Re: Stuttering Gnome Debian Buster

On 2021-08-11 13:30, Greg Wooledge wrote:

On Wed, Aug 11, 2021 at 10:10:48AM +0200, solon wrote:
I should probably have specified, but I am certain I am using a compatible
driver, and backports is enabled.

But what did you *install* from backports? Simply enabling the repository
doesn't do anything. Backports are pinned in such a way that they are
never installed by default. You must explicitly install each package.

These things, I tend to install things from backports as they seem useful, not neccesarily just because they exist:

ibverbs-providers/buster-backports,now 24.0-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
ibverbs-utils/buster-backports,now 24.0-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
libibumad3/buster-backports,now 24.0-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
libibverbs1/buster-backports,now 24.0-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
libnvpair3linux/buster-backports,now 2.0.3-9~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed,automatic]
librdmacm1/buster-backports,now 24.0-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
libuutil3linux/buster-backports,now 2.0.3-9~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed,automatic]
libzfs4linux/buster-backports,now 2.0.3-9~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed,automatic]
libzpool4linux/buster-backports,now 2.0.3-9~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed,automatic]
linux-headers-5.10.0-0.bpo.8-amd64/buster-backports,now 5.10.46-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
linux-headers-5.10.0-0.bpo.8-common/buster-backports,buster-backports,now 5.10.46-2~bpo10+1 all [installed,automatic]
linux-image-5.10.0-0.bpo.7-amd64/buster-backports,now 5.10.40-1~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
linux-image-5.10.0-0.bpo.8-amd64/buster-backports,now 5.10.46-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
linux-kbuild-5.10/buster-backports,now 5.10.46-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed,automatic]
rdma-core/buster-backports,now 24.0-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
rdmacm-utils/buster-backports,now 24.0-2~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]
spl/buster-backports,buster-backports,now 2.0.3-9~bpo10+1 all [installed]
zfs-dkms/buster-backports,buster-backports,now 2.0.3-9~bpo10+1 all [installed]
zfsutils-linux/buster-backports,now 2.0.3-9~bpo10+1 amd64 [installed]

85:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
[AMD/ATI] Oland PRO [Radeon R7 240/340] [1002:6613]

OK. First thing I wonder is whether you have installed the
firmware-amd-graphics package (from the non-free repository). But even
then, I don't know whether it has the correct firmware for your device,
because I couldn't find "R7" or "Oland" in the package description. I
do see "oland" a few times, but...

I didn't have backports graphics firmware. I've now installed it. Good suggestion. I'll see if that makes any difference:

firmware-amd-graphics/buster-backports,buster-backports,now 20210315-2~bpo10+1 all [installed]

  * Radeon HD 8500/8600/8700 series CE microcode (amdgpu/oland_ce.bin)
  * Radeon HD 8500/8600/8700 series K SMC microcode
    (amdgpu/oland_k_smc.bin)
  * Radeon HD 8500/8600/8700 series MC microcode (amdgpu/oland_mc.bin)
  * Radeon HD 8500/8600/8700 series ME microcode (amdgpu/oland_me.bin)
  * Radeon HD 8500/8600/8700 series PFP microcode (amdgpu/oland_pfp.bin)
  * Radeon HD 8500/8600/8700 series RLC microcode (amdgpu/oland_rlc.bin)
  * Radeon HD 8500/8600/8700 series SMC microcode (amdgpu/oland_smc.bin)
  * Radeon HD 8500/8600/8700 series UVD microcode (amdgpu/oland_uvd.bin)

I don't know whether any of those is intended to match your device.

Checking "dmesg | grep -i firmware" would be good.

Reporting as (after backports firmware install):

[ 2.967504] radeon 0000:85:00.0: firmware: direct-loading firmware radeon/oland_pfp.bin
[ 2.967525] radeon 0000:85:00.0: firmware: direct-loading firmware radeon/oland_me.bin
[ 2.967545] radeon 0000:85:00.0: firmware: direct-loading firmware radeon/oland_ce.bin
[ 2.967564] radeon 0000:85:00.0: firmware: direct-loading firmware radeon/oland_rlc.bin
[ 2.967594] radeon 0000:85:00.0: firmware: direct-loading firmware radeon/si58_mc.bin
[ 2.967636] radeon 0000:85:00.0: firmware: direct-loading firmware radeon/oland_smc.bin
[ 2.976662] radeon 0000:85:00.0: firmware: direct-loading firmware radeon/TAHITI_uvd.bin
[ 2.976711] radeon 0000:85:00.0: firmware: direct-loading firmware radeon/TAHITI_vce.bin

Linux MyMachine 5.10.0-0.bpo.8-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 5.10.46-2~bpo10+1
(2021-07-22) x86_64 GNU/Linux

So you grabbed a kernel image from backports, at least. That's probably
a good step. But this doesn't tell us whether you also grabbed the X
server (or Wayland), Mesa, firmware, etc.

To my knowledge there is, by design, nothing X related in backports. I've looked for xserver and gnome packages and discovered that nothing GUI is included in backports, though I can't remember exactly where I found that.

I'll upgrade to bullseye in a few days and will probably only continue
investigating it if it comes back with enabled gnome extensions after that.

Upgrading to bullseye is probably wise for this new a device. If nothing
else, it would save you having to figure out all of the backported
packages you need.

Googling gave me a page that's not directly related to Debian:

https://linux-hardware.org/?id=pci:1002-6613-1458-22b0

And an unanswered Debian bug report: https://bugs.debian.org/966420

But the person reporting that bug was using a buster kernel, where you
are using a backported kernel. So perhaps that doesn't affect you.

It's a possibility, but this problem has been present over two different radeon videocards. The previous one a ASUS ATI/Radeon 512Mb HD5450, which exhibited the same behaviour. I upgraded to this 2Gb R7 240, which didn't change anything.

I'll wait for the official bullseye release and then upgrade. This system runs a VM that does the load balancing for my home network, so I can't take it offline while the better half is busy with endless Teams meetings, it requires a little planning, so I'd prefer just doing it once when bullsseye goes to stable.

So far I'm suspecting that the problem is related to gnome-extensions, with those disabled it certainly behaves alot better. That wasn't a problem under Ubuntu though, so I'm guessing there is an issue with gnome versions somewhere there.

Thanks for the responses so far,