Glad to hear things worked out. We've never used the Omega package, though
I think it still exists.
My son's machine is backed all the way back to 6.1, to avoid conflict with
one video game's anti-cheat kernel, but there are very recent software
versions which support AGP (eg, the 2008 Radeon HD3650 came in an AGP
version, and versions of Catalyst written for it should work on ThinkPads
with Mobility Radeon). You just have to find the right one.
David
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Jonathan Berry" <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, August 24, 2009 7:25 PM
To: <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [Thinkpad] Widescreen monitor and X32
Success. In the DriverHeaven forum for Radeon and Win XP,
there was a posting about Omega, a popular packaging of the ATI
drivers that seems to have faded away. In that thread, an
owner of a Thinkpad T41 complained that he was having a
particular problem. Thus was indicated that the version of
Omega under discussion, which corresponded to Catalyst 7.1,
would support both Mobility Radeon and AGP. I DL'd Catalyst
7.1.2, the last of the 7.1 series, and last of the 7 series
too. I noted that the 8 series for WinXP was considerably
smaller in MB, so perhaps that's when they dropped the AGP and
Mobility Radeon support.
The right-click desktop says that it supports 1920x1080 in an
external monitor. We'll see what happens when the monster
arrives.
The Catalyst Control Center looks great.
Thank you, David Ross!
To add to the confusion, the latest Catalyst version at the
DriverHeaven website, Catalyst 8.12 (the one I DL'd), does not
seem to be the latest Catalyst version. I see mention of the
availability of 9.x in posts.
I'm not sure why they have all those versions of Catalyst
available, yet don't mention AGP on either the modder page or
the Catalyst download page.
There is also something called an "AGP hotfix" which came out
in conjunction with the Catalyst releases. For example 8.8 and
8.9. These get talked about in the DriverHeaven forums, but I
haven't located a description of what they are supposed
to do.
They told me to use the latest Catalyst. If I need an earlier
Catalyst version, as you suggest, I am unable to determine
which version, despite some time searching their forum, putting
appropriate terms in google, and following up the hits.
I will check later tonight to see what we have running on my son's T42.
However, that one is a fairly old one (maybe 6.x) so as to be compatible
with some games of his.
David
I'll try again, adding the term AGP to my searches.
If you just try the desktop drivers, without following exactly the
instructions involving the mod tool, this is what will happen. The
reason
is that ATI has intentionally (and unnecessarily) excluded Mobility
Radeon
from the list of chipsets Catalyst supports, the process at the website
is
designed to circumvent this crippling.
Another problem that might arise is that since a few years ago, only
every
other release of Catalyst supports AGP graphics, so you need to make
sure
that the one you download includes AGP chipsets (like the X32).
David
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Jonathan Berry" <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, August 24, 2009 11:26 AM
To: <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [Thinkpad] Widescreen monitor and X32
Everything seemed to go smoothly, but after I rebooted
I got this message:
"No ATI graphics driver is installed, or the ATI driver is not
functioning properly. Please install the ATI driver
appropriate for your ATI hardware [OK]"
which also comes up when you right click the desktop and click
Catalyst.
The right click desktop Settings are now pretty basic. No
external monitor, for example.
Perhaps the problem relates to my downloading the latest
(8.12) Catalyst XP drivers rather than using the method David
suggested.
The instructions *did* state:
3: Download the newest desktop [sic] drivers from www.ati.com (or get
them from Driver Heaven Downloads).
I got Catalyst from Driver Heaven, as the ATI (AMD) site did
not navigate properly for me in Firefox.
I tried to look up what version of Catalyst I should be using
by searching the DriverHeaven forums, but unfortunately they
don't allow a search for multiple keywords such as "Thinkpad
X32", while searches for "Thinkpad" and "X32" separately are
pointless. Too bad IBM didn't skip from X31 to X33, omitting
the number corresponding to 2 to the power 5.
I guess I could re-install the Lenovo ATI drivers that I
DL'd this morning. That should bring back the capability to
have an external monitor, albeit not of the desired resolution.
I googled a blog entry in Chinese (which I don't read) which
seemed to indicate that a mod of the Catalyst 6.5 drivers
(Omega V3.8.252) from 2006 might work. I'm investigating ....
You want to install the highest version of the ATI Catalyst drivers
that
support the X32 chipset. The problem is that ATI won't let the
Catalyst
drivers install on laptops, but you can make them install using a
thing
called "modtool". Start here:
http://www.driverheaven.net/modtool.php
David
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Jonathan Berry" <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, August 24, 2009 4:35 AM
To: <[email protected]>
Subject: [Thinkpad] Widescreen monitor and X32
There's a 1900x1080 monitor coming into the household, and I'm
wondering how I might best make use of it with my X32.
The following thread
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=77753
contains a discussion pertaining to Intel chipsets
(for the X4* models). It's a bit difficult to follow, for
Little Old Me, but it does seem that with some tinkering
you can get a wide monitor to fully work on an X4*--
but since the X32 has as its graphics card an
ATI Mobility Radeon 7000
maybe it doesn't apply. The poster writes about looking
at ig*.inf files which don't exist on my computer, I guess
because ig means "Intel Graphics". I have a lot of ati*.inf
files instead.
I also looked in the Thinkwiki and didn't find much.
On the desktop, the X32 gives options only for installing
4:3 external monitors. That doesn't change when I install
the .inf file for the wide monitor.
Or is my best approach just to tempt the other computer user
(who has a desktop) with the wide monitor and hope to glom on to
her
4:3 monitor?
And while I'm here, is there any chance of using a monitor
sideways as an external monitor? For example 1080x1920
(of course I'm dreaming) or 1024x1280 (the 90 degree rotation
of which, 1280x1024, *is* supported by the X32).
--
happy
Jonathan Berry and Erika http://members.shaw.ca/berry5868/fun.htm
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