Video

The purpose of this page is to give you streamlined steps for setting up your video hardware for X, and desktop environments such as GNOME.

   Important

Editors: OK, I've decided to change the plans for this page. This is going to be a page similar to Subarches. The idea is to help people to identify their hardware and guide them toward the correct driver for their chipset. The focus will be primarily on defining the types of hardware that are supported, what products they appear in, and how to know if you have this hardware, and also give people good general overview of options available to them (free vs. proprietary, etc.) Other important topics that apply to all drivers, like eselect opengl should be covered as well. This will then serve as the meta-page for Video support, with individual ebuild pages holding the details for each driver.

Video Drivers

First determine which video card you have and which driver it requires.

root # lspci -nn | grep -i vga

to see what your system is using:

root # lspci -k

Once hardware is determined use the following sections to add or edit the VIDEO_CARDS global variable in /etc/make.conf. For more granular details including kernel configurations, frame buffer settings, and xorg configurations: see specific package page links.

AMD/ATI

Users can choose between free (x11-drivers/xf86-video-ati) and proprietary (x11-drivers/ati-drivers) video drivers.

x11-drivers/ati-drivers supports a variety AMD products, including Radeon R9, R7, R5 and HD 5000 Series through HD 8000 Series. Also supported are AMD A-Series APUs and Mobile Radeon HD chipsets.

The free x11-drivers/xf86-video-ati has an official hardware and feature compatibility matrix. The free drivers are recommended as the proprietary drivers are not currently maintained very well by AMD.

Intel

The Intel video driver (No results supports Intel GMA and Intel HD graphics processors, which are found in laptops and desktop systems.

NVIDIA

Users can choose between Open (nouveau) and Closed-Source x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers video drivers. Open nouveau drivers are preferred as many kernels conflict with closed-source drivers.

Other

Multiple Cards (Hybrid Graphics)

recommended make.conf VIDEO_CARDS Hybrid intel/ati:

   /etc/portage/make.conf - set video global variable

VIDEO_CARDS="fglrx intel"

Virtual Machine Guests

These settings are used by Parallels VM's and presumably others

   /etc/portage/make.conf - set video global variable

VIDEO_CARDS="vesa vga"

Raspberry Pi

   Important

This section is in need of updates.

Install

Once your video cards variables are set in make.conf, and kernel configurations are arranged merge changes into your system:

root # emerge -avuND world

   Note

we should change world to the specific package that pulls in all the other video stuff so if this page is ran on an old stale system it doesn't pull in 50 bazillion packages

Configure X.org

Nvidia

nvidia-xconfig, etc.

AMD/ATI

aticonfig, etc.

root # aticonfig --initial --input=/etc/X11/xorg.conf

Finalize and test

eselect opengl

   Note

change the number of card eselected to match the card of your system

root # eselect opengl list
root # eselect opengl set 1

eselect opencl

   Note

some setups can make use of opencl

root #eselect opencl list
root #eselect opencl set 1

• reboot/test process

Troubleshooting

• what to do if only a blank screen

Category:Video Cards wrap me with braces when im snazzy Category:First Steps wrap me with braces when im snazzy