Motherboard Woes - MSI RS482M-IL (ATI Radeon Xpress 200) with Linux
Published January 31st, 2006 in MiscellaneousI was recently looking for components to build my new home server. Hosting my blog and other development services like subversion on my laptop was quite restrictive and meant everything going offline when taking my laptop out of the house.
I went to the usual place I go, www.komplett.ie, to search for parts. I decided on a 64-bit low-cost solution and opted for a socket 754 AMD Sempron 2800+ (latest E6 edition with 64-bit capability). I had a bog standard 80GB IDE hard drive and a CD-RW drive already, so I just needed the CPU, a motherboard, RAM and chassis. As usual, the motherboard is the most crucial part of the system and is where the majority of issues with Linux systems will pop up. Going for cheap motherboards and expecting them to work out of the box with your favourite Linux distro is usually unrealistic and sometimes a bit of work is required to install or update drivers. That is why the advice is usually to go for a slightly older motherboard and as new a distro (and kernel) as possible. That usually gives you the best chance of direct or generic support for chipsets, vga, lan, ide, etc.
Choosing the MSI RS482M-IL, therefore was a calculated risk. It has a very new chipset, the ATI Radeon Xpress 200. The LAN chip is a Realtek 8139 based one. Usually, all I worry about when purchasing a motherboard for use on a Linux system is that I can get LAN to work - the Realtek 8139 series is well supported in the kernel - and the VGA - again ATI Radeon chipsets are usually well supported or older drivers often suffice. In the event of issues with either, there are usually workarounds and drivers can be compiled in the worst case scenario. What one does not expect is chronic problems with IDE and even the system clock.
Access to the hard drive was very bad. hdparm showed access times of just 1MB/s, instead of the 40 - 50MB/s one might expect. Even more bizarrely, the system clock was running exactly twice normal speed. I mean, for every 1 second of real time, 2 seconds would pass on the system clock. As I expected, I had no issues with LAN or VGA (an update for VGA was available from the ATI web-site and it worked very easily). The hard drive was nothing special, an IBM Deskstar I had used in some other systems and was in perfect working order. I had issues even with Windows XP trying to install to the same hard drive.
In addition to the above issues, I had to update the BIOS to recognise the new E6 type 64-bit Sempron. There is a kernel update (more of a hack really) in kernel 2.6.13 to address the system clock issue. I had no solution to the IDE access issue, and I tried CentOS 4 and Debian 3.1 without any luck. In the end I decided to abandon the motherboard in favour of another MSI board, the K8MM3-V. This was an altogether more reliable board. No IDE issues, no clock issues and the LAN worked straight away. VGA is running on a VESA driver and is of a poor quality at the moment. I have downloaded a driver from the VIA web-site designed specifically for the VIA chipset and I expect that to improve the VGA quality. I am now running my server on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 for AMD64 and if you can read this blog, then it is working well.
I’m afraid the bottom line is: do not get the MSI RS482M-IL or any other motherboard with the ATI Radeon Xpress 200 chipset.
23 Responses to “Motherboard Woes - MSI RS482M-IL (ATI Radeon Xpress 200) with Linux”
- 1 Pingback on Jun 20th, 2006 at 2:06 pm
I should also point out that I had serious problems also with sound on both Windows and Linux. On Linux, there was a massive interrupt load on the CPU, symptomatic I think of the IDE issue. There may have been a way of fixing the interrupt handling or whatever, but I am no expert in that area and the time that would take versus the cost of a cheap replacement didn’t add up.
As an aside to my post, I decided to go with Ubuntu 5.10 rather than SLES9. I decided that for what is not really a *critical* production server and is more focused on development, then a more bleeding edge Linux would suit. The inclusion of Kernel 2.6.12 also cured any driver issues I had, particularly the K8M800 Via chipset on my motherboard. VGA output is great.
I had grown to love Debian based distros anyway from my experience with Debian 3.0 on some old Cobalt Raq4 servers I decommissioned. Ubuntu seems to add a bit of style and panache to the sturdy if unglamorous plain Debian.
I was wondering if you tried this motherboard with a newer kernel (2.6.15) and Ati 8.21.7 drivers? I need a board with onboard video and I have to decide between ATI or Nvidia and both seem to have issues unless people that are having problems are using old software. I use Frugalware .4pre2 so i have the most up to date software etc. Finding reviews for motherboards that work well in Linux is just to difficult
In general Nvidia motherboards should be fine and supported out of the box by the latest kernel. However, I have had most success with Via motherboards.
The RS482M-IL board had no problem with the latest ATI driver, but that’s only for graphics. You won’t have a problem with LAN either. I also suspect that the system clock issue is fixed in 2.6.15. That really just leaves sound and IDE. You might have no issue with IDE, it might just have been an incompatability with my hard drive, though it is a not very new bulk hard drive which thousands of people use. I can’t say anything about whether sound will work.
I have not sent back the RS482M-IL board. I’m assuming that in a few months the latest distros will support it well and I will be able to build another Linux PC with it.
that 50% interrupt load u were having, there’s a fix for that (see my website) if u still want to use that board. (It has to do with a timer inturrupt, in older kernels u can disable apic to get rid of the problem (NOT acpi), in newerish kernels you can use a disable the timer pin that’s going crazy)
)
The chipset in this laptop is the same that powered that mobo, it’s actually not bad in linux (fedora core 4) (That is, the radeon xpress 200m is in my motherboard which I suspect is an awful lot like what’s in that board u have, just stripped down
The Ati Radeon Xpress works fine for me MSI RS-482M4-L
remeber since ATI xpress is mostly new you cant use a 3year old Distro
HDD transfer rates are fast
USB 2.0 the same
modules that should load
sata_sil (Silicon Image IDE and SATA chipsets) If you dont have this generic kicks in like any OS including Windows.
atixt (chipset and sensors)
RT 8319 (Ethernet is Realtek 8139 )
USB (EHCI OHCI 1.1 & 2.0)
sound (intel 8x compatible)
Graphics (just work.)
Temp Sensors work fine
The clock thing happens on mine too
runs for hours and suddenly counts 2 seconds at a time (from what i have discover either ACPI , Cool’N'Quiet, or anyother power management causes it)
notes
Mandriva 2006
clock ran fast from imediate from boot eventually reaching speeds of 15seconds per second 2.6.13
Install Disc idenfifies and installs open source ATI drivers incorrectly
ATI Proprietry installed and ran OpenGL fine
Suse 10.0
takes 4-12hours for clock to start acting up if at all 2.6.14
Suse install Disc leave Video card almost fully functional xv and video players work (No opengl)
ATI Proprietry install does not work at all i have never ever got openGL to work in SUse10.0 no matter what tricks i play.
Found your blog via google. I’m having the exact 1-2MB/s access issue for my IDE drives on this motherboard. I have updated the bios and tried every bio combo I can think of that can affect performance and even swapped hard drives.
Linux distro: Centos 4.2 32bit and 64bit.
Now here is the fix:
Use Linux 2.6.15 series kernel.
I tried the latest Dapper Drake Ubuntu beta distro with 2.6.15 kernel and everything is fine. Memory read operation is now twice as fast, back to normal, and IDE read/write speed is also back to normal/expected range. Joy! Don’t have to waste a trip to return the item.
Conclusion: There are severe driver issues with pre-2.6.15 kernels and this motherboard’s chipset.
Hope this helps.
Xing
Thanks for the replies. I still have the motherboard lying around. I’ll make sure it does not go to waste. Dapper Drake sounds like a winner for the board. I’ll wait for the official release in April and decide then whether to build another server or PC using the board.
I’m having the same problems with the RS482M-IL with Ubuntu Breezy. My clock is super fast. It’s about 4-5s per real second. I bought this board for mythtv since it comes with an svideo and composite out which work great with the latest ati drivers. However, my mythtv skips which I suspect is an IDE problem. I was running a raid 0 with two brand new seagates which didn’t make sense. I will try Dapper to see what happens. Also tried non raid and still had the problem. My hdparm -t gives:
/dev/hda:
Timing buffered disk reads: 26 MB in 3.18 seconds = 8.18 MB/sec
which seems really slow. If Dapper doesn’t work can anyone recommend a socket 754 board with an integrated TV out?
Thanks,
Matt
I have the same motherboard. I had some issues with it - particularly finding a distro that would support it
Debian Sarge wouldn’t see my SATA Drive, Ubuntu Breezy had the double clock rate bug - fixed by installing a new kernel. Then I installed Kanotix and updated it with the latest Debian Unstable packages and it works just fine. The clock was OK even on 2.6.14, same thing with sound. I used the Kanotix fglrx-install script to install the fglrx ATI proprietrary driver and get OpenGL support. No problems with HDD either, though as I said it’s a SATA drive so maybe that’s why. Just yesterday I upgraded udev (which stopped working, complaining about the kernel being too old), then installed 2.6.16 kernel, which eventually fixed a bug with HAL preventing KDE from recognizing mounted devices, so now I can click on my pretty CD and pendrive icons and have them open ;D
The only thing I can’t get working is ACPI suspend/standby, from what I found with Google I assume that people are usually very happy if they have as much working hardware as I do and don’t even dream about ACPI sleep (or just don’t need it on a desktop system, but I want it since my family complains about the energy bill ;] )
I’ve been fighting it for two days and discovered that feeding the kernel with “acpi=noirq” makes the system wake up from standby (ACPI S1) *without hanging* (S3 still hangs - more incompatibilities), but also brings back the infamous CPU clock bug, AND prevents the system from rebooting cleanly (it hangs up at the end.). When I give it both “acpi=noirq” and “noapic” it’s just like I didn’t do anything - clock OK, hangs at standby/wake. I have yet to try the clock pin trick.
Did anyone succeed to make ACPI (particularly S3) work with this mobo?
I’m considering buying this mobo for a linux box although many think it’s not a good idea.
But from what I see using a recent kernel and the last ATI drivers make this mobo work under Linux almost 100%. Have anyone tried Dapper? That’s what I will be installing on it and would be nice to know if anyone tried it?
Larkin have you tried it?, (saw you did it on your laptop, so what about with this mobo…..=)
Should I bought this or go for a K8MM3-V ?
I have an RS482-M, works fine under gentoo linux
I had all these issues you describe with a 32-bit mode kernel, the fast clock, kernel panics on boot - they all went away when I installed a 64-bit kernel - Works perfectly under 2.6.14-gentoo-r2 (aside from some cryptic APIC error on CPU0: 40(40))
Doesn’t work with a lot of 32-bit livecds, couldn’t get Kororaa to run, but otherwise works great. Even got Xgl running, but its kind of slow on the integrated graphics (compared to my Radeon 9700 Pro at least)
The only kernel option I have is no_timer_check (I don’t remember why)
It certainly isn’t the best for linux, but I bought it really cheap at Fry’s bundled with a 3200 processor, so no complaints
If you’re considering it I suggest you buy something else, unless you’re feeling really brave (I wasted a lot of hours getting it to work perfectly)
Heh. I am currently workin on a Compaq Presario laptop with XPRESS 200M board. However I did have the same clock problem with my gentoo linux (it got solved with a new kernel), I am satisfied with the chipset. Everything works just fine.
Oh, I had a small struggle with ati-drivers. Ati isn’t very linux-oriented :/
Anyway - I recently got suspend2 kernel working, with acpi (power button hibernates).
gar!,
I want to smash this motherboard into little bits. I’ve always been a nvidia man and I remember why.
I am greeted with a hard system lock when I try to switch consoles or log out of the current X session.
I’m going to try the x64 kernel.
Kernal: 2.6.15-23-386
CPU: AMD Sempron(tm) Processor 3000
MB: RS482M-IL
Well, just to let you know. I finally bought thie mobo and installed Ubuntu on it. Till now It works fine with no clock problems, video is working great, also sound.
I have not test yet ACPI, but will try soon.
Until now I have not experienced the problems everyone here describes, I hope it stays like this
I have a few more experiences from that card which I posted to comp.os.linux.hardware
In a message I wrote this:
> I’m thinking about building a small computer and the MSI RS482M4-ILD seems
> nice on paper as it is m-ATX and has built in graphics with DVI out.
> However, all computers that I have built before has had intel motherboard
> chipsets so this Radeon motherboard chipset is unfamiliar to me. A few
> questions:
I ended up buing this board anyway and now I am able to answer my own
questions as I have installed Slackware 10.2 on the box.
> Will IDE dma work with kernel 2.4.31?
No, DMA didn’t work with the PATA HD or the PATA DVD -RW with 2.4.31.
> Does it work with a 2.6 kernel?
Yes, DMA did work both for HD and DVD with 2.6.13 which was included as
test26.s in the testing directory with Slackware.
> Is DRI supported by the opensource drivers in X.org? According to
> http://ftp.x.org/pub/X11R7.0/doc/html/radeon.4.html it seems to work, but
> I have seen other pages saying that it is untested. Will the DVI port work
> with the opensource drivers? At least with earlier versions of X.org I
> have had problems to get the DVI port to work with Radeon 9250 cards.
Maybe DRI does work with a more up to date X.org. I don’t know. Slackware
10.2 include X.org 6.8.2 and that ATI driver does not work at all. Instead
I am now using the vesa driver. One day I might upgrade X.org…
> Does the built in sound work fine with ALSA?
No, so far I have not been able to get any sounds from this machine. The
alsa modules are loaded, alsamixer works and all channels are unmuted
except the PCM channel which does not seem possible to mute. However I
have not yet been able to get any sounds from the built in sound card.
> I suppose that the built in USB and firewire ports work?
I can confirm that the USB ports work, but I haven’t tried firewire. I can
only see that firewire modules get loaded.
It was rather problematic to get the machine working. At first the network
and the DVD refused to work, probably because they couldn’t agree if an
IRQ was shared and if it should be flank or level trigged. “pci=noacpi”
cured this problem. The network chipset really seems unable to share IRQ
with anything else. When the only com-port was set to COM1: (ttyS0) with
IRQ 4 the network which shared that interrupt died again. The only com
port had to be configured as COM2: (ttyS1).
At the moment, I would not recomend this card to anyone else. Maybe it
will work better in a few years when drivers have matured. But by then the
card will probably no longer be on the market.
regards Henrik
I’ve just finished resolving primary issues with my ECS Elite Group RS482-M (ATI Xpress 200) mobo. Some hints were picked from various places in the web, including this blog.
Hope this can be useful for other folks:
http://www.izmiran.ru/~osin/slackware/ati
I just installed SuSE 10.1 (64 bit) on that board without a hitch. Works like a charm. Hd transfer rate is at 65MB/s. SuSE rocks (as always)
Everything works fine on Ubuntu Edgy Eft 6.10. Will try TV-out, report back.
Hi,
I just installed debian sarge (32 bits) on ECS Elite Group RS482-M and I have a lot of error with USB
“ohci_hcd 0000:00:13.0: Unlink after no-IRQ? Controller is probably using the wrong IRQ”.
Does anyone can tell how configure BIOS for resolve this problem?
Thanks a lot.
Takodz
I’ve been running Fedora 6 on an ECS 482-M for several months, upgraded from FC-5. Both worked fine. I have not experienced the slow HD performance (33-66MB/s depending on IDE drive). However, I am experiencing occasional (all-too frequent) “white-screen-of-death” lockups. Typically, the screen goes all white, and the machine is completely unresponsive. Is anyone else experiencing this phenomenon?
I am not sure whether this will work. I have problem with displaying grahic under Mandrake 9.2 and was searching around in the internet. Here are something I found on the search. Hope it will help.
https://a248.e.akamai.net/f/674/9206/0/www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/ati-driver-installer-8-01-x86.x86_64.run
http://ati.amd.com/support/drivers/linux/linux-radeon.html
http://odin.prohosting.com/wedge01/gentoo-radeon-faq.html