Envy + ATI driver (8.42.3) + Desktop Effects = Success

This new release will make your experience with ATI and the Desktop Effects a bit easier (in Ubuntu and in its derivatives). The fglrx driver was not included in Compiz’s whitelist in Ubuntu Gutsy, therefore ATI users were not able to use the Desktop Effects. Envy is now able to solve this problem for you (but it will restore the old whitelist if you uninstall the driver from Envy, in case you’re wondering). Of course the Desktop Effects will work only if you use the ATI driver 8.42.3.

I have cut (and resized) the logo since it didn’t fit certain screens in low resolution (please remember that the textual install should fit any screen). Furthermore the following translations were added: Danish, Norwegian, Romanian, Taiwanese, Ukrainian.

Translators
Danish: Søren Bjerrum
Norwegian: Kjetil Rydland
Romanian: nokia
Taiwanese: Jose Sun
Ukrainian: Artem Gluvchynskyj

P.S. You can get Envy here as usual

61 thoughts on “Envy + ATI driver (8.42.3) + Desktop Effects = Success”

  1. Thanks for this great piece of software and this update (bit easier to set up my laptop). But I’m having a little annoyance on my desktop with the nvidia driver: I’m not able to enable compiz using the appearance options in gutsy. I have to run it with the command “compiz –replace”.
    Is there any way to still use gutsy’s way?

    Reply

  3. Installed latest Envy, using it installed the ATI driver. Restarted the system. Tried to enable Visual Effects, Normal, error says “Desktop effects could not be enabled”.

    Under Restricted Drivers enabled the ATI driver, restart again, same error for Visual Effects.

    Checked xorg.conf, it has the fglrx driver.

    The identifier for the video card is: “ATI Technologies Inc RV370 5B60 [Radeon X300 (PCIE)]”

    Any suggestions?

    Thanks,
    Marius

    Reply

  4. @Christophe:
    I can enable compiz with the appearance options (with my Nvidia card).
    What happens exactly?

    @Marius Scurtescu
    You shouldn’t use Restricted Drivers Manager if you use Envy.
    Just install the driver through Envy.
    Then if you still can’t enable the Desktop Effects try typing:
    sudo depmod -ae

    then restart the Xserver and try to enable the effects again.

    Reply

  7. >ATI users were not able to use the Desktop
    >Effects.
    Desktop Effects work with the default installation with a Radeon 9200 mobile…
    (just as a side note)

    Reply

  8. @Pharao
    I’m talking about the “fglrx” driver (i.e. ATI’s proprietary driver).

    ATI’s open source driver (“ati”) (the one you’re using) works out-of-the-box.

    I think the title is quite clear.

    Reply

  11. Ciao Alberto,ho installato questa versione sul mio pc vecchio (usa i 96.43),però alla fine quando dice di configurare automaticamente lo xorg.conf,premo y,poi invio,ma non succede nulla.
    A cosa è dovuto?

    Grazie

    Reply

  13. In pratica premo invio e va a capo,e da li non si schioda.
    Allora lo chiudo con ctrl-c però lo xorg.conf rimane quello vecchio.
    Premetto che ho usato l’interfaccia testuale

    Reply

  16. anche un altro utente mi ha segnalato questo problema. Credo dipenda da nvidia-xconfig (che Envy usa).

    Posso risolvere il problema implementando questa funzionalità a modo mio, senza usare nvidia-xconfig (nella prossima versione di Envy).

    Reply

  17. Hello,
    The installation for the 8.42.3 was sucessful but i still get the “Desktop effects can not be enabled”.
    In a terminal when i try tu run compiz.envy
    it says :

    Checking for Xgl: not present.
    No whitelisted driver found
    aborting and using fallback: /usr/bin/metacity

    (by the way i’m not sure it’s the right command)

    Reply

  20. Well, that’s somewhat weird.

    Envy now works in Russian, thanks for that BUT…

    1) The translation has a lot of mistakes which weren’t present when I sent you my translation.
    2) It doesn’t have my name in the translation section

    Seems as though Ivan Potapov (the third translator) reviewed the original translation by Anton Starikov (the first translator) instead of the one I sent you (the reviewed first translation), probably because you forgot to replace it on your LaunchPad translation site…

    Reply

  22. Hi,
    when run cmmpiz i get the following error :
    $ compiz
    /usr/bin/compiz: 228: Syntax error: “(” unexpected

    when i look at line 228 :
    verbose “Comparing resolution ($RESOLUTION) to maximum 3D texture size ($TEXTURE_LIMIT): “;

    the only ( is between quotes…
    i’m a bit confused

    thanks

    Reply

  25. On Synaptic it’s write:
    “Envy is an application written in Python which will download the
    latest Nvidia driver or the Legacy driver (for older cards)
    (according to the model of your card) from Nvidia’s website and
    set it up for you handling dependencies (compilers, OpenGL, etc.)
    which are required in order to build and use the driver.”

    But Envy also install ATI driver…

    Reply

  26. it’s just a little modification that has to be done to the script, it doesn’t affect so no biggie
    hi alberto, great job with this tool, the only but I find is like on the previous version it doesn’t dettect my Radeon HD2600 pro

    Reply

  27. @pierluc
    I’ll fix it

    @Lusanagi
    can you post the output of this command (so that I can see you card’s ID)?
    lspci -n | grep 300

    Reply

  28. This version(0.9.8) works great with compiz. But my firefox page-scrolling and overall responsiveness on Gutsy Gibbon got sooo slow. I’m on Gutsy Gibbon on ThinkPad T42(Mobility Radeon 9600)

    Reply

  30. Hi Alberto. Thanks for this. Now I can install the drivers for my ati HD2600xt, but envy still doesn’t recognize my card automatically. I have to use the manual installation option… but al least it works! =D

    Reply

  31. Hi!
    My ATI HD 2600 also isn’t recognized. Here the output of the command “lspci -n | grep 300”:
    01:00.0 0300: 1002:9581
    Greetings

    Reply

  32. i have the latest kubuntu version, 7.10 and vhen i try ti install envy i get this error :
    “Unpacking envy (from envy_0.9.8-0ubuntu10_all.deb) …
    dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of envy:
    envy depends on gksu; however:
    Package gksu is not installed.
    envy depends on module-assistant; however:
    Package module-assistant is not installed.
    dpkg: error processing envy (–install):
    dependency problems – leaving unconfigured
    Errors were encountered while processing:
    envy”

    PLEASE HELP… i’m a newbie

    Reply

  34. Using the Restricted Driver Manager together with Envy was a pretty bad idea. Unselecting the restricted driver completely messed up X11. Uninstalling Envy did not help at all.

    Eventually recovered from an old xorg.conf backup file.

    No restricted driver, Envy installed ATI drive fine. When enabling desktop effects the whole screen goes white and that’s the end of it 🙁

    Using the latest Envy: envy_0.9.8-0ubuntu13_all.deb.

    Reply

  37. @Coldwar55
    1) can you post the output of this command?
    glxinfo | grep direct

    2) can you send me your /usr/bin/compiz via email?

    Reply

  38. albertomilone,

    For some reason I got the window manager to work correctly now so compiz is enabled and seems to work however like everyone els is complaining, it is running rather sluggish. Choppy scrolling, etc.. . I’m guessing the fglrx driver isn’t completely ready for Compiz yet.

    If you wish I can still send you my Compiz file, however the only modification I’ve made was to add the “fglrx” to the WHITELISTED line.

    I running a Sapphire X1600 Pro AGP 256 MB Edition.

    Reply

  40. I thought so, due to the numerous complaints I have seen on the Ubuntu, OpenSUSE, Compiz and various other forums about sluggish performance.

    I just think it’s rather sad that my laptop with built in Intel Graphics is performing better than my desktop in the Graphics realm in Linux (In General).

    Thanks again for your help

    Reply

  41. Albert. Thanks again for keeping this great tool up-to-date. I just tried to use envy on an iMac with an x1600 ATI card (just used the GUI and chose install ATI). The driver seems to install just fine but enabling desktop effects results in a white screen. If I wait about a minute I am returned to a regular desktop and effects are set back to none. Any ideas?

    Also, fwiw, on a default install (I’m using gutsy) I cannot enable desktop effects. I get an error about “composite extension” not available (not sure the exact error at the moment).

    Thanks again.

    Reply

  42. Ciao Alberto,
    ho una Sapphire HD 2600XT ed ho provato il tuo tool. Non mi riconosce la scheda. Allora ho provato a forzare l’installazione ma quando faccio il reboot che avviene regolarmente (sento il suono del login eseguito ecc…) ma ottengo uno schermo nero.
    Soluzioni da consigliarmi ? (uso Ubuntu 7.10 e dal forum ufficiale non ne sono venuto fuori.)
    Grazie mille in anticipo.
    Davide

    Reply

  43. Ciao grandissimo alberto,
    quando aggiorni envy alla versione dei driver 7.11 che sono ansioso di provarli!!!!! : )

    Reply

  44. I am also experiencing the white screen problem after enabling the desktop effects.
    I am on a kubuntu gutsy 64bit and I have an ATI Mobility Radeon X700.

    Reply

  45. I am also getting the white screen when enabling the desktop effects, and when i browse the screensavers that come with ubuntu, it lags -badly- with my ati x850 XP platinum card. but my older nvidia 5600 card performs lagfree on my other computer. Starting GL Desktop also gives me the same white screen. Thanks, Toni Blixt

    Reply

  46. Alberto,

    Envy worked great on my new Gutsy upgrade, but I’m having the same problem Christophe was. I don’t think his last comment, #9 on this page, was ever answered, but lots of people seem to be having this problem. I have an nVidia 8600 GTS. Do you have any suggestions?

    Thanks for an otherwise great utility!

    Reply

  47. HI Alberto
    thank you for envy.

    will it install the new ATI 7.11 drivers for me?

    i use ATI X1400 mobile, so i still cant suspend/hibernate, Ati7.11 is supposed to fix that.

    londonartist(at)gmail.com

    Reply

  48. I’m also with the white screen as the people above have said before. I only see the login screen and then it all turns to white.
    I’ve been told to try envy since Ubuntu says “your hardware does not need any propietary drivers”, but I have a 1440×900 monitor and I cannot see it at that resolution. My graphic card is Ati radeon hd 2400 pro AGP.

    Reply

  49. @Emma
    boot in Recovery mode (from the GRUB menu) and type:
    envy –uninstall-all

    then type:
    reboot

    and boot as usual

    @londonartist
    sure

    @Peter
    Try to enable the Desktop effects, let Restricted Drivers Manager install the driver again, then (don’t reboot) use Envy again and finally reboot.

    Reply

  52. Thanks for all Alberto, envy is a very good package.

    I have a problem, and is that I’ve installed the ATI drivers from envy, and when I do fglrxinfo it says me that I have the mesa drivers. Is a strange thing because when I haven’t the ATI driver installed the maximun resolution I could reach on my sreen was 1280×1024 and hen I install the drivers 1680×1050 but I haven’t any graphic acceleration

    Reply

  54. thankyou, I’ll try it this afternoon. Finaly I’ve solved it desinstalling xserver-xorg-all like said in a how-to, but now I have little black rows on the rigth-down corner, so I want to try your solution

    Reply

  55. thank you very much!! you are the best!! I have tried it and it works!! and not only that, without black rows on the corner!! I am in debt with you!!

    Reply

  56. I too had the whitescreen problem after logging in.
    This happend after i installed the latest ati driver with envy.

    The following sollution worked for me (ati radeon 9800)
    http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=417161
    Do “lsmod | grep edac”. If you get output containing i82875p_edac and edac_mc, blacklist them:
    code:
    sudo gedit /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist

    add lines:
    blacklist i82875p_edac
    blacklist edac_mc

    Reply

  57. Great program, but I’m having one issue.

    I couldn’t get desktop effects to work on my Dell E1505 with an ATI Mobility x1400 card using the fglrx driver. I tried Envy, and it works, with one little issue; it cuts the screen in 1/2 and puts all kinds of garbage at the bottom. The mouse alignment is as if it is normal, so I have to run the mouse in the “garbage” area and watch the button in the top area until it highlights.

    Here’s a pic: http://www.plastikhosting.net/uploads/Natedogg/Screenshot.jpg

    Any ideas?

    Reply

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