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Need Help Getting Smooth Video Playback in Ubuntu 14.04

Running Ubuntu 14.04 LTS on an HP-Compaq DC7600 tower PC. Monitor is a 27" Asus VE278Q set to 1920 x 1080 (16:9)

lspci shows that the graphics card is a, "VGA compatible controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] RV370 [Radeon X300]"

I am getting horrible video playback when watching anything on YouTube. It's horribly jerky.

I ran "sudo apt-get install fglrx" to install the proprietary AMD drivers and this only causes the resolution to change to 1280 x 768 and and it also messes up the refresh rate, so I had to uninstall them to get back my 1920 x 1080 resolution.

How can I get better video playback?

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

rindi

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anuneznyc

ASKER

Thanks Rindi. I spoke to another Linux Expert who said I asking to do the impossible.

That Radeon X300 video card has neither the VRAM nor the horsepower to drive smooth video playback to a 27" monitor running at 1920 x 1080.

I'm going to give it a try using a lower resolution to see the results.

anuneznyc

ASKER

I tried to reinstall the 'fglrx' drivers, hoping can open the driver manager (sudo amdcccle) to adjust the resolution to something lower so that video playback might be smoother. But now I'm getting these errors when I try to run amdcccle:

gksu amdcccle
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0.0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0.0".
gnome-session-is-accelerated: No hardware 3D support.
gnome-session-check-accelerated: Helper exited with code 256
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0.0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0.0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0.0".
gnome-session-is-accelerated: No hardware 3D support.
gnome-session-check-accelerated: Helper exited with code 256
gnome-session[2357]: WARNING: software acceleration check failed: Child process exited with code 1

anuneznyc

ASKER

Running 'fglrxinfo' gives the following output:

Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0.0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0.0".
Error: couldn't find RGB GLX visual!

anuneznyc

ASKER

On another test machine (which uses an integrated NVidia chipset), I had success with downloading the appropriate driver packagedirectly from the NVidea website and then running the "Software Updater" from the GUI. When you open the Settings in Software Updater. There are 5 tabs in Settings and the last one is "Additional Drivers." On my other test machine, it was immediately able to see that I had proprietary NVidia drivers available and I was able to select the NVidia driver as the default driver for my video card.

On the PC I'm having trouble with, I downloaded the appropriate X300 64-bit driver package from the AMD website. I made the file executable, but I get the errors below when I try to run it. The main error is, "Error: ./default_policy.sh does not support version"

sudo sh ati-driver-installer-9-3-x86.x86_64.run
Created directory fglrx-install.84PSDJ
Verifying archive integrity... All good.
Uncompressing ATI Proprietary Linux Driver-8.593...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
==================================================
ATI Technologies Linux Driver Installer/Packager
==================================================

Error: ./default_policy.sh does not support version
default:v2:x86_64:lib32::none:3.13.0-92-generic; make sure that the version is being
correctly set by --iscurrentdistro

Removing temporary directory: fglrx-install.84PSDJ

rindi

NVidia GPU's are different from AMD GPU's, particularly for older versions you get working legacy drivers (not the nouveau driver that comes with the OS) which can be installed and work more or less. But AMD GPU's generally only offer the OS built-in OpenSource ATI driver. Legacy AMD drivers are generally only available for relatively new GPU's.

Your hardware is just too old. Get something newer. Even if you get an nVidia card for that PC, your CPU is still too old and slow, and you won't get much improvement out of a better video card. This old stuff is a waste of time.

anuneznyc

ASKER

I think you're correct, Rindi. I'm beating a dead horse here! :-)

anuneznyc

ASKER

Thanks!