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How to Downgrade Graphics Drivers on Ubuntu Mate 18.04

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WTRIX

I have an old 32bit(i386) machine with those Intel Pentium P6100*2 CPU's and integrated HD graphics (it's of great sentimental value). It's internal display is fried so it's hooked to a TV monitor via HDMI. Everything worked smoothly on Ubuntu 14.04 but the OS was a little too outdated to integrate with other modern devices in my home so I upgraded it to Ubuntu 16.04, and there my problem began.

The graphics drivers aren't working. I've had to drop the default 1920x1080 resolution to 1280x720 to stop the screen from blinking on & off. Still, videos are sluggish on YouTube even at 360p (and only get worse at higher settings). Here's the original thread

I've since upgraded to Ubuntu Mate 18.04 but the driver issue persists. I've done some digging around and found that I have the default OpenGL version string: 2.1 Mesa 20.0.8 installed. I've even played around with some PPA's to find custom intel drivers but no luck yet. I need to install some old drivers, where could I find them?

I've read of the old xorg packages but apparently those would crash a new Ubuntu release. Ubuntu's intel drivers are kernel modules and any packages that conflict with the kernel would be troublesome. I'm looking for something a little more detached such as proprietary drivers would be.

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guiverc avatar
cn flag
guiverc
Are you aware that *flavors* of Ubuntu only come with three years of supported life (five years applies to Ubuntu Desktop, Ubuntu Server but not flavors), so you're asking about a release that only days ago reached it's EOL. (https://fridge.ubuntu.com/2020/08/14/ubuntu-18-04-5-lts-released/ or a UWN - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuWeeklyNewsletter/Issue681#Lubuntu_18.04_LTS_End_of_Life_and_Current_Support_Statuses highlights the EOL notices for Lubuntu/Ubuntu-MATE/Kubuntu/Ubuntu-Budgie. See https://ubuntu-mate.community/t/ubuntu-mate-18-04-lts-reaches-end-of-life/23966/7
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guiverc avatar
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guiverc
Drivers are actually kernel modules; so are linked with what kernel stack you've chosen to use. I have some old devices that were fine with GA kernel of 18.04 (thus are still good), but didn't like the HWE stack once it *bumped* from 5.3 to 5.4... the easy fix for those was to revert to using the GA kernel stack & thus use the older kernel modules (ie. *drivers). You didn't provide your stack details - are you using GA or HWE? If using the HWE you can switch to GA and thus use the older stack (kernel modules for older kernel thus older *drivers*)
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WTRIX avatar
cn flag
WTRIX
Sounds like sonar to a dolphin! I ran the uname -r command and found that I'm running the 5.4.0-77-generic version. I don't know if that indicates the kernel stack as well.
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WTRIX
"The 18.04.2 and newer point releases will ship with an updated kernel and X stack by default for the desktop. Server installations will default to the GA kernel and provide the enablement kernel as optional." I've installed and updated 18.04.05 Desktop, so I assume it's an HWE stack, not GA. The wiki only provides the command to update HWE: sudo apt-get install --install-recommends linux-generic-hwe-18.04 xserver-xorg-hwe-18.04 . The same goes for 16.04 which is when my problem began, so I really think this GA fix will work for me.
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guiverc avatar
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guiverc
A 18.04 system using GA and HWE fully-upgraded will report as 18.04.5 (the current level, and is expected to remain current level for life of product, but you never know, 16.04 reached 16.04.7 before it was end-of-standard-support). What kernel are you using? If you're using 4.15 then you're using the GA stack, at 18.04.5 the HWE stack will be 5.4 kernel, ie. `uname -r` will tell you the kernel & thus stack you're using (or you could look at packages too; both can be installed and chosen at boot so `uname` is good at which you're using; package for what's installed)
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guiverc avatar
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guiverc
The wiki page (there are a number) does say how to downgrade - it's very prominent on one page as Ubuntu 20.04 LTS Desktop defaults to HWE, thus the switching to GA from HWE is prominent in that page - you didn't say which page you looked at, but there are multiple. https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Kernel/LTSEnablementStack
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guiverc avatar
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guiverc
Sorry I missed where you'd reported you're using 5.4 kernel (additional details are usually best added to question) - but yes that means you're using the HWE kernel stack (18.04 & 18.04.1 were 4.15, 18.04.2 was 4.18, 18.04.3 was 5.0, 18.04.4 was 5.3, 18.04.5 was 5.4 with HWE, 4.15 for all if using GA) Refer prior comment
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WTRIX avatar
cn flag
WTRIX
That really helped me out. It's not the complete fix I was looking for, after downgrading to GA the issue remained the same. However, I think the GA kernel stack allowed me to run this line without any errors: sudo apt-get install -y xserver-xorg-video-all. After rebooting I could run a 1080p game trailer on YouTube with very little lag. I should probably attempt an older xorg package (if it exists) but I've thrown in enough time for now. It also seems that videos are slightly interrupted when there's page activity, so I was thinking the compositor might be involved as well (discovered today).
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