BeagleBone AI web browser

General Discussion
1

BBAI running on Debian 10 march release with LXQT GUI.

When I try to open a web browser, the CPU pegs to 100%. It eventually will draw the web browser but the system is essentially locked up. Even moving the mouse has a 2 minute delay. It doesn’t seem to make it far enough for me to try to load a page, I have to power-cycle the board to recover.

This is true with the Firefox that the debian image ships with, and also chromium.

Anyone know what’s going on here?

image

Certainly this board is powerful enough for basic web browsing?

2

That smells like the default Debian 10’s fbdev xorg driver… Switch to the reverse engineered 2d etnaviv driver.

sudo apt update
sudo apt install xserver-xorg-video-armada-etnaviv

#/etc/X11/xorg.conf
Section "Monitor"
        Identifier      "Builtin Default Monitor"
EndSection
Section "Device"
        Identifier      "Builtin Default fbdev Device 0"
        Driver          "armada"
EndSection
Section "Screen"
        Identifier      "Builtin Default fbdev Screen 0"
        Device          "Builtin Default fbdev Device 0"
        Monitor         "Builtin Default Monitor"
EndSection
Section "ServerLayout"
        Identifier      "Builtin Default Layout"
        Screen          "Builtin Default fbdev Screen 0"
EndSection

Regards,

3

Thanks, just want to make sure I’m reading this correctly, my apologies I’m not knowledgeable about xorg.

You mention to switch from fbdev to armada/etnaviv, but I’m swapping instances of ‘armada’ to ‘fbdev’ in /etc/X11/xorg.conf. This seems to contradict.

my file was like:

Section "Device"
        Identifier      "Builtin Default armada Device 0"
        Driver          "armada"

and now looks like:

Section "Device"
        Identifier      "Builtin Default fbdev Device 0"
        Driver          "armada"

is that a correct interpretation of your instructions?

4

I implemented those changes, rebooted, and there is no change in the results.

I have discovered some more clues:

  • I can start the browser “minori” and load a webpage
  • When I maximize the window, the problems begin
  • The CPU hovers around 100% from this point
  • the window will show maximized, but as it tries to load content, I lose control of the cursor
  • After a few seconds the screen goes black
  • Few seconds later I am presented with a debian login screen

Chromium and Firefox just draw a white box on the desktop and peg the CPU, this leads straight to the crash.

If I reduce the desktop resolution to 1080P, I can get much further. I can load the page maximized, and use it for a couple minutes before the eventual lockup.

It’s difficult to get logs because once the problems begin, even the command line is extremely slow / unresponsive.

5

That’s correct interpretation, you had it correct prior… But yeah, that Identifier text doesn’t really matter… Sadly, the armada driver should have fixed the 2 second pauses…

Regards,