Computation Errors for ATI GPU on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

Thanks for the reply AgentB.

amd-gpupro, as far as I can ascertain, will never support anything less than a 7000 series on Ubuntu 16.04. I can personally confirm that installing 16.30.3-315407 makes my system unusable (I cannot log on and the screen alternately flashes between two windows!). I had to figure out how to get into Ubuntu's version of safe mode and uninstall it there to recover.

So I installed Mesa OpenCl. Boinc now recognises the GPU's, clinfo gives info on both Cedar's saying they support OpenCL 1.2 etc. But the tasks gives Computation errors.

I suppose my question boils down to this: Do Einstein ATI GPU tasks need the amd-gpupro installed on Ubuntu 16.04 to work, or should they work with just the default ATI drivers that come with Ubuntu 16.04 and Mesa OpenCl installed as well ?

Thanks for the advice AgentB. I'm definitely going to look into options 1 and 2 but definitely not option 3: I like to try and get old hardware do new tricks !

Update.

Spurred on by some interesting possibilities suggested in:-

http://boinc.berkeley.edu/dev/forum_thread.php?id=11630

https://einsteinathome.org/content/older-radeonati-gpu-and-ubuntu-driver...

and taking up one of AgentB's suggestions above,

I decided to purchase a different card to see if I could get any hsgamma_FGRPB1G_1.18_x86_64-pc-linux-gnu__FGRPopencl1K-ati Work Units running, completed without error and validated using the mesa drivers.

New card DELL OEM ATI R7 350X.

Configuration 1:-
OS: Ubuntu 16.04.3 LTS;
Driver: Mesa 17.0.7, installed using 'sudo apt-get install mesa-opencl-icd';
Result: Failed, https://einsteinathome.org/task/685222947

Configuration 2:-
As Configuration 1 except: Driver: Updated with:-
'sudo add-apt-repository ppa:paulo-miguel-dias/pkppa'
'sudo apt-get update'
'sudo apt-get install libclc-amdgcn mesa-opencl-icd'
Rebooted;
Result: Success, https://einsteinathome.org/task/685499094

So I have now a working OS/Mesa Driver/ATI Card system.

Now I thought I would try adding the HD5450 and see if that would work:-

Configuration 3:-
As Configuration 2 but with HD5450 added and cc_config.xml excluding all other cards for Einstein except this one:-
Result: Failure, https://einsteinathome.org/task/686323828

I thought I would try replacing the HD5450 with a HD6450 and see if that would work:-

Configuration 4:-
As Configuration 3 but with HD6450 instead of HD5450 and cc_config.xml excluding all other cards for Einstein except this one:-
Result: Failure, https://einsteinathome.org/task/687353250

I thought I would try replacing the HD6450 with a R5 230 and see if that would work:-

Configuration 5:-
As Configuration 4 but with R5 230 instead of HD6450 and cc_config.xml excluding all other cards for Einstein except this one:-
Result: Failure, https://einsteinathome.org/task/687356130

So in conclusion the HD5450, HD6450 and R5 230 did not work with this configuration. But the error messages were unhelpful in diagnosing the problem to the untrained eye.

I know for a fact that both the HD6450 and R5 230 cards are successful at processing hsgamma_FGRPB1G_1.18_windows_x86_64__FGRPopencl1K-ati under Windows 10, e.g.

https://einsteinathome.org/task/685022931
so I thought I'd try the HD5450 in a windows machine and see what happen:-

Configuration 6:-
OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Professional x64 Edition, (10.00.14393.00);
Driver: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. OpenCL 1800.8 (VM);
Result: Failed, https://einsteinathome.org/task/687361804

However, the error message was a bit more helpful:-

line 24: error: work
group size exceeds the maximum default value for the selected device
__attribute__(( reqd_work_group_size( 16, 16, 1 ) ))

CLinfo gives the value of 'MAX WORK GROUP SIZE' of the HD5450 as '128', but that for the HD6450 and R5 230 as '256', so it would seem that, even if I could get Ubuntu Mesa to recognise the HD5450, the Einstein application requires at least a 'MAX WORK GROUP SIZE' of 256 (16*16*1) to run and would not work on this card anyway,

I am now going to see if I can get the HD6450 card working in Ubuntu Mesa, does any one know of a web page listing the details of what Mesa supports and does not support ?

regards,

Kevin.

Thanks for the reply Paulie.

Your explanation for the Ubuntu Mesa error messages for the HD5450, HD6450 and R5 230 seems reasonable but Christian Beer's message in https://einsteinathome.org/content/please-implement-gpu-test-fp64-support-sending-or-starting-wus suggests that the application should fall back on the CPU double precision when no Fp64 is found on the GPU. Hence, software emulation for double precision on the GPU should not be necessary. This CPU double precision 'fall back' within the application obviously works in the Windows version, otherwise I would not have had any successfully completed and validated work units. Is this implemented in the linux version ? If so, why does it not appear to 'kick in' on Ubuntu ?

regards,

Kevin.