[devil103]

I am having the same problems as reported above.
Natty install, XBMC built from git following the guide and it automatically crashes XBMC/Mplayer when opening a .mkv file with the same debug info as above.

ATI 11.5 driver and vainfo output is:

libva: libva version 0.32.0-sds2
Xlib: extension "XFree86-DRI" missing on display ":0.0".
libva: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva: Trying to open /usr/lib/va/drivers/fglrx_drv_video.so
libva: va_openDriver() returns 0
vainfo: VA API version: 0.32
vainfo: Driver version: Splitted-Desktop Systems XvBA backend for VA-API - 0.7.8
vainfo: Supported profile and entrypoints
VAProfileH264High : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileVC1Advanced : VAEntrypointVLD

Best guide so far though. I have a feeling this is going to be another little problem (hopefully)

Any suggestions?

PS: Mplayer-vaapi crashes with following message

MPlayer interrupted by signal 11 in module: preinit_libvo

[htpcero]

I am having the same problems as reported above.
Natty install, XBMC built from git following the guide and it automatically crashes XBMC/Mplayer when opening a .mkv file with the same debug info as above.

ATI 11.5 driver and vainfo output is:


Best guide so far though. I have a feeling this is going to be another little problem (hopefully)

Any suggestions?

PS: Mplayer-vaapi crashes with following message

MPlayer interrupted by signal 11 in module: preinit_libvo

I found the same results doing both a GIT build and using xbmc-pvr from Lars' PPAs, on e350 + ubuntu 11.04/amd64. When using xbmc-pvr, dependency problems also creep up but the crash is the same.

So far I haven't found any clear indication that VAAPI actually works in this scenario (people had reported success on older ubuntu releases, older fglrx). It seems we are in for some wait until this gets sorted out.

[wobu]

have u tried this?

yeaah

got my Vaapi and XBMC working again.
The reason was any xorg.conf setting.

i'm thinking this one

Code:

Section "Extensions"
Option "Composite" "Disable"
EndSection

is needed.

But i don't know the exactly effects of this setting....

[WytRaven]

I have been trying for the better part of a week to get xbmc up on my ASUS E35M1-I Deluxe board. I built this system to be a home file/backup server + HTPC.

I used this thread as a starting point so have been trying to get up from an ubuntu natty mini.iso but cannot get xorg going at all, not with fglrx or without.

Issues I have come across and conquered so far:

1. Issues with boot process breaking mdadm arrays on reboot over and over again. Fixed using a combo of POST delays in BIOS, using a new version of mdadm from the proposed repository, and upgrading kernel to 2.6.39.

2. Issues with the onboard Realtek 8111E gigabit ethernet. Sustained transfers at gigabit speeds for more than a few minutes were causing kernel panics. Solved by installing Realtek's own linux driver.

So far I have successfully gotten this system up and running as a nice 12TB AFP file server and Time Machine backup target for my home's Mac fleet (5 x 3TB in RAID5), which allows for a centralised source for music/media files whilst allowing each mac to have it's own unique iTunes library, but as soon as I try to get xorg going it all ends in tears very quickly. I have not once been able to successfully get an X server running properly let alone XBMC...

When trying to configure xorg with X -configure it fails every time. With fglrx there are KMS issues + "Number of created screens does not match the number of detected devices" errors despite appearing to be installed correctly (had to use a special version of fglrx from a PPA patched to work with 2.6.39 but even before upgrading kernel the results where the same so I don't think this really has anything to do with it) and with radeon it's just the number of displays issue. After much searching I have tried all sorts to get this going but to no avail; I cannot get past the first hurdle

There is so much on the net of people obviously just regurgitating stuff without any real knowledge "try this, try that, etc" that it makes it very difficult to find anything of value. Even trying to find an overview of how xorg works so as to be able to understand why it is breaking in the first place seems nigh impossible.

Not really expecting everyone to jump up and try to solve my issues just more sharing my experience with trying to get Ubuntu Natty + AMD Fusion to work.

I haven't given up but I am currently in a state of burn out and despair after so many trys and so many failures. I can only assume I am missing something pretty major or my fixes for the above issues are causing breaks elsewhere, as I see all over the net people reporting that they are up and running in XBMC and are now just trying to solve playback, refresh rate, or crashing issues.

Hopefully I will eventually get it up and running once I manage to wade through the endless supply of mis-information out there on the subject and if so I will report back here with an update on how it was resolved. Or maybe some one else has come across the same issues and already has found a solution...?

I'm about to start again from scratch for what feels like the 50th time now. Wish me luck, or the force to be with me, or something

[Rapoza]

I'm now in my nth try only to make ubuntu get the drivers working. I tried natty and maverick. Now I'll try to use old SO and drivers.

I'm starting to think that this thing doesn't work, so sorry for having followed someones for choosing the mobo model, and understanding why people using this platform goes to windows 7.

Already wasted 5 days almost completely.

Good luck WytRaven.

Thanks for all the help I received from this forum.
Sergio.

[devil103]

have u tried this?

I'll try building xbmc again later today. First backup my root this time since I did another fresh install yesterday evening.

How did you get get the pvr build running on natty? I run into the dependencies problem and the splitted desktop libva/libva-dev/xvba packages...

I still have confidence to get this working and it's fun to mess around in Linux again

Thanks above for the Realtek network tip, I been getting some kernel panics as well and will upate to the Realtek drivers.

[WytRaven]

How did you get get the pvr build running on natty? I run into the dependencies problem and the splitted desktop libva/libva-dev/xvba packages...

Code:

wget http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/libva/pkgs/amd64/libva1_0.32.0-1+sds2_amd64.deb
wget http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/libva/pkgs/amd64/libva-dev_0.32.0-1+sds2_amd64.deb
wget http://www.splitted-desktop.com/~gbeauchesne/xvba-video/xvba-video_0.7.8-1_amd64.deb

apt-get install libdrm-dev
apt-get install pkg-config
dpkg -i libva1_0.32.0-1+sds2_amd64.deb
dpkg -i libva-dev_0.32.0-1+sds2_amd64.deb
dpkg -i xvba-video_0.7.8-1_amd64.deb

I think this is the fix for what you are talking about dependency-wise, the key being "apt-get install libdrm-dev" before attempting to install the others. If this isn't what you were talking about then move on - nothing to see here

[wobu]

i cant remember on any dependency problem, maybe i had one but i don't know it anymore.
Earlier i posted this simple guide which roughly decribes my steps which i did to get it working.
The last step (xorg.conf changes) will also cause that the Unity Desktop of Ubuntu Natty Narwhal won't work anymore. For me it isn't a problem cause i administer my HTPC via PuTTY and NoMachine from a 2nd PC.
I'm using my HTPC since the release of Natty Narwhal to watch Live TV and HD video stuff.

1. firstly install all Vaapi packages
2. checkout xbmc via git, i took the current pvr development (patching isn't needed anymore)

Code:

git clone https://github.com/opdenkamp/xbmc.git

3. Look into the README file for linux and install all packages needed for compiling xbmc
4. compile and install xbmc
5. insert into the /etx/X11/xorg.conf following section

Code:

Section "Extensions"
        Option      "Composite" "Disable"
EndSection

i needed it but i don't now exactly why, cause otherwise my xbmc always crashed on playing a video file

[devil103]

Succes!

With another new installation I now have a working XBMC vaapi.
720p with Unity Desktop, 30% CPU, dc:ff-h264-vaapi

Basically did:

installation from alternative installer (needed for lvm)
sudo apt-update
sudo apt-upgrade

sudo apt-get libdrm-dev

wget three vaapi packages and dpkg -i them

wget the latest 11.5 catalyst drivers
sudo sh ati-driver --buildpkg Ubuntu/natty
sudo dpkg -i fglrx*.deb
sudo aticonfig --initial

test with vainfo, fglrxinfo

sudo shutdown -r now (reboot!)

git from xbmc-pvr and then compile

If wanted I can make a more detailed step guide of what I did, this is just what I can quickly type up now.

[h0tzen]

thank you very much for that HowTo.
please excuse the dumb question, but what does PVR stand for in xbmc-pvr?

[macer]

thank you very much for that HowTo.
please excuse the dumb question, but what does PVR stand for in xbmc-pvr?

PVR is Personal Video Recorder. When you have, for example, DVB-T tuner, you can watch live tv in xbmc-pvr

[devil103]

PVR = personal video recorder. The PVR build is more geared towards capturing live tv.

[WytRaven]

Good to hear you have had success devil103 that gives me new hope too. I have now tested my hardware using the nemek custom live-cd so I can confirm that it can work on my hardware too.

Another note on the Realtek 8111E driver issue with the ASUS E35M1-I Deluxe board. I can now confirm that using the Realtek driver (r8168 version 8.024.00) with the 2.6.39 kernel is solid. I have had it transferring solidly at gigabit speeds (100MB/s+) for over 7 hours now transferring my blu-ray collection from old system to new. That says solid to me.

One gotcha with the driver replacement was making sure to blacklist the old r8169 module to prevent it being loaded again and then update initramfs. Here is basically what I did (all performed as root via "sudo su"):

Code:

--- Installed 2.6.39 kernel from ppa:kernel-ppa/ppa and booted up with new kernel
add-apt-repository ppa:kernel-ppa/ppa
apt-get update
apt-get install linux-headers-2.6.39-0 linux-headers-2.6.39-0-generic linux-image-2.6.39-0-generic --fix-missing
reboot

---- Downloaded driver archive from http://www.realtek.com/downloads/downloadsView.aspx?Langid=1&PNid=13&PFid=5&Level=5&Conn=4&DownTypeID=3&GetDown=false
tar xvfs r8168-8.024.00.tar.bz2
cd r8168-8.024.00
./autorun.sh

--- added the following two lines to /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf
# Replaced by r8168 v8.024.0 for the NIC RTL8111E
blacklist r8169

--- Update initramfs
update-initramfs -u
reboot

--- At this point you should be able to run the following command and see the loaded driver as r8168 and not r8169
lspci -v

I know the NIC stuff is a little off topic for this thread but as it is related directly to hardware that people may have that are reading this thread I figure it is valid it being here. However I do not yet know if kernel 2.6.39 can be successfully used with XBMC VAAPI but I have heard others state they have achieved it

[peterk2005]

Good to hear you have had success devil103 that gives me new hope too. I have now tested my hardware using the nemek custom live-cd so I can confirm that it can work on my hardware too.

How about 24p accelerated playback with vsync on? Does it work for you?

[dafrog]

Hi there,
I am following this thread for a while as I have the same ASUS E35M1-I Deluxe board as "WytRaven". Some of the problems sound familiar to me. Thanks for NIC hint by the way...

I installed my system the way "devil103" suggested without bigger issues. The XBMC has been installed from here using the Unstable-Blueray release.
In my xbmc-video-settings the VAAPI is enables and VPDAU is disabled with the result that every time I am trying to play a video I get the following "error msg" crashing the application:

Code:

libva: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva: Trying to open /usr/lib/va/drivers/fglrx_drv_video.so
libva: va_openDriver() returns 0
vainfo: VA API version: 0.32
vainfo: Driver version: Splitted-Desktop Systems XvBA backend for VA-API - 0.7.8.pre1
vainfo: Supported profile and entrypoints
      VAProfileH264High               :    VAEntrypointVLD
      VAProfileVC1Advanced         :    VAEntrypointVLD
[b]Segmentation fault[/b]

This is the content of "/usr/lib/va/drivers/"

Code:

-rw-r--r-- 1 root root  17888 2011-02-24 12:33 dummy_drv_video.so
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root     17 2011-06-15 01:31 fglrx_drv_video.so -> xvba_drv_video.so
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 121488 2011-02-26 04:23 xvba_drv_video.so

What is this "Segmentation fault" about? Could this be a fix? I am not a linux beginner but it would save me some time if somebody already tried that. Here is another info - maybe I am using a broken vainfo?!

In a lot of posts I saw "libva: va_openDriver() returns 0" - is this a issue or a warning? "OpenDriver" normaly sounds important

The normal playback with VAAPI & VDPAU disabled works - but with the known restrictions...

Any ideas?
Regards Fabian