Just got a VSIMM for my sparc 20 at work. For those not familiar with the
sparc architecture, a VSIMM is an ingenious invention from
Sun. :) Basically a sparc 20 (or a 10 SX) have the motherboard capability
for onboard video. However, there is no actual graphics chip on the
motherboard.
Two of the memory banks have extra slots for connections beside them. A
VSIMM is a (complex) stick of RAM that has an extended PCB with a graphics
chip on it, extending down to connect into the extra slot. This connects
the chip to the system, enabling the video port on the chassis, and gives
a faster connection between the graphics "card" and the system
memory. They come in 4M and 8M versions (maybe more, those are the two I
know of).
The nicest thing about the VSIMM is that it does 24bpp, which (outside of
the UltraSparcs) is usually pretty expensive to get on a Sparc. So, I
gleefully shut my system down, swapped out my CG6 (accelerated 8bpp
graphics card) and dropped in the VSIMM.
However, now I'm having a problem. :( I go to login using dtlogin like I
have for the last year and a half (or so) and my apps specified in my
.xinitrc start up. So does blackbox. But... blackbox never takes over. No
windows have frames, the placement is off, the toolbar isn't there... it's
as if blackbox wasn't even running. But it is. I can truss it (similar to
strace under linux) and see activity when I move the mouse,
etc. Eventually, it clears the screen of the Solaris logo and falls back
upon a black background.
This never happened when I was running under 8bpp. I tried going from
0.60.3 to 0.61.0, same problem. 0.60.2 and 0.60.1 have the same
problem. Now here's where it really gets wierd: 0.51.3.1 doesn't. It works
fine.
Something REALLY wierd is happening, and I don't really know what else to
do to try to track it down. I've been waiting for 24bpp for a while and am
looking forward to getting this to work. Any suggestions would be
appreciated; any information I can get to help, I will. I realize this is
a bit vague, but I'm not seeing any messages in an rxvt X console that I
start via .xinitrc, nor in /var/log/syslog or /var/adm/messages.
--Nathan
