Linux-Hardware Digest #587, Volume #14 Sun, 8 Apr 01 09:13:04 EDT
Contents:
Re: Disk Block Size ("Going, gone")
Parport problem (Gunnar)
Re: RH7.0 on A7M266, worth it? ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: RH7.0 on A7M266, worth it? (Julie Brandon)
Can't see hard disk ("Lee Fuller")
Re: 32MB I/O MagicVideo TNT2 AGP (Norbert Veber)
Screen is shaking!!!!!!!!! ("Richard")
Re: RH7.0 on A7M266, worth it? ("Jeffrey Yu")
All of linux in this site. Instruction complete downloads ecc. go to :
http://members.xoom.it/frecell ("frecell")
Re: Can't see hard disk ("NiHiLiST")
synaptics touchpad rocker button (Bill Shear)
Re: Parport problem (Dances With Crows)
Re: Asus A7A266 hardware bug + Linux 2.4.3 problem (Rafal Wysocki)
Re: Internal Modem (Eric R Brueggemann)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Going, gone" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Disk Block Size
Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2001 06:31:52 GMT
Rebecca wrote:
>
> I am trying to write a program that will provide hard disk configuration
> info. What I want to know is how to determine the block size of the disk. In
> the /proc filesystem everything seems to be reported in blocks - ie disk
> size partition size - how can I convert this to MB. I have seen in some
> places that block size is always assumed to be 512bytes - is this correct?
> If not how can I find out what the actual block size is. There is an ioctl
> call -BLKGETSIZE that returns the size of a block device in number of
> sectors - is this always 512 bytes? I found in the lvm library that the
> return value from this call is always divided by 2 to get Kb - Is this a
> valid assumption. Block size for physical disks is usually assumed to be the
> sector size (at least that is what I thought) Is this true?
>
> Thanks alot,
> Rebecca
As far as I know (that's not saying much), the
sector size is always 512 bytes and the standard
block size is 1024 (i.e. 2 sectors). Larger block
sizes may be used by a filesystem such as say
4096 bytes but I haven't heard of block sizes
equal to sector size (maybe there are some).
I would try running a scripted output of fdisk
with the -u switch to get at starting and ending
sectors instead of cylinders. Total partition
sectors/2 = kb's.
Without the -u switch the fdisk output header
will give you units as 16965 * 512 bytes
in the case of one of my drives i.e. more or
less 8,432 kb's or 8.4gb's.
There must be easier ways but ioctl calls are
water deeper than I can swim in. If you don't
find any then try this.
HTH://
==============================================
Suse-7.0, ReiserFS, Asus-Tx97,i200mmx, 64ram,
Voodoo3-2000, hp6L, hp7550i, ibm34L1201nic,
SbLive, usr56kV.
==============================================
CounterSpam:
Remove all characters that may
appear between may01 and @ to otherwise use
normally until that date.
==============================================
------------------------------
From: Gunnar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Parport problem
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2001 07:21:38 GMT
Hello.
I have a Fujitsu-Siemens Pro C5 computer with a paralell port that refuses
to work. I run debian 2.2r2 with 2.2.18pre21 kernel. I have appended some
output from /proc at the end of the message, but basicly there is a NIC at
IRQ5 and a soundcard at IRQ9. The parallellport is set to parport_pc style
and compiled into the kernel. The autoprobe returns correct information
(see below for output).
Here is what I have done:
In the BIOS setup I have set the parallelport to use: 378h, irq 7 and the
"auto" for it's addresses, and I have set the parport style in the BIOS to
"printer", "bidirectional", "EPP", "ECP". Does anybody have any clue about
what these means? The BIOS is a Phoenix BIOS.
When I try to print the file adsf:
k62:~# cat adsf > /dev/lp0
su: /dev/lp0: No such device
k62:~# cat adsf > /dev/lp1
su: /dev/lp1: No such device
k62:~# cat adsf > /dev/lp2
su: /dev/lp2: No such device
I have run out of good ideas, so if you have any, please respond.
I read email that is sent to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Thanks in advance
Gunnar.
Some output from /proc
k62:/proc# cat interrupts
CPU0
0: 186371 XT-PIC timer
1: 2117 XT-PIC keyboard
2: 0 XT-PIC cascade
5: 2173 XT-PIC NE2000
9: 0 XT-PIC ESS Solo1
12: 108131 XT-PIC PS/2 Mouse
13: 1 XT-PIC fpu
14: 5415 XT-PIC ide0
15: 7 XT-PIC ide1
NMI: 0
k62:/proc#
k62:/proc# cat parport/0/hardware
base: 0x378
irq: none
dma: none
modes: SPP
k62:/proc# cat parport/0/irq
none
k62:/proc# insmod parport_probe
Using /lib/modules/2.2.18pre23/misc/parport_probe.o
k62:/proc# cat parport/0/autoprobe
CLASS:PRINTER;
MODEL:HP LaserJet 6L;
MANUFACTURER:Hewlett-Packard;
DESCRIPTION:Hewlett-Packard LaserJet 6L Printer;
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Crossposted-To:
alt.comp.hardware.amd.thunderbird,alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.asus,comp.os.linux.setup
Subject: Re: RH7.0 on A7M266, worth it?
Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2001 08:51:03 GMT
Please- let us not discuss hardware performance (the value of
benchmarks, etc.) issues only- that is hashed out elsewhere. What can
you all provide in terms of your experiences with linux on the AND760
(761) chipset boards?
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Julie Brandon)
Crossposted-To:
alt.comp.hardware.amd.thunderbird,alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.asus,comp.os.linux.setup
Subject: Re: RH7.0 on A7M266, worth it?
Date: 8 Apr 2001 08:38:47 GMT
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
On Sat, 07 Apr 2001 17:14:11 GMT, Colorado Dave ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) said:
>Is it possible for people to DISCUSS an issue without resorting to
>profanity, name-calling, and insults?
Not, usually, when a thread is crossposted to three or more groups, like
this one is. In fact it's rather a certainty really, which I guess is why
trolls often crosspost their messages.
Ta-ra,
--
Julie Brandon, Derby, UK | Gena Side (HL, Q3A & UT)
<URL:http://www.computergeeks.co.uk/> | Wocyllis (Daytona & PSO 28 HUnewear)
(includes cheap'n'chearful live webcam) | Happy to team with PSO newbies!
------------------------------
From: "Lee Fuller" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
linux.redhat.install,alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.abit,alt.os.linux.redhat
Subject: Can't see hard disk
Date: Sun, 8 Apr 2001 19:04:12 +1000
I have an Abit KT7Raid motherboard which has 4 ATA100 IDE channels on the
raid controller in addition to the standard 4 ATA66 channels. I have an IBM
30G ATA100 hard disk on the secondary master of the ATA100 controller. On
the standard channels I have a CD-DVD and ZIP100. The problem I'm having is
in trying to install linux. Both fdisk and disk druid do not see the hard
disk. The only partition shown is 95M ("hdd" or "hdd4") being the ZIP drive.
(I have the same problem trying to install QNX) I have Win98 using 20G on
the hd. Of course the Win98 fdisk sees it ok.
What should I do?
Thanks,
Lee.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Norbert Veber)
Subject: Re: 32MB I/O MagicVideo TNT2 AGP
Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2001 10:31:44 GMT
> I have a TNT2 based card and Mandrake7.2 and RedHat6.2 detect it and set it
> up perfectly as a display device. Mandrake even sets up with 3D acceleration
> working quite well but I'd wait a while until a distribution is available
> with XFree86 4.0.2 and kernel 2.4 if you want a stable system and better
> support.
How does mandrake set it up with 3D acceleration? As far as I know the only
driver available is the Nvidia driver, and its license forbids
redistribution. Is there a free driver available now? If so, do you know
where I can get it?
I've been having alot of problems with the nvidia driver, my card is a
TNT2 M64, it crashes very often, sometimes just the application I'm running,
and sometimes the entire machine locks up completelly.
I'm running the latest nvidia driver, and have tried kernels 2.4.0 though
2.4.3 without much difference. I have an AMD athlon cpu, so I thought maybe
its an AGP problem, but it happens just the same with the kernel agp driver,
and with agp disabled altogether..
So far I've used quake3a, and soldier of fortune, and they both crash after
a few minutes of playing. Even if I'm not running a 3d application, X can
only go a few days without freezing up.
The driver included in X is very stable, but doesnt have 3d support :(
Does anyone else have an nvidia card working in linux with an AMD processor,
without stability issues? I'm starting to think that its the card itself,
and maybe going to a gforce, or another manufacturer alltogether.
Are there any other 3d cards that work well in linux now that 3dfx is gone?
It looks like nvidia is more or less the only choice?
Thanks,
Norbert
------------------------------
From: "Richard" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Screen is shaking!!!!!!!!!
Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2001 10:32:12 GMT
Hi,
After installing the linux(mandrake or redhat), my screen seems to be
shaking.(it's driving me nutz!!)
Have 1ghz AMD T , Abit k7 motherboard and 32mb ATI something(i will post the
exact name if you want later).
I don't think it has anything to do w/ installation for x because my reg
mode(prior to do starx) is also shaking.
I have dual boot w/ win98 which is not causing that problem.
I am only getting it when i am in linux mode.
Although, hardware is really new and in fact i am having some problem w/
bios setting, I am not sure why this is the case under only linux.
Any idea?
ps: if you need any other specific info to troubleshoot, PLease let me know.
Thank you
------------------------------
From: "Jeffrey Yu" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.comp.hardware.amd.thunderbird,alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.asus,comp.os.linux.setup
Subject: Re: RH7.0 on A7M266, worth it?
Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2001 11:18:22 GMT
Without knowing the specifics of the hardware designs of these two boards,
I am leaning toward the A7V133 for 2 reasons:
1. The chipset has been around a while, the quality is somewhat known. The
DDR memory/chipset definitely could deliver better speed, but they could
introduce
bugs/incompatibility as well, which we may not have experienced yet.
Therefore,
the track record of A7V133 have a upper hand of DDR/AMD761 chipset.
2. The performance difference could be slim in most of the cases. More
importantly,
users may not realize the difference at all. To that end, stability becomes
more
important.
So, could we say A7V133 might be more suitable to Linux, as we have seen
problems
often result in incompatibility? What's your thought on this? Thanks
again.
J.
"Tom Roberts" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Jeffrey Yu wrote:
> > Yes, the question is whether it is worth to have RH7.0 installed on a
> > A7M266 motherboard, the CPU in mind is the 1.33G, and 512MB RAM.
> > The alternative is the A7V133A, any comment at all? TIA.
>
> I have an A7V133 and love it.
>
> Yes, benchmarks can distinguish between DDR and PC133 memory, just like
> they can distinguish between 800 and 1300 MHz processors. But _YOU_ almost
> certainly won't be able to, EXCEPT IN YOUR WALLET!
>
> For all but the tiny percentage of programs which can execute mostly
> cache-bound[##], the core speed of the CPU is almost irrelevant: what
> matters is memory speed. For memory speed, what matters is ACCESS TIME and
> not data rate. Those DDR RAMs have the same 60-70 ns (or so) access time
as
> PC133 RAMs.
>
> [##] "mostly" is >98%; for even a 3% cache miss rate the CPU
> wastes time waiting on memory (in our simulations, at least).
>
> This is a highly technical question of how the data actually gets from
> memory to the CPU (reads outnumber writes by typically 4:1 or more, so
> one normally optimizes for reads). I do NOT know what these motherboard
> chipsets can do, but I do know about our memory controllers (this is
> for a PowerPC system, not Intel/AMD). Our current memory controller takes
> 12 clocks per memory access of which the last 4 carry data. So DDR memory
> would reduce that to 10 clocks, less than 20% improvement. BUT -- that
> improvement is LOST unless the memory controller can overlap a sufficient
> number of requests to keep the memory bus occupied. Ours can have 4
> requests outstanding, but for DDR that is not enough, and there is no
> advantage whatsoever of DDR over PC133, IN OUR DESIGN. YMMV, and I
> suspect the motherboard chipset designers worry about this a lot....
>
> Unless the motherboard chipset can keep at least 8 memory requests
> outstanding AND OVERLAP THEM, and unless you have multiple DIMMs which
> are appropriately interleaved (so different requests hit different
> memory banks), DDR will have essentially no advantage over PC133 at all.
> (This assumes the processor is pipelined enough so 8 memory requests can
> exist.... Our PowerPCs can just about do that, but I don't know about
> Pentiums or Athlons....).
>
> I am not the hardware designer of the system I mentioned, I
> do OS software for it. It is an embedded PowerPC "supercomputer
> on a board" completely unrelated to the PC market. I know enough
> about this to be dangerous.... And I know NOTHING about the
> details of Pentiums or Athlons or PC chipsets.
>
>
> Tom Roberts
------------------------------
From: "frecell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: All of linux in this site. Instruction complete downloads ecc. go to :
http://members.xoom.it/frecell
Date: Sun, 8 Apr 2001 13:34:09 +0200
All of linux in this site. Instruction complete downloads ecc. go to :
http://members.xoom.it/frecell
------------------------------
From: "NiHiLiST" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
linux.redhat.install,alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.abit,alt.os.linux.redhat
Subject: Re: Can't see hard disk
Date: Sun, 8 Apr 2001 13:22:35 +0100
I take it you have another hard drive on the master of the ATA100? If not
then switch it from slave to master mate
Lee Fuller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:3ad0291d$0$25503$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> I have an Abit KT7Raid motherboard which has 4 ATA100 IDE channels on the
> raid controller in addition to the standard 4 ATA66 channels. I have an
IBM
> 30G ATA100 hard disk on the secondary master of the ATA100 controller. On
> the standard channels I have a CD-DVD and ZIP100. The problem I'm having
is
> in trying to install linux. Both fdisk and disk druid do not see the hard
> disk. The only partition shown is 95M ("hdd" or "hdd4") being the ZIP
drive.
> (I have the same problem trying to install QNX) I have Win98 using 20G on
> the hd. Of course the Win98 fdisk sees it ok.
> What should I do?
>
> Thanks,
> Lee.
>
>
------------------------------
From: Bill Shear <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.portable
Subject: synaptics touchpad rocker button
Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2001 12:43:28 GMT
How do I tell X to recognize the rocker button on the synaptics
touchpad?
I wrote a simple program to read /dev/mouse and /dev/psaux. It read
events from the pad and the two buttons, but nothing from the rocker
button. I suspect /dev/mouse and /dev/psaux are not even the right
devices. Any ideas?
BTW I tried the tpconfig program but I don't think it supports the
rocker button.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Dances With Crows)
Subject: Re: Parport problem
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: 08 Apr 2001 12:49:03 GMT
On Sun, 08 Apr 2001 07:21:38 GMT, Gunnar staggered into the Black Sun
and said:
>I have a Fujitsu-Siemens Pro C5 computer with a paralell port that refuses
>to work. I run debian 2.2r2 with 2.2.18pre21 kernel. I have appended some
>output from /proc at the end of the message, but basicly there is a NIC at
>IRQ5 and a soundcard at IRQ9. The parallellport is set to parport_pc style
>and compiled into the kernel. The autoprobe returns correct information
>(see below for output).
>
>Here is what I have done:
>In the BIOS setup I have set the parallelport to use: 378h, irq 7 and the
>"auto" for it's addresses, and I have set the parport style in the BIOS to
>"printer", "bidirectional", "EPP", "ECP". Does anybody have any clue about
>what these means?
There were/are 4 different ways a parallel port can run:
unidirectional, only used on very old machines from the PC-XT area,
bidirectional, where max. data transfer rate was 150KB/s in both
directions, EPP, which increased the transfer rate, and ECP (Extended
Capabilities Port) which increased the transfer rate even more. Some
parport drivers and/or devices didn't work with some settings, but
everything modern should work with the ECP/EPP settings.
>k62:~# cat adsf > /dev/lp0
>su: /dev/lp0: No such device
Is the "lp" module loaded, and does "ls -l /dev/lp0" return the
following?
crw-rw---- 1 root lp 6, 0 Jul 29 2000 /dev/lp0
You must have the "lp" module loaded to get any output from the printer.
If it doesn't exist in /lib/modules/$VERSION/misc/ , then you need to
compile it. When you tried to access /dev/lp0, the kernel module loader
should've loaded the module automatically. Put the following line in
/etc/modules.conf if it isn't there already:
alias char-major-6 lp
>I read email that is sent to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
And I read the newsgroups. What's your point?
>k62:/proc# cat parport/0/hardware
>base: 0x378
>irq: none
>dma: none
>modes: SPP
>k62:/proc# cat parport/0/irq
>none
>k62:/proc# insmod parport_probe
>Using /lib/modules/2.2.18pre23/misc/parport_probe.o
>k62:/proc# cat parport/0/autoprobe
>CLASS:PRINTER;
>MODEL:HP LaserJet 6L;
>MANUFACTURER:Hewlett-Packard;
>DESCRIPTION:Hewlett-Packard LaserJet 6L Printer;
The hardware is there; just get that lp module loaded and you should be
in business. If you wish to use interrupt-driven mode for printing,
which might help performance, try doing "tunelp /dev/lp0 -T on". HTH,
--
Matt G|There is no Darkness in Eternity/But only Light too dim for us to see
Brainbench MVP for Linux Admin / Workin' in a code mine, hittin' Ctrl-Alt
http://www.brainbench.com / Workin' in a code mine, whoops!
=============================/ I hit a seg fault....
------------------------------
From: Rafal Wysocki <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Asus A7A266 hardware bug + Linux 2.4.3 problem
Date: Sun, 8 Apr 2001 14:50:09 +0200
On Sun, 1 Apr 2001, Rafal Wysocki wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> It seems there is a problem with new Asus A7A266 MBs. Namely the clock
> configuration is lost by the MB and the system clock is slowed down (4 or
> 5 times).
Well, the problem is that the Asus BIOS (weird, IMHO) is not happy with
the RTL8139 CONFIG_8139TOO_PIO option (I use an RTL8139-based NIC ;-)).
If the option is not enabled, the whole thing works perfectly.
FYI, the Asus K7V mobo has exactly the same problem.
Regards
Rafael
PS
FYI, Athlon 1.2 GHz on A7A266 (PC133 SDRAMs) is two times as fast as
Athlon 800 MHz on Asus K7V (PC133 SDRAMs, too) as far as the kernel
compliation is concerned (according to bash ;-)).
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Eric R Brueggemann)
Subject: Re: Internal Modem
Date: 8 Apr 2001 13:01:54 GMT
Jonadab,
just out of curiosity, which Zoom modem was this, and what's your mobo?
Thanks,
Eric
On Sat, 07 Apr 2001 22:42:32 GMT, Jonadab the Unsightly One wrote:
>
>> I have a Viking 56k LT internal modem and everything i read says it should
>> work fine, but it never has. I've followed all the instructions i can find,
>> but no luck.
>
>I had problems getting my (Zoom) modem to work under various OSes
>until I disabled the "PNP OS installed" and "Allocate IRQ for USB"
>settings in the BIOS. Don't know if this is related to your
>problem, but it's probably worth trying.
>
>- jonadab
------------------------------
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