Steam flickers on Linux on a Chromebook (GalliumOs)

steamclosed Distro Family: Ubuntu

ValveSoftware/steam-for-linux#7422 · opened 2020-10-20 by danielristic · updated 2023-09-08 · 8 comments · github

Ddanielristic 2020-10-20 github

Your system information

Steam client version (build number or date): built Oct 7 2020
Distribution (e.g. Ubuntu): GalliumOS 3.1
Opted into Steam client beta?: No
Have you checked for system updates?: Yes

Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:

Any game flickers regardless of the video settings.

Steps for reproducing this issue:

Launch any game and it will start flickering at random (even on the title screen).

Kkisak-valve maintainer 2020-10-20 github

I'm guessing by the list of currently supported hardware for GalliumOS that you're on an Intel-based X86 Chromebook. It may be worthwhile to also mention this issue to your video driver vendor (mesa/Intel).

Also, assuming that is true, you might be able to test a newer mesa version using a PPA like kisak-mesa, but this is completely untested with GalliumOS.

Ddanielristic 2020-10-22 github

Hello,

Thanks for your comment, it is indeed an Intel-based Chromebook (an Intel Celeron N3036 with "3.0 Mesa 20.0.8" according to Steam's System Information panel).

Just to make sure that I understand your suggestions correctly I would need to file a bug report here and also try switching to this driver which is a fork of the regular one, is that correct?

As there are no specific instructions for GalliumOS, to do so I would follow the general instructions for Ubuntu which consists of the following commands?

sudo apt install ppa-purge
sudo ppa-purge ppa:kisak/kisak-mesa

or possibly sudo ppa-purge -d galliumos ppa:kisak/kisak-mesa

Thanks for your help.

Kkisak-valve maintainer 2020-10-22 github

From what I could find, GalliumOS 3.1 is based on Ubuntu 18.04 (Bionic), so that would make the removal method for the PPA something like sudo ppa-purge -d bionic ppa:kisak/kisak-mesa.

Issues with mesa drivers should go directly to the folks working on that project instead of another PPA maintainer. https://docs.mesa3d.org/bugs.html is a good place to start.

Ddanielristic 2020-10-23 github

I've updated to the kisak-mesa driver but it still flickers, would that mean it's most likely not a video driver issue?

Thanks.

Kkisak-valve maintainer 2020-10-23 github

That's unfortunate, thanks for testing. All that tells us is that we didn't get lucky and it's a current issue that hasn't been fixed on the driver's side since GalliumOS 3.1 was released.

Ddanielristic 2020-11-10 github

Thanks for your help. After further testing, I noticed a couple of things that make me doubt the video drivers are to blame:

Contrary to what I initially thought, some games do not have the issue at all.
For the games that have the issue (eg. Worms Armageddon), while changing the video resolution or settings does not help, launching the game in windowed mode completely prevents the flickering.

I yet need to try this on an external display but it might be an issue with the games themselves.

Kkisak-valve maintainer 2023-07-08 github

Hello @danielristic, are you still experiencing this issue on an up to date system?

Kkisak-valve maintainer 2023-09-08 github

Closing pending feedback.

Nothing extracted yet.