[Desktop] Old graphics card/driver issue

[Jeremy_Ray]

I've installed 25.04 on an ancient computer. Had to upgrade to get a current internet browser. The problem I have is, I was able to run Blender 4.0 and, I think, 4.2 fine on this hardware with an older version of OpenSUSE, but trying to run 4.0 under 25.04 gives this error message -

your graphic card or driver is not supported.

Newer graphics drivers may be available to improve Blender support.

Graphics card:

Mesa MAD BARTS (DRM 2.50.0 /6.14.0-22-generic, LLVM 19.1.7) 4.5 (Core Profile) Mesa 25.0.3-1ubuntu2

The program will now close

I can get Blender 2.7 to run, but it renders with all kinds of artifacts and errors that make it unuseable.

How can I make this set up functional again?

[claydoh]

Had to upgrade to get a current internet browser.

Odd. Firefox will be the latest version no matter which *buntu release one has no matter how one has it installed -- stock Snap, Mozilla deb, or from a tarball. At least once one has updated post-install.
Same for Chrome or most all other manually installed browsers out there.

your graphic card or driver is not supported.

Can you tell us what hardware you have? You can collect the basic specs using Info Center or "About this System" in System Settings.

There is also a Driver Manager in System Settings that might offer non-free drivers, if available or needed.

[Jeremy_Ray]

I told you this stuff was ancient, right? No laughing . . .

[Jeremy_Ray]

The Driver Manager says "no additional drivers are available."

[Snowhog]

Ancient is an understatement!

The AMD Barts graphics processor, which powers the Radeon HD 6800 series, was introduced on October 22, 2010. Specifically, the Radeon HD 6850 and 6870 were released on this date according to TechPowerUp.


AI Overview

Based on the provided search results, here's an overview of the compatibility of the AMD Barts graphics processor (found in the Radeon HD 6000 series, e.g., HD 6850
) with modern Linux kernels:

• Limited/Legacy Support: The Barts GPU is based on AMD's TeraScale 2 architecture, which is an older architecture compared to the Graphics Core Next (GCN) series that the driver is designed for. Therefore, AMD doesn't have official plans to support these older GPUs with their modern driver.
• Open-Source Drivers: You would likely need to rely on the open-source ATI driver (often referred to as the driver) for this graphics card.
• "Terakan" Vulkan Driver: There has been development on a community-driven open-source Vulkan driver called "Terakan" for these pre-GCN GPUs, including the HD 6000 series. This suggests some level of ongoing effort to enable modern graphics APIs on older hardware, although it's not official AMD support.
• Legacy Software Support: AMD has moved these older graphics products to a legacy support model, meaning they have reached the end of their planned driver releases. You might find information about the final available drivers on their support pages, but they will not be updated for the latest kernel releases or Linux distributions.

In summary: While AMD generally works with Linux kernel developers to provide support for their hardware via the driver, this driver is not designed for older architectures like Barts. You would likely use the older open-source driver for basic functionality. For modern features like Vulkan, the community-driven "Terakan" driver is an option, but it's important to remember that these older GPUs are no longer actively supported by AMD with their latest drivers.

[Jeremy_Ray]

Ancient is an understatement!

The AMD Barts graphics processor, which powers the Radeon HD 6800 series, was introduced on October 22, 2010. Specifically, the Radeon HD 6850 and 6870 were released on this date according to TechPowerUp.


AI Overview

Based on the provided search results, here's an overview of the compatibility of the AMD Barts graphics processor (found in the Radeon HD 6000 series, e.g., HD 6850
) with modern Linux kernels:

• Limited/Legacy Support: The Barts GPU is based on AMD's TeraScale 2 architecture, which is an older architecture compared to the Graphics Core Next (GCN) series that the driver is designed for. Therefore, AMD doesn't have official plans to support these older GPUs with their modern driver.
• Open-Source Drivers: You would likely need to rely on the open-source ATI driver (often referred to as the driver) for this graphics card.
• "Terakan" Vulkan Driver: There has been development on a community-driven open-source Vulkan driver called "Terakan" for these pre-GCN GPUs, including the HD 6000 series. This suggests some level of ongoing effort to enable modern graphics APIs on older hardware, although it's not official AMD support.
• Legacy Software Support: AMD has moved these older graphics products to a legacy support model, meaning they have reached the end of their planned driver releases. You might find information about the final available drivers on their support pages, but they will not be updated for the latest kernel releases or Linux distributions.

In summary: While AMD generally works with Linux kernel developers to provide support for their hardware via the driver, this driver is not designed for older architectures like Barts. You would likely use the older open-source driver for basic functionality. For modern features like Vulkan, the community-driven "Terakan" driver is an option, but it's important to remember that these older GPUs are no longer actively supported by AMD with their latest drivers.

I'd gladly replace the video card, if I knew what would be compatible with the equally ancient Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 motherboard. There's probably something 10X as powerful that costs $30 now.

As far as drivers go, what was wrong with, like, every other driver I've used up to this point, in multiple flavors of Linux? I can see the latest version of Blender needing the latest version of OpenGL, but I'm fine with running Blender 4.0 on this machine.

I know this is an old soldier, but it still does most of what I need doing.

[Snowhog]

Per your image in post #3, you are using Wayland as the Graphics Platform. Have you tried switching to X11 on the SDDM Login screen? It would be informative (I think) to know if X11 fares better, worse, or the same, as in Wayland.