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fglrx breaking upgrades to 8.04
Filed under: UbuntuIt seems AMD’s scripts to build an Ubuntu package for 7.10 include a diversion for /etc/xdg/compiz/compiz-manager so they can add fglrx to the list of supported drivers. The problem is that they don’t remove this diversion on upgrade/uninstall so when you upgrade to Ubuntu 8.04 the /etc/xdg/compiz/compiz-manager file will no longer exist and compiz will not start.
The fix is pretty simple, just run this:
sudo dpkg-divert --rename --remove /etc/xdg/compiz/compiz-manager
Yay, compiz works again. 
Remember, this is why you should only install such drivers from Ubuntu. The latest version is not worth a broken upgrade.
11 Responses to “fglrx breaking upgrades to 8.04”
Thanks for the update. I will keep this in mind when I upgrade to Hardy (probably this weekend).
I would love to only install fglrx drivers from Ubuntu and I did that with Edgy and Feisty, however, Gutsy’s fglrx drivers were broken (they didn’t fully support the new xorg release) and never updated. I wasted two days trying to get dual monitor support working like it did in Feisty before I switched to the latest release from ATI. Compiz was not supported until a later fglrx driver.
ATI is now upgrading their drivers monthly with improvements Ubuntu could only hope to provide and their drivers are getting better all the time. I don’t even have to recompile the drivers with a kernel upgrade now, that happens automatically. Ubuntu only provides a new fglrx driver once a release and that is usually not the latest driver available at the time.
Why shouldn’t I use the latest drivers, especially when they fix bugs and provide enhancements not available from the Ubuntu drivers?
Thank you! I had the same problem, after I upgraded to Hardy RC a few days ago. I almost went back to Gutsy, because of that, but now I don’t need to.
Thanks for the info. Now my compiz working like before. Huraayyyy!!!
Thank you very much.
I am so glad I found this before I started doing all the other “fixes” and tweaks that the forums are filled with.
Thank you very much.
I am so glad I found this in time, before I started doing all the fixes and tweaks suggested in the forums.
I have the very same problem.
Compiz stopped working when I upgraded to Hardy.
But now, when I run this command, I’ll face:
“No diversion `any diversion of /etc/xdg/compiz/compiz-manager’, none removed”
Any comment?
P.S: I’ve an Intel 945 VGA.
Well, finally I got it;
“sudo apt-get install fglrx-driver” helped, but there is
another problem now, when I change the Visual effects into Extra, the computer becomes incredibly slow.
This is while I could use Compiz with 7.10.
Have I done something wrong with my VGA driver?
What should I do noe?
You just said you had intel, why did you install the driver for ATI cards? Uninstall that, for a start. After that you probably have the bug were desktops with Intel 945 don’t get recognized by the driver and so you get no 3d acceleration. I think there is going to be a fix for this in Ubuntu 8.04 but it may have to wait until Ubuntu 8.10.
I have an Acer Travelmate 2310 notebook with SiS graphics chipset and looks like it does not support Compiz in Ubuntu. Any ideas?
Thanks.
Cheers,
Harry
Thanks Travis,
I just executed the command, I didn’t know it would install the ATI driver.
And I guess you’re right about the bug. So all I can do is to wait for update.
Cheers,
Azad
I had the same problem after an upgrade from Ubuntu 7.10 to 8.04. The instructions below resolved the issue.
To get this to run, according to this post, you will need to modify /usr/bin/compiz by adding these two lines at the top of the file:
LIBGL_ALWAYS_INDIRECT=”true”
SKIP_CHECKS=”yes”
I found this at http://yoonkit.blogspot.com/2008/04/compiz-works-on-heron.html
According to the blog, this tells compiz not to check if the system is capable of running it.
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