Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
Following up: The solution proposed by Hans was somewhat successful. The buffer update problem has apparently been solved at a higher of 1024x768. Wavy vertical lines are still evident. This I can ignore, however. At 862 On 11/21/05, Alan E. Davis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:I think Hans's idea makes sense, since it was the file storm.c that was patched in the first place by others. I'll have to wait, because I've started a new gentoo install due to problems detecting the /boot partition in my machine. I botched an attempt to move data from that partition to the / partition. I have been able to do 1064x768 at 16 or 24 bits. Even 1100something x something worked, perhaps not as perfectly. Thank you for so many great answers, in great depth. I will see what comes about in a day or two. It's tricky to do this on a dialup. Alan DavisOn 11/20/05, Walter Dnes [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Fri, Nov 18, 2005 at 11:57:12PM -0600, kashani wrote The Mystique has 4mb of RAM upgradeable to 8mb IIRC. It was likely0 new in '95-'96 as I scraped together $140 to by the slightly better Matrox Millennium used off Ebay in '96. The Mystique did not do well at higher resolutions, which is why I went with the Millennium. I'd shoot for 800x600 and go from there.1024x768 at 24bits (16 million colours) should be doable.--Walter Dnes [EMAIL PROTECTED] In linux /sbin/init is Job #1My musings on technology and security at http://tech_sec.blog.ca --gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
More information: at a lower clock, even at 1024x768 the lines seem to be less of a problem. At 832x624, this artifact is not apparent. Thank you for all the help. Alan On 11/25/05, Alan E. Davis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Following up: The solution proposed by Hans was somewhat successful. The buffer update problem has apparently been solved at a higher of 1024x768. Wavy vertical lines are still evident. This I can ignore, however. At 862 On 11/21/05, Alan E. Davis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:I think Hans's idea makes sense, since it was the file storm.c that was patched in the first place by others. I'll have to wait, because I've started a new gentoo install due to problems detecting the /boot partition in my machine. I botched an attempt to move data from that partition to the / partition. I have been able to do 1064x768 at 16 or 24 bits. Even 1100something x something worked, perhaps not as perfectly. Thank you for so many great answers, in great depth. I will see what comes about in a day or two. It's tricky to do this on a dialup. Alan DavisOn 11/20/05, Walter Dnes [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Fri, Nov 18, 2005 at 11:57:12PM -0600, kashani wrote The Mystique has 4mb of RAM upgradeable to 8mb IIRC. It was likely0 new in '95-'96 as I scraped together $140 to by the slightly better Matrox Millennium used off Ebay in '96. The Mystique did not do well at higher resolutions, which is why I went with the Millennium. I'd shoot for 800x600 and go from there.1024x768 at 24bits (16 million colours) should be doable.--Walter Dnes [EMAIL PROTECTED] In linux /sbin/init is Job #1My musings on technology and security at http://tech_sec.blog.ca --gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
I think Hans's idea makes sense, since it was the file storm.c that was patched in the first place by others. I'll have to wait, because I've started a new gentoo install due to problems detecting the /boot partition in my machine. I botched an attempt to move data from that partition to the / partition. I have been able to do 1064x768 at 16 or 24 bits. Even 1100something x something worked, perhaps not as perfectly. Thank you for so many great answers, in great depth. I will see what comes about in a day or two. It's tricky to do this on a dialup. Alan DavisOn 11/20/05, Walter Dnes [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Fri, Nov 18, 2005 at 11:57:12PM -0600, kashani wrote The Mystique has 4mb of RAM upgradeable to 8mb IIRC. It was likely0 new in '95-'96 as I scraped together $140 to by the slightly better Matrox Millennium used off Ebay in '96. The Mystique did not do well at higher resolutions, which is why I went with the Millennium. I'd shoot for 800x600 and go from there.1024x768 at 24bits (16 million colours) should be doable.--Walter Dnes [EMAIL PROTECTED] In linux /sbin/init is Job #1My musings on technology and security at http://tech_sec.blog.ca--gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
Hi, On Fri, 18 Nov 2005 00:56:18 +1000 Alan E. Davis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I backed down to 1024xsomething: vertical lines were scalloped/wavy. Someone mentioned this would be a timing issue, but I don't know what I'd do to microadjust timing? xvidtune? I'll try it. That won't help. I'm currently using a mystique and am having the very same problem. It's _very_ easy to circumvent but requires a recompile of xorg. The fix still hasn't made it into xorg CVS. Maybe time to write another bug report. But i think I remember having written one for XFree86, which behaved the same way. I was told that it was merely a timing issue but AFAIK this isn't configurable und it was fixed in 4.5. But I never tried that out. To fix the issue, I usually did the following: 1. $ emerge xorg-x11 waited after the moment when everything is unpacked and patched and hit CTRL-Z 2. $ vi /var/tmp/portage/xorg-x11.../work/xc/programs/Xserver/hw/xfree86/drivers/mga/mga_storm.c search for the lines: |/* MGAISBUSY() reportedly causes a freeze for Mystique revision 2 and older */ |if (!(pMga-Chipset == PCI_CHIP_MGA1064 (pMga-ChipRev = 0 pMga-ChipRev = 2))) |while(MGAISBUSY()); Reading the comment exactly, it is easy to fix it (i.e. it couldn't work for Rev. 2): |if (!(pMga-Chipset == PCI_CHIP_MGA1064 (pMga-ChipRev = 0 pMga-ChipRev 2))) (i.e., changing = 2 to 2) 3. $ fg to continue the suspended emerge job I'd suggest making a binary package and saving it somewhere... -hwh -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
On Fri, Nov 18, 2005 at 11:57:12PM -0600, kashani wrote The Mystique has 4mb of RAM upgradeable to 8mb IIRC. It was likely new in '95-'96 as I scraped together $140 to by the slightly better Matrox Millennium used off Ebay in '96. The Mystique did not do well at higher resolutions, which is why I went with the Millennium. I'd shoot for 800x600 and go from there. 1024x768 at 24bits (16 million colours) should be doable. -- Walter Dnes [EMAIL PROTECTED] In linux /sbin/init is Job #1 My musings on technology and security at http://tech_sec.blog.ca -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
On Fri, Nov 18, 2005 at 12:56:18AM +1000, Alan E. Davis wrote I backed down to 1024xsomething: vertical lines were scalloped/wavy. Someone mentioned this would be a timing issue, but I don't know what I'd do to microadjust timing? xvidtune? I'll try it. There are two set of constraints... 1) See the page http://koala.ilog.fr/cgi-bin/nph-colas-modelines which can generate custom modelines for you system. You need to know the max and min frquencies (horizontal and verticl) for your monitor. I've managed to get 2048x1536 running on my NEC Multisync95... whee!!! 2) You mentioned it was an ancient card. How much RAM does it have? Under X, here are the RAM requirements... 8 bit colour (256 colours) = 1 byte per pixel 16 bit colour (65536 colours) = 2 bytes per pixel 24 bit colour (16777216 colours) = 4 (yes, *FOUR*) bytes per pixel. A 1-megabyte video card will give 1152 x 864 at 256 colours or 800 x 600 at 65536 colours. -- Walter Dnes [EMAIL PROTECTED] In linux /sbin/init is Job #1 My musings on technology and security at http://tech_sec.blog.ca -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
Walter Dnes wrote: 2) You mentioned it was an ancient card. How much RAM does it have? Under X, here are the RAM requirements... 8 bit colour (256 colours) = 1 byte per pixel 16 bit colour (65536 colours) = 2 bytes per pixel 24 bit colour (16777216 colours) = 4 (yes, *FOUR*) bytes per pixel. A 1-megabyte video card will give 1152 x 864 at 256 colours or 800 x 600 at 65536 colours. The Mystique has 4mb of RAM upgradeable to 8mb IIRC. It was likely new in '95-'96 as I scraped together $140 to by the slightly better Matrox Millennium used off Ebay in '96. The Mystique did not do well at higher resolutions, which is why I went with the Millennium. I'd shoot for 800x600 and go from there. kashani -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
Bob: Your comments are extremely useful. However much I would like to get a newer graphics card, I am stuck with this one for a few weeks at least. It works well on an Ubuntu system on a different partition. How would you recommend to go about trying vesa. That may be what Ubuntu is doing. Turn on vesa framebuffer? I backed down to 1024xsomething: vertical lines were scalloped/wavy. Someone mentioned this would be a timing issue, but I don't know what I'd do to microadjust timing? xvidtune? I'll try it. Thanks again. Alan On 11/17/05, Bob Sanders [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Have you tried just using - vesa?Or vga?It should work.Turning on everythingis always a sure way to break a kernel. Description: when scrolling the buffer, some lines are doubled, some are lost, and using Firefox at least, when I type Ctrl-L, the frame displays properly until it is scrolled again. I have found descriptions of similar issues on the Inet, but nothing that has helped get my system to work properly. Does this symptom ring a bell with anyone?Generally, it's because the gfx card can't refresh from it's internal memory fast enough.As I recall, the Mystique had an optional memory module, which I have on mine.Perhaps its just that your trying to use too high a resolution and hitting the cards performancelimits?With due respect, save up your pennies and get a current Gfx card.Should be aroundUS$42. Sure, that's a months wages in some parts of the world.But still - throwing a massively powerful processor in a system with a dead-end Gfx card is kind of wasteful, unless you're makingthis thing into a server.Bob---gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
On Fri, 18 Nov 2005 00:56:18 +1000 Alan E. Davis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: How would you recommend to go about trying vesa. That may be what Ubuntu is doing. Turn on vesa framebuffer? Yes. Under - Device Driver -- Graphics support -- Select VESA VGA graphics support The further down in the Gfx support section -- Console Display Driver Support -- * VGA text console * Video mode selection support * Framebuffer Console support I backed down to 1024xsomething: vertical lines were scalloped/wavy. Someone mentioned this would be a timing issue, but I don't know what I'd do to microadjust timing? xvidtune? I'll try it. Yes, xvidtune. Also, it mught be useful to download the mga.o from Matrox and follow the instructions to replace the one in /usr/X11R6/lib/modules (if I recall the path correctly). Bob - -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
On 11/18/05, Bob Sanders [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Also, it mught be useful to download the mga.o from Matrox andfollow the instructions to replace the one in /usr/X11R6/lib/modules (if I recallthe path correctly). I did download this driver, and when I installed, a message was generated that the version was wrong. Maybe I'll try again, and just install it anyway. Thanks again. I'll try these ideas. Alan
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
On Fri, 18 Nov 2005 13:11:58 +1000 Alan E. Davis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I did download this driver, and when I installed, a message was generated that the version was wrong. Maybe I'll try again, and just install it anyway. I wonder if the HAL use flag needs to be set to use the driver? It's a new USE flag this year and may cause a re-compile of Xorg if an emerge -uDNav world is done after setting it. Bob - -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] Dinosaur Matrox Mystique: corruption
On Wed, 16 Nov 2005 20:50:14 +1000 Alan E. Davis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I gather that there was a bug in the mga drivers some time ago, and it appears that the xorg drivers have incorporated the patches I have seen during my google searches. I had one running on Gentoo last year, before the motherboard on an 800 MHz Athlon Slot-A died. X ran fine. I do wonder what to do about framebuffers, though. Tiring of the battle, after many years of avoiding framebuffers, Have you tried just using - vesa? Or vga? It should work. Turning on everything is always a sure way to break a kernel. Description: when scrolling the buffer, some lines are doubled, some are lost, and using Firefox at least, when I type Ctrl-L, the frame displays properly until it is scrolled again. I have found descriptions of similar issues on the Inet, but nothing that has helped get my system to work properly. Does this symptom ring a bell with anyone? Generally, it's because the gfx card can't refresh from it's internal memory fast enough. As I recall, the Mystique had an optional memory module, which I have on mine. Perhaps its just that your trying to use too high a resolution and hitting the cards performance limits? With due respect, save up your pennies and get a current Gfx card. Should be around US$42. Sure, that's a months wages in some parts of the world. But still - throwing a massively powerful processor in a system with a dead-end Gfx card is kind of wasteful, unless you're making this thing into a server. Bob - -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
