This is about just getting my video card to work at all; info on actually playing DVDs is here.

Laptop

Don’t get me wrong, I really do prefer Linux to that Other operating system…

X recognizes my 600m laptop’s video card as:
Chipset: ATI Radeon Mobility 9000 (M9) Lf (AGP) (ChipID = 0x4c66)
Device: ATI Technologies, Inc. Radeon R250 Lf [Radeon Mobility 9000 M9]

The last ATI driver to support the Mobility 9000 was 8.28.8 (for comparison: 8.29.6). The Dapper Installation Guide cover installation of this version, along with how to fix some of it’s brokenness. Following the directions for Method 1 won’t work, however, because sudo apt-get install xorg-driver-fglrx will now install a later version which does not support the Mobility 9000. In Method 2 you have to change all the version numbers back to the old version.

The easyubuntu ATI driver does not work.
Because it’s an ATI graphics chipset, 915resolution won’t work.

From http://wiki.cchtml.com/index.php/Ubuntu_Dapper_Installation_Guide:

Make sure the restricted repository is enabled in /etc/apt/sources.list or this guide will not work!

Help on enabling repositories can be found at https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Repositories/Ubuntu.

sudo apt-get update
# Okay if this next one is already installed
sudo apt-get install linux-restricted-modules-$(uname -r)
sudo apt-get install xorg-driver-fglrx
sudo depmod -a
sudo aticonfig --initial
sudo aticonfig --overlay-type=Xv

An alternative to the aticonfig --initial command is to edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf and replace the string “ati” with “fglrx” in the “Device” section. This way you won’t lose your old “Screen” and “Monitor” settings. Afterwards you can use aticonfig for setting overlay, etc.

Now Reboot your system:
sudo shutdown -r now

Confirm that it works:
fglrxinfo
display: :0.0 screen: 0
OpenGL vendor string: ATI Technologies Inc.
OpenGL renderer string: RADEON 9600 Generic
OpenGL version string: 2.0.5814 (8.25.18)

Unfortunately OpenGL seems to be broken for R200 cards (everything below Radeon 9500) in this driver version which results in messages like
[fglrx] API ERROR: could not register entrypoint for Uniform2iARB
and similar when running OpenGL applications. This may be fixed by replacing /usr/lib/libGL.so.1.2 with libGL.so.1.2 from the previous driver version (8.24.8). To do so download this file: libGL.so.1.2 and then copy it to the /usr/lib/ directory.

It might be necessary to create a symlink to get accelerated OpenGL:
sudo ln -s /usr/lib/dri /usr/lib/xorg/modules/dri

It ends up looking something like this (note the xorg.conf backup locations–I had to use these to revert a bad change once):

steve@ghost:~$ sudo apt-get install linux-restricted-modules-$(uname -r)
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
linux-restricted-modules-2.6.15-23-386 is already the newest version.
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 2 not upgraded.
steve@ghost:~$ sudo apt-get install xorg-driver-fglrx
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
xorg-driver-fglrx is already the newest version.
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 2 not upgraded.
steve@ghost:~$ sudo depmod -a
steve@ghost:~$ sudo aticonfig --initial
Uninitialised file found, configuring.
Using /etc/X11/xorg.conf
Saved back-up to /etc/X11/xorg.conf.original-0
steve@ghost:~$ sudo aticonfig --overlay-type=Xv
Warning: Option 'VideoOverlay' doesn't affect running session.
Warning: Option 'OpenGLOverlay' doesn't affect running session.
Using /etc/X11/xorg.conf
Saved back-up to /etc/X11/xorg.conf.fglrx-0
steve@ghost:~$

or (I think this is what I did last time I went through this):
# per http://wiki.cchtml.com/index.php/Ubuntu_Installation_Guide
sudo apt-get install xorg-driver-fglrx
# Okay if this next one is already installed
sudo apt-get install linux-restricted-modules-$(uname -r)
# Select the fglrx driver (64-bit users also deselect int10a) on this next one
sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg


Desktop

I run a dual-monitor setup on my desktop, which has an Nvidia GeForce 8600 GT card. First install the driver like so: sudo apt-get install nvidia-glx-new (which probably installs a more specific package like nvidia-glx-180 or nvidia-glx-185). Then run nvidia-settings. I set my configuration to run TwinView at 1280 x 1024 1600 x 1200. One screen has position Absolute +0 +0 and the other Absolute +1280 +1600 + 0. If anything goes wrong log back in under recovery mode and run sudo dpkg-reconfigure -phigh xserver-xorg to fix back up your /etc/X11/xorg.conf.