Weird display problem with linux on a HD6670 based machine

[digit.sh]

Hi, I have been facing this weird graphics problem!!

My HD6670 based machine isn't working with whichever distro I try! The machine boots fine, lets me install linux from DVD/pendrive in graphical mode without problem. But when I restart boot into it from grub menu, it shows the login screen split into two parts with a black stripe in the middle. I can see the username password input boxes, and when I press enter to login, it just hangs in there, it never shows me the welcome screen To better understand this problem please see this

In short, the problem is, I can run any distro of linux with good 2d/3d acceleration in live mode from cd/dvd/pendrive, i can even install in graphical mode without any problem, but distros installed on hdd doesn't run, it just hangs at the point shown in the attached photo.

Any help is much appreciated! Anyone having this problem with HD6xxx series card?

P.S. Each and every distro i tried so far(mint-12,k/ubuntu12.04,fedora-17) all show exactly same problem. The photo was taken when i was trying to run kubuntu-12.04beta2 which just released(in hope that newer version of distros may not have this bug)

Update: I booted the machine in text mode and blacklist the radeon driver, the system boots up fine now, BUT, with VESA driver indeed. The split screen problem is gone. No 3d and 2d performance sucks!
Any help with how to make radeon driver work? This link says hd6670 should work fine with radeon driver even in Ubuntu 11.10 ! Whats happening with my machine!?

 

[doomgiver]

agreed, that is one f'd up display.
hmm, you are running compiz, yeah? (i do believe it handles all the fancy effects in gnome/kde)
if yes, try some other window manager.

try this for now, until the other members see this thread.

also, check your Xorg server.
and if possible, the drivers.

 

[dead.night7]

I'm new to linux, am using ubuntu. Even I had the similar problem yesterday. Had installed compiz-fusion and had fun with panes, But when I rebooted my pc and started running c++ commands in terminal (When zoomed) had boxes and non displayable characters, Even I have a sufficient rig that most of the time handles hardcore games perfectly... But I thought maybe it was a bug in Compiz,

Installed my graphics drivers now, and i'm up and running no issues now. maybe try to find if the graphic card has been detected or not and update all those drivers by the additional drivers. I have it in System>Administration>Additional Drivers; Thats it.. Try if it works for you?

 

[digit.sh]

Thanks doomgiver and dead.night7 for your reply

Tried averything you two said. Sadly nothing worked. Only options are to continue with VESA driver or to install AMD proprietary driver which I was never a fan of.

Hope future versions of OSS radeon driver will fix this issue.

 

[skeletor]

I'm using the OSS driver with my HD 6950. Works smoothly.

You can install Catalyst. It is fine lately.

 

[digit.sh]

Update:
Thought that recent latest version of oss radeon driver may fix this issue, to test, I installed the latest ChakraLinux and I am right, graphics worked smoothly. But , chakra provides a very small number of packages in their repo and its not compatible with Arch repo(though its a arch based distro). So I decided to install Arch and finally I did it!(did a netinstall). After a few initial hiccups, everything working perfectly now.

 

[mediator]

ATI drivers do install fine. You need to remove xorg.conf and reconfigure it back after installing the drivers.

Here's the correct procedure : Install ATI official drivers in Ubuntu Ubuntu Technical