nouveau drivers supported? kernel dependent? [Solved]

[urlwolf]

when I upgrade kernel, I have to install matching nvidia-proprietary drivers. Is this the case for nouveau? Are they kernel-dependent?

I know nvidia-proprietary drivers are better for 3d and one of the main attractions of sabayon is that OOTB nvidia-proprietary drivers work. I don't care about 3d and I'm trying to debug my daily X crashes (filed a bug, posted dozens of logs, nobody knows why this happens!) so I'm trying nouveau. But not a good idea if they are unsupported/old/ignored... are they supported in Sabayon?

Thanks!

[wolfden]

try checking the package manager?

http://packages.sabayon.org/quicksearch ... au&x=0&y=0

[urlwolf]

I know they are there... it just that it's not trivial to get them to work. Just installing the package will not do. My notes:

How to get nouveau to work
1- remove module nvidia in /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

...
blacklist nvidia
-------
Now edit your /etc/X11/xorg.conf to use the nouveau driver:

Change in Section "Device" the Driver line to Driver "nouveau"

* The minimal xorg.conf file, which you should try, if you encounter any problems, is:

Section "Device"
Identifier "n"
Driver "nouveau"
EndSection

------
to check if nvidia is working do lsmod. should not be there.
Then nouveau should load fine automatically on next reboot. To test it now, first make sure nvidia is no longer loaded

# rmmod nvidia

Now load nouveau

# modprobe nouveau

And check that it loaded fine by looking at kernel messages

$ dmesg

Marking as solved...

[wolfden]

that's pretty much same routine for any x driver

[urlwolf]

argh, I still get constant X crashes with nouveau. I have no idea what to try next...

[micia]

Uhmmm, what do you mean by X Crashes?

Is there any useful information in /var/log/messages or /var/log/Xorg.0.log?
How do you experience the crash?

[urlwolf]

The bug that has kept me awake till 5AM is here.

It happens by itself, I wake up to a gdm prompt when there was a full session the night before.
It also happens when working, but never repeatably, e.g. open libreoffice BOOM. blank screen, then gdm prompt.

Tried different window managers, now different nvidia drivers, different kernels (from .34 to .38). It's always there, in both laptop and desktop (!). Maybe software has something to do with it? I use xflux, which may be doing something to all X windows... no idea...