It turns out to be a sensors related problem. Apparently you can't use any utility that periodically polls the sensors or the desktop freezes with powerplay messages sent to syslog.
The system is not completely frozen though, so if you're lucky you may manage to issue a poweroff command via the terminal to gracefully shut down.

Quoting: ShmerlAnd don't be dramatic about it. Nvidia is from far from perfect either. You simply exchange it to different type of issues.

No Shmerl, you can spin it any way you want and ofc Nvidia is not perfect, but the difference between AMD and them is night and day. A problem on Nvidia is very much the exception, whereas it’s the rule with AMD.

Quoting: damarrinNo Shmerl, you can spin it any way you want and ofc Nvidia is not perfect, but the difference between AMD and them is night and day.

Depends on the problem. Nvidia has a lot more money, but they only support limited Linux use cases. Fall outside use cases Nvidia care about, and you get zero support, despite all the money, no matter how you spin it. That's not an exception, it's a clear cut rule with them.

AMD has less money (so support takes longer), but they support all Linux use cases properly due to working with upstream. So I'd take AMD over Nvidia any day, but faster support would be of course appreciated.

Last edited by Shmerl on 1 Dec 2019 at 1:13 am UTC

Quoting: barottoIt turns out to be a sensors related problem. Apparently you can't use any utility that periodically polls the sensors or the desktop freezes with powerplay messages sent to syslog.

Yes, this bug has been an issue from the start, but it got somewhat better. Some fixes are still pending. If it will be still a problem in 5.5, it means something is still missing.

Last edited by Shmerl on 1 Dec 2019 at 1:12 am UTC

Quoting: Shmerl

Quoting: damarrinNo Shmerl, you can spin it any way you want and ofc Nvidia is not perfect, but the difference between AMD and them is night and day.

Depends on the problem. Nvidia has a lot more money, but they only support limited Linux use cases. Fall outside use cases Nvidia care about, and you get zero support, despite all the money, no matter how you spin it. That's not an exception, it's a clear cut rule with them.

AMD has less money (so support takes longer), but they support all Linux use cases properly due to working with upstream. So I'd take AMD over Nvidia any day, but faster support would be of course appreciated.

Well, they let me play some games on Linux and that’s really the only use case I care about and any others are really off topic as per this site’s name. AMD don’t let people play games on Linux.

Quoting: damarrinWell, they let me play some games on Linux and that’s really the only use case I care about and any others are really off topic as per this site’s name. AMD don’t let people play games on Linux.

That's all you might care about, but that's not every Linux use case, including not every gaming one. Issues from broken PRIME to lack of Wayland and XWayland support plagued Nvidia for years, and despite all the money they didn't bother doing much about it. As I said, as soon as it's outside of their limited interest - it's a complete wasteland of support. Just because you didn't encounter that, doesn't mean it's not a problem.

Last edited by Shmerl on 1 Dec 2019 at 9:08 am UTC

Shmerl, let's not continue this fairly pointless back and forth. I don't think I can say anything that'll convince you, or that you can say anything that'll convince me. We're all Linux brothers, regardless of the CPU, GPU or distro we use. From things you've written in the past I can see you're a sensible chap, I'll let you live in your all-is-dandy-in-AMD-land insanity bubble if you let me live in my la-la-la-nvidia-la-la-la insanity bubble, how about that?

Last edited by damarrin on 1 Dec 2019 at 9:27 am UTC

I guess bottom line is:
- Go AMD for a perfectly integrated Linux solution, but either wait a year after release of a new hardware generation or be prepared to invest considerable time into living on the edge with kernel RC's, mesa master etc.
- Go Nvidia if you want to use newest hardware but be prepared to restrict your use cases to what NVidia supports, thus e.g. just classic X and be ready for the occasional breaking when updating your system.

Both options have their own advantages, non is perfect, so best answer here: it depends on personal preference ;)

Quoting: damarrinShmerl, let's not continue this fairly pointless back and forth. I don't think I can say anything that'll convince you, or that you can say anything that'll convince me. We're all Linux brothers, regardless of the CPU, GPU or distro we use.

You're not really helping your case with claims like "AMD don’t let people play games on Linux". Please don't go around starting fires if you don't like the flames.

AMD's driver situation for their new hardware is far from perfect (on Windows as well I hear), but that obviously doesn't mean that AMD doesn't let us play our games on Linux.

I have a perfectly reasonable response to that, but I'm just going to stop posting now. Do note what thread we are in, though.

Quoting: damarrinI have a perfectly reasonable response to that, but I'm just going to stop posting now. Do note what thread we are in, though.

Yeah, and I get the frustration. I'd be frustrated as well if I bought hardware and it didn't work.

But my point was that your attitude seems very "us versus them" for someone who thinks we're all brothers. I wasn't really trying to start a conversation.

Quoting: Shmerl

Quoting: barottoIt turns out to be a sensors related problem. Apparently you can't use any utility that periodically polls the sensors or the desktop freezes with powerplay messages sent to syslog.

Yes, this bug has been an issue from the start, but it got somewhat better. Some fixes are still pending. If it will be still a problem in 5.5, it means something is still missing.

The curious thing is I went along using my desktop with just the nodma trick enabled, and everything was apparently fine. Then powerplay problems started after I made a system update, even if I locked my kernel version to v5.3.0-19, which gave me no problems before. This is when I tried v5.4.1, which did not resolve anything.
Maybe navi firmware files got updated? Does that make sense? Is it possible the problems are in the firmware rather than in the kernel? Or maybe it's both...

Quoting: jensI guess bottom line is:
- Go AMD for a perfectly integrated Linux solution, but either wait a year after release of a new hardware generation or be prepared to invest considerable time into living on the edge with kernel RC's, mesa master etc.
- Go Nvidia if you want to use newest hardware but be prepared to restrict your use cases to what NVidia supports, thus e.g. just classic X and be ready for the occasional breaking when updating your system.

Both options have their own advantages, non is perfect, so best answer here: it depends on personal preference ;)

I think this sums it up quite nicely.

Quoting: jensI guess bottom line is:
- Go AMD for a perfectly integrated Linux solution, but either wait a year after release of a new hardware generation or be prepared to invest considerable time into living on the edge with kernel RC's, mesa master etc.
- Go Nvidia if you want to use newest hardware but be prepared to restrict your use cases to what NVidia supports, thus e.g. just classic X and be ready for the occasional breaking when updating your system.

Pretty much, yes. I expect AMD to improve that, once their financial situation will improve as well. For instance, they can start providing upstream support more in advance, like Intel do, hire more developers for the Linux team to fix bugs faster, and so on.

However that's not the only criteria for the choice, at least for me. Nvidia not working properly with upstream due to stubborn refusal to open source and problems they cause to Nouveau is a big minus. And in contrast, reporting upstream issues to AMD and Mesa is a big plus for both users and developers. Not only AMD can work on those, but the likes of Valve and others can participate, thus we get radv, ACO and so on, which wouldn't have been even possible otherwise.

Last edited by Shmerl on 1 Dec 2019 at 6:13 pm UTC

Quoting: barottoThe curious thing is I went along using my desktop with just the nodma trick enabled, and everything was apparently fine. Then powerplay problems started after I made a system update, even if I locked my kernel version to v5.3.0-19, which gave me no problems before. This is when I tried v5.4.1, which did not resolve anything.
Maybe navi firmware files got updated? Does that make sense? Is it possible the problems are in the firmware rather than in the kernel? Or maybe it's both...

That's interesting, but if I understood it correctly, there was a race condition in powerplay, which was fixed in 5.4. So not sure why the problem still persisted for you with 5.4.1. For me it got fixed, but those messages still spam dmesg, so I disabled most amdgpu sensors meanwhile, except for temperature monitor in KDE plasmoid, which doesn't trigger it for me.

Last edited by Shmerl on 1 Dec 2019 at 7:00 pm UTC

Quoting: damarrinShmerl, let's not continue this fairly pointless back and forth. I don't think I can say anything that'll convince you, or that you can say anything that'll convince me. We're all Linux brothers, regardless of the CPU, GPU or distro we use. From things you've written in the past I can see you're a sensible chap, I'll let you live in your all-is-dandy-in-AMD-land insanity bubble if you let me live in my la-la-la-nvidia-la-la-la insanity bubble, how about that?

The point is not to bubble anything, but to explain objective issues. No solution is perfect.

WOw wish I knew this before buying an AMD for the first time in 15 years, I only read how awsome AMD now was in linux for the last few months. And ofc I bought a 5700 xt thinking since its been out for a while now the drivers would be rock solid. But now I read that they pretty mutch suck.

For a month or so it's actually pretty good, but you need to use cutting edge stack for it. And it's generally well known, that for using Mesa and AMD you are better off with rolling distros. If that's news for you, then good to learn it now :)

Last edited by Shmerl on 3 Dec 2019 at 4:26 pm UTC

Quoting: PangaeaThis is going *way* back, to when ATI existed and I had a Radeon 8500 card. Back then the drivers weren't exactly up to snuff either, and I remember we used an alternative called Omega or some such

Ah, that brings back memories…

Anyway, my switch back to AMD and its Ryzen CPU was a really rough ride. Recently, I even switched from nVidia back to an AMD graphics card and that seems to have made things even worse. No matter what I've tried, nothing has helped. I now have such an unstable and unreliable system that I consider it no longer fit for work. Heck, I even had to completely re-install my OS recently because the computer froze in the middle of a system update, breaking the whole system in the process.

I'm already thinking of ditching my whole Ryzen/RX570 setup for good and buying a completely new computer based on Intel/nVidia hardware.

Quoting: PlintslîchoNo matter what I've tried, nothing has helped. I now have such an unstable and unreliable system that I consider it no longer fit for work. Heck, I even had to completely re-install my OS recently because the computer froze in the middle of a system update, breaking the whole system in the process

Are you using first generation Ryzen by chance? They have hardware bugs. Also, what is your motherboard and RAM? Freezes and hangs often mean faulty hardware or bad UEFI configuration.

Regardless of components, it's a good idea after building a new system to run a RAM and CPU stresstest before starting using it for real work. No need to install anything for that, you can do it using a bootable image. That can help identify faulty hardware that requires an RMA. Running a new untested system can end up like you describe, which is not good especially if it causes some data loss.

Last edited by Shmerl on 5 Dec 2019 at 6:47 am UTC