getting fglrx to work on Fedora Core 4

I had a screaming nightmare on Sunday and Monday, trying to get ATI hardware acceleration working for my Fedora Core 4, dual monitor setup. I use two cards:
1) ATI 9800 Pro All in Wonder (AGP)
2) ATI 9200SE (PCI)

Previously, I was running both cards without hardware acceleration. The situation was fine, as both cards gave a crisp display to my dual Dell flat panels. But I wanted to get ATI's hardware acceleration working with Cinelerra, my video editing software. The developers of Cinelerra, www.heroinewarrior.com, just released an OpenGL version with some significant performance enhancements. So I had my work cut out for me.

First, I tried to get both cards working together with the latest and greatest ATI driver, the 8.28.8. No go. Looking at the glxinfo output, I would always receive:
direct rendering: No

or in /var/log/Xorg.0.log:
direct rendering disabled

So, I simplified the setup and used only the 9800 AGP card. I went through a number of interations with the Livna ATI RPMs. These seem to be the more stable. However, what is not made clear in the instructions is that you need to match three items:
1) both the ATI configurator (ati-fglrx) and fglrx kernel module have to be stamped with the same ATI driver version
2) you need to install the fglrx kernel module that matches your kernel

I upgraded my kernel to 2.6.17-2142_FC4smp to get the ATI fglrx drivers working. You'll know they are working when direct rendering is on (or direct rendering=yes). Here is the outline of what you need to do:

1) Install, 2) Configure, 3) Validate, 4) Test

Here's the detailed listing of how I got the Livna fglrx drivers version 8.26.18-1 to work:

Install
yum install ati-fglrx-8.26.18-1.lvn4
yum install kernel-module-fglrx-2.6.17-1.2142_FC4smp-8.26.18-1.lvn4.i686.rpm

Verify Installed Files
[root@computer X11]# rpm -qa grep fglrx
ati-fglrx-8.26.18-1.lvn4
kernel-module-fglrx-2.6.17-1.2142_FC4smp-8.26.18-1.lvn4

Configure
ati-fglrx-config-display enable

Validate
dmesg grep fglrx
fglrxinfo
glxinfo more
grep irect /var/log/Xorg.0.log

Test
glxgears

You should see much better performance than when direct rendering is turned off. Make sure the configs stay working through a warm boot and cold boot.

Here is some useful ouput:
[root@computer X11]# dmesg grep fglrx
fglrx: module license 'Proprietary. (C) 2002 - ATI Technologies, Starnberg, GERMANY' taints kernel.
[fglrx] Maximum main memory to use for locked dma buffers: 1898 MBytes.
[fglrx] module loaded - fglrx 8.26.18 [Jun 22 2006] on minor 0
[fglrx] Internal AGP support requested, but kernel AGP support active.
[fglrx] Have to use kernel AGP support to avoid conflicts.
[fglrx] AGP detected, AgpState = 0x1f004a1b (hardware caps of chipset)
[fglrx] AGP enabled, AgpCommand = 0x1f004312 (selected caps)
[fglrx] total GART = 134217728
[fglrx] free GART = 118222848
[fglrx] max single GART = 118222848
[fglrx] total LFB = 126873600
[fglrx] free LFB = 116387840
[fglrx] max single LFB = 116387840
[fglrx] total Inv = 0
[fglrx] free Inv = 0
[fglrx] max single Inv = 0
[fglrx] total TIM = 0


[root@computer X11]# glxinfo
name of display: :0.0
display: :0 screen: 0
direct rendering: Yes
server glx vendor string: SGI
server glx version string: 1.2
server glx extensions:
GLX_ARB_multisample, GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating,
GLX_EXT_import_context, GLX_OML_swap_method, GLX_SGI_make_current_read,
GLX_SGIS_multisample, GLX_SGIX_fbconfig
client glx vendor string: ATI
client glx version string: 1.3
client glx extensions:
GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_EXT_import_context,
GLX_ARB_get_proc_address, GLX_ARB_multisample, GLX_ATI_pixel_format_float,
GLX_ATI_render_texture
GLX extensions:
GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_EXT_import_context,
GLX_ARB_multisample
OpenGL vendor string: ATI Technologies Inc.
OpenGL renderer string: RADEON 9800 Pro Generic
OpenGL version string: 2.0.5879 (8.26.18)
OpenGL extensions:
GL_ARB_multitexture, GL_EXT_texture_env_add, GL_EXT_compiled_vertex_array,
GL_S3_s3tc, GL_ARB_depth_texture, GL_ARB_fragment_program,
GL_ARB_fragment_program_shadow, GL_ARB_fragment_shader,
GL_ARB_multisample, GL_ARB_occlusion_query, GL_ARB_point_parameters,
GL_ARB_point_sprite, GL_ARB_shader_objects, GL_ARB_shading_language_100,
GL_ARB_shadow, GL_ARB_shadow_ambient, GL_ARB_texture_border_clamp,
GL_ARB_texture_compression, GL_ARB_texture_cube_map,
GL_ARB_texture_env_add, GL_ARB_texture_env_combine,
GL_ARB_texture_env_crossbar, GL_ARB_texture_env_dot3,
GL_ARB_texture_mirrored_repeat, GL_ARB_transpose_matrix,
GL_ARB_vertex_blend, GL_ARB_vertex_buffer_object, GL_ARB_vertex_program,
GL_ARB_vertex_shader, GL_ARB_window_pos, GL_ARB_draw_buffers,
GL_ATI_draw_buffers, GL_ATI_element_array, GL_ATI_envmap_bumpmap,
GL_ATI_fragment_shader, GL_ATI_map_object_buffer, GL_ATI_separate_stencil,
GL_ATI_texture_env_combine3, GL_ATI_texture_float,
GL_ATI_texture_mirror_once, GL_ATI_vertex_array_object,
GL_ATI_vertex_attrib_array_object, GL_ATI_vertex_streams,
GL_ATIX_texture_env_combine3, GL_ATIX_texture_env_route,
GL_ATIX_vertex_shader_output_point_size, GL_EXT_abgr, GL_EXT_bgra,
GL_EXT_blend_color, GL_EXT_blend_func_separate, GL_EXT_blend_minmax,
GL_EXT_blend_subtract, GL_EXT_clip_volume_hint,
GL_EXT_draw_range_elements, GL_EXT_fog_coord, GL_EXT_framebuffer_object,
GL_EXT_multi_draw_arrays, GL_EXT_packed_pixels, GL_EXT_point_parameters,
GL_EXT_rescale_normal, GL_EXT_secondary_color,
GL_EXT_separate_specular_color, GL_EXT_shadow_funcs, GL_EXT_stencil_wrap,
GL_EXT_texgen_reflection, GL_EXT_texture3D,
GL_EXT_texture_compression_s3tc, GL_EXT_texture_cube_map,
GL_EXT_texture_edge_clamp, GL_EXT_texture_env_combine,
GL_EXT_texture_env_dot3, GL_EXT_texture_filter_anisotropic,
GL_EXT_texture_lod_bias, GL_EXT_texture_mirror_clamp,
GL_EXT_texture_object, GL_EXT_texture_rectangle, GL_EXT_vertex_array,
GL_EXT_vertex_shader, GL_HP_occlusion_test, GL_NV_blend_square,
GL_NV_occlusion_query, GL_NV_texgen_reflection, GL_SGI_color_matrix,
GL_SGIS_generate_mipmap, GL_SGIS_texture_border_clamp,
GL_SGIS_texture_edge_clamp, GL_SGIS_texture_lod, GL_SUN_multi_draw_arrays
glu version: 1.3
glu extensions:
GLU_EXT_nurbs_tessellator, GLU_EXT_object_space_tess

visual x bf lv rg d st colorbuffer ax dp st accumbuffer ms cav
id dep cl sp sz l ci b ro r g b a bf th cl r g b a ns b eat
----------------------------------------------------------------------
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