Intel

Firmware

Systems using Skylake, Broxton or newer Intel graphics will need to install additional firmware^[1] from sys-kernel/linux-firmware package:

Otherwise errors such as the following might be visible in dmesg:

kernel: i915 0000:00:02.0: Direct firmware load for i915/skl_dmc_ver1_27.bin failed with error -2
kernel: i915 0000:00:02.0: Failed to load DMC firmware [https://01.org/linuxgraphics/intel-linux-graphics-firmwares], disabling runtime power management.

Device Drivers  --->
    Generic Driver Options  --->
        -*- Userspace firmware loading support
        [*] Include in-kernel firmware blobs in kernel binary
            (i915/skl_dmc_ver1_27.bin) External firmware blobs to build into the kernel binary
            (/lib/firmware) Firmware blobs root directory

Device Drivers  --->
    Generic Driver Options  --->
            Firmware loader  --->
                -*- Firmware loading facility
                (i915/skl_dmc_ver1_27.bin) Build named firmware blobs into the kernel binary
                (/lib/firmware) Firmware blobs root directory

kernel: [    1.294069] [drm] GuC: Failed to fetch firmware i915/kbl_guc_ver9_33.bin (error -2)
kernel: [    1.294079] [drm] HuC: Failed to fetch firmware i915/kbl_huc_ver01_07_1398.bin (error -2)

/usr/src/linux/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_guc_fw.c-#define I915_SKL_GUC_UCODE GUC_FW_PATH(skl, SKL_FW_MAJOR, SKL_FW_MINOR)
/usr/src/linux/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_guc_fw.c:MODULE_FIRMWARE(I915_SKL_GUC_UCODE);
--
/usr/src/linux/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_csr.c-#define I915_CSR_SKL "i915/skl_dmc_ver1_27.bin"
/usr/src/linux/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_csr.c:MODULE_FIRMWARE(I915_CSR_SKL);
--
/usr/src/linux/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_huc_fw.c-	SKL_HUC_FW_MINOR, SKL_BLD_NUM)
/usr/src/linux/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_huc_fw.c:MODULE_FIRMWARE(I915_SKL_HUC_UCODE);

Kernel

The following kernel options need to be activated:

Processor type and features  --->
    [*] MTRR (Memory Type Range Register) support
Device Drivers  --->
    Graphics support  --->
        <*> /dev/agpgart (AGP Support)  --->
             <*> Intel 440LX/BX/GX, I8xx and E7x05 chipset support
        <*> Direct Rendering Manager (XFree86 4.1.0 and higher DRI support) --->
            <*> Intel 8xx/9xx/G3x/G4x/HD Graphics
            [*]   Enable modesetting on intel by default
            [*]   Enable legacy fbdev support for the modesetting intel driver

The legacy fbdev support is required since kernel 3.14.14 at least for i915 (CONFIG_DRM_I915_FBDEV=y).^[2][3] For hybrid Intel/AMD system, follow also the steps of radeon (open source) or fglrx (closed binary) drivers.

Since kernel version 4.4 the driver has been moved and the legacy fbdev support is now CONFIG_DRM_FBDEV_EMULATION=y.

Device Drivers  --->
            Graphics support  --->
                <*> /dev/agpgart (AGP Support)  --->
                    --- /dev/agpgart (AGP Support)
                    -*-   Intel 440LX/BX/GX, I8xx and E7x05 chipset support
                <*> Direct Rendering Manager (XFree86 4.1.0 and higher DRI support)  --->
                    --- Direct Rendering Manager (XFree86 4.1.0 and higher DRI support)
                    [*]   Enable legacy fbdev support for your modesetting driver
                <*> Intel 8xx/9xx/G3x/G4x/HD Graphics
                [ ]   Enable alpha quality support for new Intel hardware by default
                ()    Force probe driver for selected new Intel hardware
                [*]   Enable capturing GPU state following a hang
                [*]     Compress GPU error state
                [*]   Always enable userptr support
                [ ]   Enable Intel GVT-g graphics virtualization host support

X drivers

Portage uses the VIDEO_CARDS variable, which expands into the USE_EXPAND variable, for enabling support for various graphics cards. Assuming the x11-base/xorg-drivers package has already been installed, setting the VIDEO_CARDS variable in /etc/portage/make.conf will pull in the correct video driver:

<syntaxhighlight lang="bash">VIDEO_CARDS="intel"</syntaxhighlight>

<syntaxhighlight lang="bash">VIDEO_CARDS="intel i915"</syntaxhighlight>

<syntaxhighlight lang="bash">VIDEO_CARDS="intel i965"</syntaxhighlight>

<syntaxhighlight lang="bash">VIDEO_CARDS="intel i965 iris"</syntaxhighlight>

The intel value is for x11-base/xorg-drivers. The i915 and i965 and iris values are for media-libs/mesa.

After making any make.conf modifications, update the system so the changes take effect by passing the --changed-use --deep options to emerge:

Those wishing to not accept the Intel graphic driver defaults in the main repository can read on into the sub-sections below.

<syntaxhighlight lang="xorg.conf">Section "Device"
        Identifier  "Intel Graphics"
        Driver      "intel"
        Option      "AccelMethod"    "sna"
EndSection</syntaxhighlight>

<syntaxhighlight lang="xorg.conf">Section "Device"
   Identifier  "Intel Graphics"
   Driver      "intel"
   Option      "TearFree"    "true"
EndSection</syntaxhighlight>

<syntaxhighlight lang="xorg.conf">Section "Device"
        Identifier  "Intel Graphics"
        Driver      "modesetting"
        Option      "AccelMethod"    "glamor"
        Option      "DRI"            "3"
EndSection</syntaxhighlight>

add_drivers+="... i915 ..."

VAAPI

Intel GMA X4500HD / G45 / GM45 and newer supports VAAPI hardware video acceleration.

Vulkan

As of November 15th, 2016^[7] Vulkan is supported in the main ebuild repository for Intel Core processors using the i965 mesa driver.

Please note, that this will build a working Vulkan driver, but it will not provide a libvulkan.so.1, but a drivers-specific libvulkan_intel.so. The package media-libs/vulkan-loader provides libvulkan.so.1.

Misc

Various utilities useful for debugging are provided by x11-apps/igt-gpu-tools package.

For example GPU min/max/current frequency can by displayed by:

All provided commands can be discovered by listing the provided files with equery:

Kernel

Permissions

If the acl USE flag is enabled globally and elogind is being used (default for desktop profiles) permissions to video cards will be handled automatically. It is possible to check the permissions using getfacl:

A broader solution is to add the user(s) needing access the video card to the video group:

Note that users will be able to run X without permission to the DRI subsystem, but acceleration will be disabled.

xorg.conf

Choose one of the following configuration options:

• Classic Driver -- x11-drivers/xf86-video-intel

As xorg is not aware of i915 or i965 they will need to be addressed as Driver intel.

FILE /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/intel.confExplicit intel driver section

<syntaxhighlight lang="xorg.conf">Section "Device"
   Identifier  "intel"
   Driver      "intel"
EndSection</syntaxhighlight>

• Alternate Driver for Gen 4+ -- Modesetting

Note
Experiences of this configuration can be found in the Discussion of this page. Add any difficulties there so this section can be improved.

As of xorg-server-1.17, the modesetting driver was moved into x11-base/xorg-server. This driver has more features than the classic driver, such as the ability to support acceleration via GLAMOR.

This configuration is the default for VIDEO_CARDS="intel i965" beginning with x11-base/xorg-drivers-1.19. If you wish to use the classic driver, you will need to install x11-drivers/xf86-video-intel manually:

root #emerge --ask x11-drivers/xf86-video-intel

xorg-server is easily configured to prefer modesetting over the older intel driver.

FILE /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/modesetting.confExplicit modesetting driver section

<syntaxhighlight lang="xorg.conf">Section "Device"
   Identifier  "modesetting"
   Driver      "modesetting"
EndSection</syntaxhighlight>

The X server is designed to work out-of-the-box, with no need to manually edit X.Org's configuration files. It should detect and configure devices such as displays, keyboards, and mice.

However, the main configuration file of the X server is the xorg.conf.

HTML5/VAAPI GPU hangs

If the GPU hangs up when watching VAAPI-accelerated video (e.g. on YouTube) try enabling IOMMU:

Device Drivers  --->
    [*] IOMMU Hardware Support --->
        [*] Support for Intel IOMMU using DMA Remapping Devices
        [*]   Enable Intel DMA Remapping Devices by default

Related upstream bug report.

KDM freezes

A workaround is to set TerminateServer=true in all sections of the file /usr/share/config/kdm/kdmrc, which starts with X-.

KDE's plasma eating CPU

If /usr/bin/plasmashell is always consuming several percent of CPU, perhaps this is related to a vsync problem. QT Quick Animation seem to loop too fast when vsync is not managed by the driver (Reference).

A way to enable vsync with SNA is to enable the TearFree option in xorg.conf:

<syntaxhighlight lang="xorg.conf">
Section "Device"
        Identifier "Device0"
        Driver "intel"

        Option      "AccelMethod" "SNA"
        Option      "TearFree"    "true"
EndSection</syntaxhighlight>

See also this Linux Mint tutorial.

Black screen

• According to this Debian wiki, CONFIG_FRAMEBUFFER_CONSOLE must be set to y (aka built-in to the kernel). Otherwise, it is possible to always have a black screen unless nomodeset is passed to the kernel, thus disabling kernel mode setting (KMS). acpi_osi="Linux" can be passed to the kernel command line to try to solve this kind of issue. This is usually done through the bootloader.
• Kernel with version 4.2 or newer is needed with some 8th generation chipsets^[9].

Brightness does not change with keyboard shortcuts

First, make sure vendor compatibility is on in the kernel configuration. Toshiba for Toshiba, etc.

If it is, or when the brightness buttons are working, the issue is that the kernel can not detect where the brightness control is located.

Luckily, this is easy enough to modify, as long as the kernel version is >= 3.13.x and < 4.2.

Add the following argument to the kernel command-line:

video.use_native_backlight=1

On kernels >= 4.2, the video.use_native_backlight option is no longer available.^[10] You should use one of the following instead (experiment to see which works on your system):

acpi_backlight=video

acpi_backlight=native

acpi_backlight=vendor

Do your key bindings map to actions viewable in xev? Can you adjust the screen brightness using xbacklight? You can always do a work around via a keyboard remapping. For LXDE it can be done via:

<syntaxhighlight lang="xml"><keybind key="XF86MonBrightnessUp">
      <action name="Execute">
          <command>xbacklight +5</command>
      </action>
</keybind>
<keybind key="XF86MonBrightnessDown">
      <action name="Execute">
          <command>xbacklight -5</command>
      </action>
</keybind></syntaxhighlight>

White or missing textures in games

This is most likely caused by missing S3TC support. Possible solutions:

• Either set force_s3tc_enable environment variable to true, or enable this option in ~/.drirc (using x11-misc/driconf):

• Install media-libs/libtxc_dxtn. On amd64, it might be a good idea to enable 32-bit build of this library since many games might be shipping 32-bit executables:

media-libs/libtxc_dxtn abi_x86_32