Iris Pro P6300 intel X11 driver (was Re: intro)

[Tom Rushworth]

Hi All,

Before I get to the real content, a list etiquette question - should I 
top/interleave/bottom post, and should I trim?  Does the list care?

Problem summary: new machine with Intel Iris Pro P6300 graphics, FreeBSD 
11 runs in console mode but I can't get an X server running.

This is just a partial update on the issue, I haven't had time to finish 
all the suggestions.

Suggestion 1 - try FreeBSD 12
I spent a day and installed head as of 2017/10/15 (or thereabouts) but 
it doesn't work out of the box (the console works, just not the X server 
with the intel driver or any other default driver).  I have lots more 
digging to do with it to make sure I really do have the latest, and that 
the configuration is correct, so this is ongoing.

Suggestion 2 - try TrueOS
I downloaded the USB stick image.  There doesn't seem to be a 'live' 
option in that image (at least I couldn't find it with a few minutes of 
poking around), and the installer does not use the intel driver, so I 
hunted down another drive for the machine and did a full install. 
Configuring the video driver to be intel during the install does give a 
working X server, and checking the XOrg.log file confirms that the intel 
driver is the one being used.

So now I either have to learn to like TrueOS and Lumina, or figure out 
where my source version or configuration is wrong for the FreeBSD-12 
setup :).  I'm probably going to do a bit of both.

The good news is that there is a working intel driver for the Iris Pro 
P6300.

Thanks for the help and suggestions - I'll update again if I figure out 
the plain FreeBSD-12 setup.

On 10/10/2017 15:28, Paul Pathiakis via freebsd-x11 wrote:
> +1 on TrueOS.... they are doing a fine job.  It's on my gf (50+) desktop
> and her mother's (80+) desktop... for the last 5 years.... They LOVE IT!!!
>
> P
>
>
> On 10/10/2017 16:51, Pete Wright wrote:
>>
>>
>> On 10/10/2017 13:29, Tom Rushworth wrote:
>>> Hi All,
>>>
>>> A few quick words to say where I'm coming from:
>>>
>>> I'm a long time C programmer, mostly userland, but I have done some
>>> kernel work.  I was doing Linux USB drivers in the early 2000's, and
>>> I tinkered with the NetBSD serial driver way back when serial ports
>>> were actually useful.  I wrote my first serious C program in the late
>>> 1970s.
>>>
>>> I'm a FreeBSD desktop user, driven out of MacOS by the marketroids,
>>> and driven out of Linux by systemd :).
>>>
>>> I recently purchased a new desktop machine that turns out to have an
>>> Intel Iris Pro P6300 (Broadwell GT3e) graphics system. It came with
>>> Linux Mint 18.1 Cinnamon, which manages the screen very nicely, so
>>> the Linux driver is good enough.  I ran into issues with ssh within
>>> hours of starting up, and I'm just not interested in digging through
>>> yet another (foolish) system administration issue involving systemd
>>> to sort it out.
>>>
>>> I tried FreeBSD 11.1, but the i915 driver there isn't quite up to the
>>> job.  I've looked at the various FreeBSD i915 websites and
>>> discussions, but can't easily sort out where the current focus is.
>>>
>>> What I'd like from the list is advice on where to start :).  I'm
>>> willing to test pre-built stuff, or build it myself, or even work on
>>> the code, but everything I looked at seemed to have ground to a halt
>>> about a year ago.
>>>
>>> So, where to begin?
>>
>> I'd suggest taking a look at TrueOS to see if the updated i915 support
>> in there offers you a better X experience.
>>
>> https://www.trueos.org/
>>
>> TrueOS is FreeBSD with some nice prebuilt additions for desktops and
>> laptops.  They even have a live image that should allow you to verify
>> X is working as expected before you install it.
>>
>> If you are wanting to run vanilla FreeBSD and don't mind periodic
>> instability you can also run 12-CURRENT and install the
>> "drm-next-kmod" pkg.  Although depending on how much time you want to
>> put into hacking on things TrueOS may be an easier entry point for you.
>>
>> HTH!
>> -pete
>>
>
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Regards,

-- 
Tom Rushworth