Re: drm changes and updating to 12.0

On 11/4/18 8:29 PM, Robert Huff wrote:
> 
> 	I have a set of older machines (e.g. AMD Phenom II, Radeon HD3300
> gpu) which will be updated from 11.<smallnum> to 12.0 once 12 is out
> and the initial round of bugs are squashed.
> 	One system is being done now, to allow time to catch any major
> problems and then plan the update process.
> 	Looking at src/UPDATING, the only thing I don't understand is the
> whole drm-kmod change.  Is there an authoritative write-up on what's
> going on, how to choose the right drivers for my hardware, and how to
> do this from source without forcing a fresh install?
> 

We are working on better documentation for this, but the main highlights 
are:  In most cases graphics/drm-kmod should suffice, especially on 
somewhat modern hardware.  You can also install any of the drm-*-kmod 
ports directly, if you want a specific version.  In general graphics 
hardware older than from 2013 requires drm-legacy-kmod instead. 
drm-kmod will also install drm-legacy-kmod on i386.

The same drivers in drm-legacy-kmod is also available in base on 12, so 
you can use the base drivers.  This is deprecated however, and not the 
case for 13-CURRENT.

You can install the drivers either from pkg, if you are using the 
GENERIC kernel, or build from ports if you have a customized kernel or 
if you are tracking for instance 12-STABLE or 13-CURRENT.

If you are using drm-legacy-kmod or the base driver with AMD graphics 
cards you might also need to install xf86-video-ati-legacy rather than 
xf86-video-ati.

Regards
-- 
Niclas Zeising