New Drivers and BIOS Plans for ATI Graphics Cards
It was good news across the board for ATI graphics card owners with AMD deciding to go for a free driver and immediately delivering the goods. Now the proprietary Linux driver, Fglrx 8.42.3, has been released, and it promises various improvements.
The new ATI graphics driver supports Compiz, Beryl and Compiz Fusion with or without XGL. The driver has new code for AIGLX support. It uses the X.org server up to version 1.4. Thanks to the TexturedVideo playback feature Fglrx 8.42.3 is said to have vastly improved video support on top of generally improved performance.
But there’s one thing the driver can’t do: it doesn’t support the current 2.6.23 Linux kernel, although an update promises to close the gap. The current release is available for the R300 through R600 series cards, but doesn’t support ATI’s FireGL models. The driver installer and release notes for Fglrx 8.42.3 are available for downloading from the ATI support pages.
Developer Oliver McFadden published plans hack the ATI graphics card BIOS in his blog: “I've been thinking about doing some reverse engineering of AtomBIOS, the BIOS used on newer Radeon cards; R500, R600, etc. Ultimately I'd like to create a free software (GPL) replacement BIOS for at least one Radeon card .” The aim is to improve ATI card performance on Linux. If he’s successful, McFadden will be releasing the BIOS under the GPL.
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
Kali Linux 2025.3 Released with New Hacking Tools
If you're a Kali Linux fan, you'll be glad to know that the third release of this famous pen-testing distribution is now available with updates for key components.
-
Zorin OS 18 Beta Available for Testing
The latest release from the team behind Zorin OS is ready for public testing, and it includes plenty of improvements to make it more powerful, user-friendly, and productive.
-
Fedora Linux 43 Beta Now Available for Testing
Fedora Linux 43 Beta ships with Gnome 49 and KDE Plasma 6.4 (and other goodies).
-
USB4 Maintainer Leaves Intel
Michael Jamet, one of the primary maintainers of USB4 and Thunderbolt drivers, has left Intel, leaving a gaping hole for the Linux community to deal with.
-
Budgie 10.9.3 Now Available
The latest version of this elegant and configurable Linux desktop aligns with changes in Gnome 49.
-
KDE Linux Alpha Available for Daring Users
It's official, KDE Linux has arrived, but it's not quite ready for prime time.
-
AMD Initiates Graphics Driver Updates for Linux Kernel 6.18
This new AMD update focuses on power management, display handling, and hardware support for Radeon GPUs.
-
AerynOS Alpha Release Available
With a choice of several desktop environments, AerynOS 2025.08 is almost ready to be your next operating system.
-
AUR Repository Still Under DDoS Attack
Arch User Repository continues to be under a DDoS attack that has been going on for more than two weeks.
-
RingReaper Malware Poses Danger to Linux Systems
A new kind of malware exploits modern Linux kernels for I/O operations.