bobbytomorow adjusted his/her AFDB on Thursday 09 Jul 2009 16:56 to write:
> I am not trying to be a dick and I appreciate help but I need a
> tutorial that assumes I am a complete noob , which I am and buy the
> looks of some of the threads so are others. Would just be nice to have a
> complete noob tutorials because it seems alot of people are having
> issues with ATi and *nix and I don’t really want to give up so early but
> if I can’t even install graphic drivers then,:
>
>
HI Bobby,
Here is how “I” do it, generally called the “Hard Way” ™
Make sure you have the needed kernel packages and the compiler and make as
noted in the readme.
D/load the drivers from the ATI site that are the right ones for your card
chipset, you go through the filter process on the download drivers page
choosing the linux version of choice whether 32bit or 64bit, then choose the
card, radeon etc, then the version number HD4800 series etc…
Now where you d/load it to is up to you, normally somewhere in your /home
dir hopefully 
I use FF and have a separate folder designated for all d/loads so I know
where they are all put.
Next you need to drop to runlevel 3 by logging out of KDE/Gnome/GUI and when
you get the to the login screen you can select a “Console” login from the
session drop down menu.
When you get to a console screen login as root and give the password.
then you need to get to runlevel 3 so that no Xserver is running, you do
this by typing:
init 3
you will see some blurb go up the screen and then it should say runlevel 3
reached
If you do not have a prompt then just press enter and one should appear.
Next get to where ever you have put the driver package, for me it is
something like:
cd /home/my-user-name/firefox-downloads/
Then run the installer which goes something like:
sh ./ati-driver-installer(version-number).run
Where (version-number) is the one that you have for your card, note not all
cards use the latest and greatest so I do not know which will be your.
Then just follow the prompts through but do not make a distribution specific
rpm the first time round you can do this later when you are sure that all is
OK.
just follow it all and if on 64bit make sure you tell it to install the
32bit compat libs as well as long as all goes fine and dandy and there are
no errors then you should be dropped back to a prompt on the console.
Naxt run the command:
aticonfig --initial
DO NOT RUN THE SAX command, it is stated in the readmes and is recommended
that you not use sax, every time I have experimented with using sax to
configure it all goes down the tubes.
After you have run the aticonfig then try:
depmod -a
modprobe fglrx
and then :
init 5
if you get a GUI and can enable 3d then all is good to go, some times it
might need a reboot ( I have seen where it actually takes 2 reboots but that
is very rare )
Now hopefully you are in a GUI with 3D to configure different aspects of the
driver you use the ATI gui app which you have to get to by running amdcccle,
just open a terminal from the menu and :
amdcccle
this give you the catalyst front end to play with
There should be no need to mess with any xorg.conf files at all unless you
want to tweak but this is not recommended.
Now the only draw back with doing it this way is that if there is a kernel
patch then you will find that after a reboot you will get bumped to a
console login as the graphics will not start so you have to reinstall the
drivers again by following the above commands, here they are in sequence,
the whole lot on my machine from logging out of KDE to back into KDE take
approximately 3 mins:
root
(root password)
init 3
sh ./ati-whatever-version-it-is.run
(follow the installer)
init 5
Note that as I have already installed the drivers before and they worked I
do not need to run the aticonfig again.
Now if you find everything works you can try and follow the rpm route of the
installer to create an rpm but that is up to you, I find that the time saved
is actually a false economy AMD/ATI try to release a new version every month
or so and kernel updates are few and far between so you are more than likely
to install new drivers than kernels and having old rpms around can cause the
loading of the older ones by mistake.
A quick thought on the sax2 question though the oneclick install on the SuSE
site pulls in specially compiled drivers which I presume will work with
sax2, I must admit because they tend to lag behind the ones on ATI site I
have never tried them but once again running the aticonfig command and then
using the amdcccle is a lot quicker IMHO.
However YMMV
HTH
Mark
Caveat emptor
Nullus in verba
Nil illegitimi carborundum
