Odd Graphics Glitches in OpenSuSE 11.3

English Hardware
1

At completely random intervals, I seem to be getting some weird horizontal line distortions that cross the entire width of the screen, and appear at completely different heights… sort of like the distortions you get when you’re viewing a video tape that’s strip has been bent. This I find very disturbing, especially considering that I have absolutely no idea what might be causing this issue… anyway, lspci identifies my graphics card as the following:

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Memory Controller Hub (rev 07)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 07)
00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 07)

Might this be a config/driver issue with this device, or what must I do to determine the actual issue here?

2

I have 2 laptops with intel graphics, one like yours. Neither has any issue whatsoever.

lspci -nnk
will just confirm the driver in use

3

Well, it’s happening, regardless of any similarities in hardware…

Here’s the driver entry:

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:2a42] (rev 07)
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:02bc]
        Kernel driver in use: i915

Is this incorrect, or might it merely be misconfigured?

4

No, that looks correct. I have the same.

Does it happen in a running live cd session?
Does it happen in any other OS you may have the misfortune of having installed?
If you create a new user account, does it happen there?

5

Hi

there have been several bios uppgrades also uppaderar your firmware on the Intel graphics, visit your manufacturer’s website and see if you have a new update

6

Hello,

after trying bios update and distortions still appear, could you try to provide “i915.powersave=0” as a boot parameter and check if problems disappear ?

Then it could be related to https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=596844 (although according to the bug-report it should be fixed)

Regards, user2304

7

I think the bios has already been updated, and the issue doesn’t occur on WinXP, but GRUB didn’t have the “i915.powersave=0” parameter… I haven’t noticed any more distortions since booting with it, at least yet, so I think that must have been my problem; thanks user2304! :slight_smile:

8

Fine.

Maybe you could add a comment at https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=596844, that this problem obviously is not fixed yet. Had this with an Intel 4500 in openSUSE 11.3 Milestone 6, in Milestone 7 it was gone.

Regards,user2304

9

Can you also search on google to see if you recognize the problems

Intel 4500 hd flickering bios

10

Well, the screen wasn’t really flickering, just randomly distorting every so often; but that’s not happening now that I’ve set the parameter described above, so that must be the fix for it.

11

Hi. i have a similar problem. i have the i845G/GL chipset and i’m using 11.3. The fonts randomly disappear or change colors. For example, right now i have opera and dolphin running, and on my panel(using latest kde) i see the windows, i see the icon’s in the buttons, but no font. just black. i didn’t have this problem with 11.2 so i might go back, unless someone knows how to help me fix this.