Getting closer - An ATI graphics guide

[anibalin]

hi captain, let me try 0.3a3 and will post again

[Reptar]

Captain, I tried 0.3a3 autodetect script, and it works but the device id reported is incorrect for my AGP 9600Xt. It is reporting 4172, but should be 4152. Right?

[captainsquash]

Captain, I tried 0.3a3 autodetect script, and it works but the device id reported is incorrect for my AGP 9600Xt. It is reporting 4172, but should be 4152. Right?

 

I'm not sure what its supposed to be, but both 4172 and 4152 are possible Device IDs for the 9600 series. I'll look into that.

[BobOki]

If you are dual booting, go into windows real fast, download SIW (free program) and it will tell you your device id. I have yet to see it get it wrong, so compair the results there with the autodetector. Please post if the autodetector is correct.

[eds]

Captain, I tried 0.3a3 autodetect script, and it works but the device id reported is incorrect for my AGP 9600Xt. It is reporting 4172, but should be 4152. Right?

 

 

I have a 9600xt and the Device ID shows 4152 in OSX.

[captainsquash]

eds -if you took at your ioreg -l output, you'll probably see that there are two device IDs for either display@*, VGA@*or AGP@*

 

Katana Autodetect uses the first one that comes up in ioreg, so it detects 4172 (in this case).

 

This was true with jsiemon anyways. Hope that answers it... I'd be curious to see if Katana does still work if it uses just the first Device ID.

[captainsquash]

The threads have been pretty silent lately.. I'm hoping no news is good news, but nevertheless, please post your findings with Katana! It can only get better with your input!

[anibalin]

hi capi, sorry for not being 'up to date' to the post. (busy weekend).

 

I installed the .3a katana, but, sadly, i get a kernel panic at restart (you were right btw, the installer took 7 minutes to show 'finish' detection takes longer.)

 

Do i have to reinstall all the os again?

 

i took note of this on a paper:

 

kernel loadable modules in backtrace (with dependencies)

rom.free.driver.Calllisto (1.0.0d1)@0x320c6000

dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOPCIfamily (2.1)@0x249a4000

dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOGraphicsFamily (1.4.4)0x3208c000

[captainsquash]

hi capi, sorry for not being 'up to date' to the post. (busy weekend).

 

I installed the .3a katana, but, sadly, i get a kernel panic at restart (you were right btw, the installer took 7 minutes to show 'finish' detection takes longer.)

 

Do i have to reinstall all the os again?

 

i took note of this on a paper:

 

kernel loadable modules in backtrace (with dependencies)

rom.free.driver.Calllisto (1.0.0d1)@0x320c6000

dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOPCIfamily (2.1)@0x249a4000

dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOGraphicsFamily (1.4.4)0x3208c000

 

No - you shouldn't have to - here's something to do when something or you brick your install...

 

 

Firstly, download a Darwin x86 boot CD, I use 8.01 (which is available here http://www.opendarwin.org/en/news/darwin801.html)

Burn the CD, load it into the dead computer and boot from it

 

A familiar looking darwin startup will appear, when its done loading it will ask you what device to install to or type 'shell' to drop into a shell, type shell and press enter

 

Type the following command (minus quotes) "mount -w -t hfs /dev/disk0s1 /mnt". In most cases this will mount your hard drive as a volume 'in the folder' /mnt, your hard drive may vary from this if you have more than one hard disk (take a look in your /dev folder for disks if you're not sure where to go)

 

Type "cd /mnt/S*/L*/E*" (minus quotes) to take you to the Extensions folder on your OSx86 install, in this case you can type the following to clean up your install

 

rm -R Callisto*

rm -R AGP*

cd ../

rm Extensions.mkext

rm Extensions.kextcache

reboot

 

Then take the CD out and you hopefully will have a Callistoless and working system.

[anibalin]

thanks capi will do that |

hope you can fix the katana soon _ let me/us know what do you need for testings (?).

 

respect.

[eds]

eds -if you took at your ioreg -l output, you'll probably see that there are two device IDs for either display@*, VGA@*or AGP@*

 

Katana Autodetect uses the first one that comes up in ioreg, so it detects 4172 (in this case).

 

This was true with jsiemon anyways. Hope that answers it... I'd be curious to see if Katana does still work if it uses just the first Device ID.

 

Hmmmm, KatanaDiag shows the Device ID as 4152 for my card not 4172.

[captainsquash]

Yes, and it should in your case, but do you see both of those in the ioreg -l? Normally I'd PM this to you but I'd be curious to see if other users are having similar issues.

Edited December 13, 2006 by captainsquash

[eds]

No I only see 1 Device ID listed.

[kn3pp]

okay .. some thoghts ...

 

As far as i know .. QE/CI has never worked in osXx86 with an ati radeon mobility 9000.

i wonder what the differences are between 9000 and 9200 (that is the card used in iBooks). Is that an aproach thats is allready checked ?

Early ibooks used the 7500card and tiger works on them too.. as far as i know...

 

do users who have 9200cards get QE/CI to work ?

 

i do hope it will come to work since that is (i think ) one of the biggest problems getting the osx86 platform working on my dell..

i think the network issues are solved but i havnt checked them.. since most apps dont work yet ... for me that is ..

 

i will now quit rambling

great work on katana tho .. !!!

Edited December 13, 2006 by kn3pp

[eugmoon]

i wonder what the differences are between 9000 and 9200 (that is the card used in iBooks). Is that an aproach thats is allready checked ?

Early ibooks used the 7500card and tiger works on them too.. as far as i know...

 

do users who have 9200cards get QE/CI to work ?

 

The problem doesn't seem to be the differences between the 9000 and the 9200. The problem seems to be the iBook running the PowerPC version of the 8500 drivers while we are trying to get our cards working with the Intel version of the 8500 drivers.

 

Basically, for some reason, while the (Intel version of) Radeon.kext that works with the 7xxx series supports hardware-accelerated OpenGL, the best that we 9xxx users can get with the Radeon8500.kext is software-rendered OpenGL. (Yes, I am saying that even using Katana, we are only getting software-rendered OpenGL. Not hardware-accelerated.) The reason I say this is that, if we were getting hardware-accelerated OpenGL, we should have been able to activate QE using some combination of AGPGart and Callisto, just like the 7500 users were able to.

 

That said, I think if prasys and captain are able to write a proper Radeon8500.kext for us, we can also get QE (but not CI - it requires features our cards don't have) working on our cards.

 

At least, that's the way I currently understand things to be. People are free to correct me if they think I'm wrong.

[Fausto]

Hi, sorry if the black-screen issue has been covered... in short, what I'd like to do is somehow, in verbose mode, get the Callisto files (or AGPGart files or whatever) onto my hard drive so that I can install them. You see, while starting up OS X, my computer (see specs below) loads almost everything correctly (the ATI drivers being the main exceptions) up until loginwindow.app, at which point the screen (any of several screens I've used -- both LCD and CRT) goes black (sometimes with some vertical lines -- perhaps due to my resolution/refresh rate being incorrect). Naturally, I suspect that my Radeon card is to blame, but I have no idea how to use solutions like Callisto (or anything else apparently requiring double-clicking, dragging, or the like) when I can't even access the Callisto files (keep in mind that I can't access the Aqua interface -- all I have is verbose mode). Should I put Callisto on a floppy disk and try to access it in verbose mode (but how)? Can the DVD drive somehow be accessed in verbose mode? Any other suggestions? Please keep in mind that I'm (probably obviously) a complete beginner when it comes to using UNIX commands/procedures. Thanks very much and in advance for any help.

 

motherboard: Asus P4P800

processor: Intel P4 2.4 GHz (overclocked to 3 GHz) ... SSE2 (not SSE3)

video card: ATI Radeon 9600 (128 MB)

OSes: XP on first partition, Jas OS X 10.4.7 on second partition (both partitions are primary)

[eds]

Hi, sorry if the black-screen issue has been covered... in short, what I'd like to do is somehow, in verbose mode, get the Callisto files (or AGPGart files or whatever) onto my hard drive so that I can install them. You see, while starting up OS X, my computer (see specs below) loads almost everything correctly (the ATI drivers being the main exceptions) up until loginwindow.app, at which point the screen (any of several screens I've used -- both LCD and CRT) goes black (sometimes with some vertical lines -- perhaps due to my resolution/refresh rate being incorrect). Naturally, I suspect that my Radeon card is to blame, but I have no idea how to use solutions like Callisto (or anything else apparently requiring double-clicking, dragging, or the like) when I can't even access the Callisto files (keep in mind that I can't access the Aqua interface -- all I have is verbose mode). Should I put Callisto on a floppy disk and try to access it in verbose mode (but how)? Can the DVD drive somehow be accessed in verbose mode? Any other suggestions? Please keep in mind that I'm (probably obviously) a complete beginner when it comes to using UNIX commands/procedures. Thanks very much and in advance for any help.

 

motherboard: Asus P4P800

processor: Intel P4 2.4 GHz (overclocked to 3 GHz) ... SSE2 (not SSE3)

video card: ATI Radeon 9600 (128 MB)

OSes: XP on first partition, Jas OS X 10.4.7 on second partition (both partitions are primary)

I think you have specs similar to mine. If you don't mind not having QE/CI, you should try CaptainSquash's Katana. It worked for me (except without QE/CI can't use FCP or screen savers).

[ipguy]

hey captainsquash

 

can i confirm what your suggesting.

if i use your method on my ATI card with the Callisto drivers i should get QE/CI and no mouse tearing ?

 

 

 

 

 

Hello everyone,

 

I've been doing MONTHS of research for getting QE/CI working on my mobility radeon 9000. At this point in time, I'm fairly confident that we can't get QE/CI working on anything lower than the 9550 (if I'm wrong please correct me).

 

Although I havn't gotten QE/CI working on my laptop, I've gotten pretty darn close. I've gotten it to the point where iTunes will render visualizations with very decent framerates, chess with no artifacts, etc. I'm not sure if any graphically intense applications (ex. Motion ) will work on this, but if anyone can get it going I'd love to hear.

 

Anyways, enough gibberish, lets get on with the guide.

 

Firstoff, go to Omni's Callisto project page

 

http://omni.starchaser.org/callisto/

 

I tried all the builds, but only build 003 worked for me. All other builds either didn't work or I got a very depressing black screen. If you don't feel like experimenting, I reccomend downloading build 003, it seems like it has the highest success rate.

 

After you download the Callisto build, extract it and open the installation file (html). Follow the steps in the walkthrough. After you've completed those steps you (should) be able to change your resolution.

 

Now lets get some 3d acceleration!

 

Download JaS's ATi driver by clicking the link below.

 

http://forum.osx86project.org/index.php?ac...post&id=678

 

r0ck3r4ever's guide for installing this driver was very good (which you can read below)

 

unzip the file

open terminal

do the following

sudo -s

enter your password

rm -r /System/Library/Extensions/ATI*

cp -r /Users/YOUR USER NAME HERE/Desktop/Ati/build/Debug/Ati.kext /System/Library/Extensions/

chown -R root:wheel /System/Library/Extensions/Ati.kext

kextcache -k /System/Library/Extensions/

then you're done!!!

reboot system

After that you should have decent 3d acceleration and a higher resolution with no mouse tearing or artifacts.

Again, if someone notices that I screwed something up, please don't hesitate to correct me.

 

Edit: Aperture runs OK (even w/o CI), a bit sluggish but very usable, also DVDs can play back using VLC (also a bit sluggish, but its a step in the right direction).

[Fausto]

I think you have specs similar to mine. If you don't mind not having QE/CI, you should try CaptainSquash's Katana. It worked for me (except without QE/CI can't use FCP or screen savers).

 

Eds and captainsquash, yup, I saw Katana as a potential solution, but whether I use Katana, Callisto, AGPGart, any combination thereof, or any other such solution, I first have to get said solution onto my hard drive, no? But with my depressing black screen, how do I do that? Can I access the DVD drive in verbose mode, so as to copy Katana/Callisto/whatever to my desktop? If not, how about a floppy drive, or something else? Thanks again.

[eds]

Can I access the DVD drive in verbose mode, so as to copy Katana/Callisto/whatever to my desktop? If not, how about a floppy drive, or something else? Thanks again.

That one's over my technical knowledge. I would start from scratch and reinstall, but you should ask the Captain.

Edited December 19, 2006 by eds

[captainsquash]

ipguy - You will not get QE/CI with this method. This will enable software (not hardware) OpenGL. You will however have no mouse tearing.

 

Fausto - Here goes... I don't have a working laptop so I can't confirm that it works (and this is all from memory), but it should get you in the right direction. This is not a manual install of Katana, but should enable you to boot into OS X (and you can install Katana later).

 

1) Download the Darwin x86 installer CD, I use the 8.01 CD which can be downloaded from here (Use the OpenDarwin mirror), extract the ISO image from the .gz archive using your unzipping utility of choice (I use WinRAR) and then burn that image to a CD.

 

2) This is a long step! - Take the Darwin 8.01 CD and put it into the problematic computer and boot from it. Place the CD in your computer, reboot, and see if a Darwin/x86 menu appears. If it does, skip to step 3, if not, continue with step 2.

 

If you don't know how to boot from a CD, immediately after your computer turns on there should be a prompt for "Boot Device" (alongside a computer manufacturer or motherboard manufacturer logo, etc.) or something like that with a key (ex. F12) next to it, repeatedly press that key until a menu comes up. If there is no boot device selection, there should be something that says something like "Press F2 to enter Setup", in which case you'd repeatedly press F2 until a screen came up.

 

If the boot device menu came up, boot from CD (it may say something like CD/DVD varying on vendor), skip to step 3.

 

If you could not find the boot device menu, and enter the 'setup' utility, follow the instructions below.

 

 

I apologize for the vagueness of this step, but BIOSes (the units that control your computer per se) vary from manufacturer to manufacturer. Somewhere in the BIOS there should be a section for Boot Devices (it may say something like boot priority, just as long as it has boot in it you should be fine ) in which case you would place your CD ROM drive higher in the boot list priority than your hard drive.

 

If you're worried that you changed any other settings which you didn't want to, restart your computer! Changes will not be saved, and you would then enter the BIOS configuration / Setup utility again to do the steps aforementioned. Once the order has been set correctly, save settings and reboot.

 

This step was somewhat confusing, and if you hit a snag, PM me and I'll help.

 

3) Press any key to have the CD boot, you'll see a bunch of scrolling text. Eventually it will ask you what device to install to or type 'shell' to drop into a shell. Note the drive it wants you to install to ( the word after the @ symbol) as you may need it later. Type "shell" (minus quotes) and press enter. Then type the following commands...

 

mount -w -t hfs /dev/disk0s1 /mnt

(Note: if the above command fails, replace disk0s1 with with the word (I think its generally followed by s1 but I'm not sure if that applies to all drives, please correct me if I'm wrong) followed by s1, (ex. words1))

cd /mnt/S*/L*/E*

rm -R ATI*

rm /mnt/S*/L*/Extensions.mkext

rm /mnt/S*/L*/Extensions.kextcache

reboot

 

4) Remove the CD and see if OS X will boot.

Good luck!

 

Edit: This guide is also applicable to any kext install gone horridly wrong, all you would need to is type the kext name instead of typing ATI* in the "rm -R ATI*" mentioned above. For example, if I was removing AGPGart, I would follow the same steps but type rm -R AGPGart.kext instead of rm -R ATI*.

Edited December 19, 2006 by captainsquash

[joe75]

Very nice, Captain

[bgg71]

Very nice, Captain

you could all use ubuntu instead and save you time. everything works on my D600 with edgy even suspend/resume.

but, hey, i still check from time to time to see what's the current state of affairs here:

Good work captain!

[arthurson]

if some of you have time, you can try to install 10.4.1 or 10.43

these two old version somehow can provide opengl support for 9200 card

as i can get around 50 scrore in xbench at 10.43

after 10.44 only 2~3 score can be achieved at 10.44

[Fausto]

Whoa, I can hardly express my gratitude, captainsquash! Now that's detail! Actually, I haven't yet implemented your suggested resolution (I just finished downloading Darwin), but I'll certainly update you as soon as I can!

 

Fausto - Here goes... I don't have a working laptop so I can't confirm that it works (and this is all from memory), but it should get you in the right direction. This is not a manual install of Katana, but should enable you to boot into OS X (and you can install Katana later).

 

1) Download the Darwin x86 installer CD, I use the 8.01 CD which can be downloaded from here (Use the OpenDarwin mirror), extract the ISO image from the .gz archive using your unzipping utility of choice (I use WinRAR) and then burn that image to a CD.

 

2) This is a long step! - Take the Darwin 8.01 CD and put it into the problematic computer and boot from it. Place the CD in your computer, reboot, and see if a Darwin/x86 menu appears. If it does, skip to step 3, if not, continue with step 2.

 

If you don't know how to boot from a CD, immediately after your computer turns on there should be a prompt for "Boot Device" (alongside a computer manufacturer or motherboard manufacturer logo, etc.) or something like that with a key (ex. F12) next to it, repeatedly press that key until a menu comes up. If there is no boot device selection, there should be something that says something like "Press F2 to enter Setup", in which case you'd repeatedly press F2 until a screen came up.

 

If the boot device menu came up, boot from CD (it may say something like CD/DVD varying on vendor), skip to step 3.

 

If you could not find the boot device menu, and enter the 'setup' utility, follow the instructions below.

I apologize for the vagueness of this step, but BIOSes (the units that control your computer per se) vary from manufacturer to manufacturer. Somewhere in the BIOS there should be a section for Boot Devices (it may say something like boot priority, just as long as it has boot in it you should be fine ) in which case you would place your CD ROM drive higher in the boot list priority than your hard drive.

 

If you're worried that you changed any other settings which you didn't want to, restart your computer! Changes will not be saved, and you would then enter the BIOS configuration / Setup utility again to do the steps aforementioned. Once the order has been set correctly, save settings and reboot.

 

This step was somewhat confusing, and if you hit a snag, PM me and I'll help.

 

3) Press any key to have the CD boot, you'll see a bunch of scrolling text. Eventually it will ask you what device to install to or type 'shell' to drop into a shell. Note the drive it wants you to install to ( the word after the @ symbol) as you may need it later. Type "shell" (minus quotes) and press enter. Then type the following commands...

 

mount -w -t hfs /dev/disk0s1 /mnt

(Note: if the above command fails, replace disk0s1 with with the word (I think its generally followed by s1 but I'm not sure if that applies to all drives, please correct me if I'm wrong) followed by s1, (ex. words1))

cd /mnt/S*/L*/E*

rm -R ATI*

rm /mnt/S*/L*/Extensions.mkext

rm /mnt/S*/L*/Extensions.kextcache

reboot

 

4) Remove the CD and see if OS X will boot.

Good luck!

 

Edit: This guide is also applicable to any kext install gone horridly wrong, all you would need to is type the kext name instead of typing ATI* in the "rm -R ATI*" mentioned above. For example, if I was removing AGPGart, I would follow the same steps but type rm -R AGPGart.kext instead of rm -R ATI*.