System: Ubuntu
Blender: 2.9-3.0
Problem:
Cannot render animation at all. Blender crashes and takes the whole system down. Rendering from the command line works fine. Too bad, since I always render the viewport.
It looks like I’ve upgraded my system’s OpenGL to 4.6 and then SHTF. They say you cannot downgrade OpenGL and it should be backward compatible. Since Blender is using OpenGL for the GUI updates, I think that OpenGL is the main reason for my problems, and possibly downgrading it to 3.3 might fix the problem. But the thing is, it looks like one cannot downgrade OpenGL on Linux or so they say.
my system info:
OpenGL vendor string: AMD
OpenGL renderer string: AMD Radeon ™ Pro WX 7100 Graphics (POLARIS10, DRM 3.38.0, 5.8.0-63-generic, LLVM 12.0.1)
OpenGL core profile version string: 4.6 (Core Profile) Mesa 21.3.0-devel (git-f86faee 2021-08-02 focal-oibaf-ppa)
OpenGL core profile shading language version string: 4.60
OpenGL core profile context flags: (none)
OpenGL core profile profile mask: core profile
OpenGL core profile extensions:
OpenGL version string: 4.6 (Compatibility Profile) Mesa 21.3.0-devel (git-f86faee 2021-08-02 focal-oibaf-ppa)
OpenGL shading language version string: 4.60
OpenGL context flags: (none)
OpenGL profile mask: compatibility profile
OpenGL extensions:
OpenGL ES profile version string: OpenGL ES 3.2 Mesa 21.3.0-devel (git-f86faee 2021-08-02 focal-oibaf-ppa)
OpenGL ES profile shading language version string: OpenGL ES GLSL ES 3.20
OpenGL ES profile extensions:
Do you have Time shift on Ubuntu it works good on Manjaro , only takes about 10 minutes to do a full install with all apps etc… I I know it doesn’t fix your open GL problem with the new driver but at least you could roll back your OS image in the future.
So I thought, hey let’s try a clean new system. I took a spare disk, installed the latest Kubuntu(Linux). Installed Blender 2.93.1 from the snap store. So, everything is fresh and clean. Now I cannot even go through the menus - Blender crashes right away and takes the whole system down.
Hi. If your graphics card is still supported by AMD it is recommended that you install proprietary AMDGPU-Pro Driver. You look about how to do this on Ubuntu distros.
First you find out if AMD offers AMDGPU-PRO driver for your card (if your card is old probably AMD drops the support). If you managed to download the driver file, you do a search like this:
Most of the time the problems are related to faulty graphics drivers (3D drivers). For AMD OpenSource drivers and proprietary drivers are available. If you have problems with OpenSource AMDGPU drivers, you should report them to MESA project:
If proprietary AMDGPU-PRO drivers are recommended for your card and if you have problems with them, you should report the problem to AMD.
Perhaps you could ask a question in the following thread so that they recommend which driver and which installation method is suitable for you, sharing there the model of the graphics card and version of Ubuntu:
YAFU, thanks for a very detailed reply! I really appreciate it.
Too bad, I know about all the suggestions you gave me already. I am sticking with AMD OpenSource drivers since AMDGPU-PRO drivers were giving me tons of problems.
I was using AMD OpenSource drivers until now, and Blender liked them alright. All other applications work fine, that includes the ones using GPU. Something happened and I don’t know what - I even cannot check crash logs since Blender takes the whole system down and takes it down hard, so no logs. I suspect OpenGL 4.6 for Linux and Blender don’t like each other. Trying to find a way to downgrade back to OpenGL 3.3, I think that’s what I had on my old Linux system before, when Blender was working fine and was super stable, even alpha releases.
Thank a lot again.
In this case with OpenSource driver you should report the problem in the Mesa project link that I have shared before. In the report you should try to include as much information as possible about your system with that glxinfo information and about the Blender problem. Then developers will probably ask you for some method to collect better information.
Edit:
You see here about how to generate apitrace output to share in the bug report with Mesa developers:
OK YAFU, thanks for the help.
I’ve narrowed the problem down to my hardware. Since I couldn’t use Blender on Linux, I’ve moved back to Windows and here we go - same problem. So, it’s my hardware. Strangely enough, the system crashes only happen when I use Blender, on both systems. And it’s not version specific. All of them crash the same.
It’s not even a crash, it feels just like an instant power down, like when your power line suddenly goes down.
As of now, I can suspect 3 things - memory, video card, and PSU. I will start with PSU for it’s the cheapest component to replace. I only hope it’s not a video card since that beast costs as much as all other PC parts combined.
What still puzzles me, it only happens when I use Blender.
Also, if I render from command line, Blender doesn’t crash the system, works just fine.
Sofar, running Blender from blender_debug_gpu.cmd and blender_debug_gpu_glitchworkaround.cmd didn’t crash the system, but I was extra careful.
OK, I’ve replaced the PSU, and it fixed the problem.
For those who encounter a similar problem, a short recap:
Symptoms: Blender crashes and reboots the system when trying to render anything or even when trying to switch from one menu or tab to another, or trying to add a video to the timeline in Video Sequencer.
Solution: If it’s not a screen freeze or some flickering, just an instant system reboot, that’s your PSU - power supply unit. Buy a new one and replace it. Make sure it’s powerful enough to handle your videocard. It solved my problem.