xorg Radeon driver HOWTO

Requirements

1. Check the HCL to see which driver supports your card

Doing the work

Blank Screen with ATI graphics card?

1. Owners of certain ATI graphics cards (or built-in chipsets) may have difficulty getting an X server running using the xorg radeon driver (as opposed to the proprietary fglrx driver). The solution is quite simple, and involves editing the xorg configuration file, as follows:

su -c vi /etc/X11/xorg.conf

2. Locate the line:

Section "Module"

3. And add the following underneath:

   Load   "ddc"

4. Then locate the line:

Section "Monitor"

5. And comment out (place a # symbol at the beginning of) any lines which start with:

HorizSync
VertRefresh
ModeLine
Option "DPMS"

6. Then locate the line:

Section "Device"

7. Ensure that the driver is "radeon" thus:

Driver   "radeon"

8. And add the following options:

   Option   "MonitorLayout" "LVDS,AUTO"
   Option   "MergedXinerama" "false"
   Option   "MergedFB" "false"

9. Save and exit.

Note: For those unfamiliar with vi (vim), here are the essential keyboard shortcuts:

<ins> = insert text (i.e. - start editing)


Cursor keys = navigate (also <pg-up> and <pg-dn>)

<esc> = stop editing

: = enter command mode


w = write file

q = quit

10. So to save and exit vi, you would type:

<esc> :wq <enter>

11. Now your xorg.conf has been changed, you can try to start X thus:

startx

More Information

Disclaimer

Added Reading 

• http://rpm.livna.org/livna-switcher.html
• http://fedora.redhat.com/docs/yum/ 
  
• http://linux.duke.edu/projects/yum/
  
• http://rpm.livna.org/configuration.html
• http://apps.ati.com/linuxDfeedback/index.asp
•  https://launchpad.net/distros/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-ati/+bug/22985