AM, wvcaudill2 wrote:
>> hold down Ctrl and Alt, and then press the Backspace key TWICE
>>
> This did not work.

WOW!! did this change?? does Ctrl+Alt+Backspace+Backspace no longer
(default) cause X to shutdown in openSUSE 12.2 64 ??

anyone know for sure? (inquiring minds want to know!)

–
dd

15

I’m assuming the X-session crashes and becomes unresponsive…

16

On 01/12/2013 10:46 AM, deano ferrari wrote:
> I’m assuming the X-session crashes and becomes unresponsive…

ah! of course. [sound of palm contacting forehead] thx!

–
dd

17

yes i did.

18

Anybody found any solution to this?

19

Google may be your best friend here. Search bug reports and/or other forum threads.