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ATI and 9.2


Big_Baller
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Well I installed 9.2 and X server fails to start. in the installation it also has tells me that 'an error has occurded' when I hit 'test' on the video. damn that sounds like a helpful tip from a M$ programmer :lol: But seriously whats wrong? I can't find the right vmodle number for my monitor in the vendor list I have a View Sonic G90f. Selecting plug n play dosn't work either. I am running the NF7-S XP2500 with ATI 9800pro. Somthing I am missing?

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First thing I wpuld check is that you don't have faulty installation media. If you downloaded ISOs its just a matter of running the checksums and making sure they match. It would at least eliminate one possible cause.

 

Its strange that it couldn't detect your monitor properly. My monitor's manufacture has never been listed but the installer has always managed to work out the settings. I don't know if the option is still in the installer, but have you tried entering the settings manually?

 

Don't give up I have an ATI 7000 (yes I know its ancient) and it perfectly happy under Linux so it should be happy with your 98000 (fingers crossed).

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I just installed Mandrake Linux 9.2 and can't get the video config to work for me. I have an Ati 9600 pro and a Flatron 777fp monitor. No matter how much I play with the settings I can't get it to work. I get the same error message:

 

(EE) Unable to determine the screen layout

 

Any help would be welcome.

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What type of monitor have you got TFT or CRT? (Sorry don't recognise the name) If its a TFT or LCD you might want to just try it with an old fashioned CRT to see if that helps. Also have you tried really basic/low settings?

 

If your Club member you could try downloading the ATI specific kernel and other packages. No idea what the difference between these are the normal ones are but it might be worth trying.

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My monitor is a crt. I have tried everthing but install the new .rpm file from ATI. The trouble is I'm a real noob when it comes to linux and without a GUI I'm totaly lost. I grew up with dos and know nothing about linux commands. If I can't get this to work then I may as well stick with XP pro and stay on the MS band wagon. ( as much as I hate it ) I was formerly and OS/2 lover but that never made it far.

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This reminds me of the problem I had with both mandrake and win98se, with the 1996 vintage NEC MultiSync XV1700+ (I think the model is correct). When I selected the correct model in the hardware list: HUGE TROUBLE! In mandrake, it was best to use a generic monitor for this. In win98se, it chose the XV1700 (not the + model) and it worked fine. I learned a lesson on that experience.

 

Now, I have an ATI XPert 2000 Pro 32 MB 4x AGP and mandrake sees it as a Rage 128. No problems. My generic 15 inch flat panel TFT monitor is seen as a Custom monitor by Mandrake. I leave these hardware selections alone. NO problems.

 

The only thing I did was turn on hardware acceleration for the ATI card. I did NOT test it, as I tried that and it came up with an error. (Maybe a bug somewhere in the test?).

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I'll try that command. Tried to find a command list but they are scarse. I think it's time to go out and buy a book. I'll try out the force switch and see how it goes and let you know. Thanks again for the help.

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I tried everything I could with the knowledge I have ( very limited ) and installed anouther linux package. Icepack. That install went nice and smooth and had no problems with it recognizing my hardware. Too bad since I was really looking forward to using Mandrake. Oh well, maybe anouther version. Thanks for the help guys. A shame I don't have the linux knowledge to make use of it a little better.

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I have done a bit of research about ATI cards (nearly every laptop I was considering had one of the ATI cards). Apparently, even if you could get 9800 up and running, it is unlikely that 3D support will work in XFree86. Nevetheless, my impression was that, after some tweaking it is possible to get it working. If tweaking is not an option, either get NVIDIA, or check out commercial alternatives to XFree86; e.g. www.xig.com. I have no experience with their X server, but it seems that they have done a lot of work on radeon.

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I did a check on that site and they have no support for the Radion 9600 Pro. They only support the older cards and are asking a good price for the little program itself. As a matter of fact I can't find support for any high end card not even from ATI. The new rpm file from ati does not support my card either. I'm starting to wonder if linux is mainly designed to work around lower end machines since it is a realitivly cheap form of software. I love it but wish there was more support for more modern hardware around.

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The information on that site is a bit outdated. You may want to email them as well as ATI and check with them as to their plans to release the driver. Nvidia seems to be more Linux friendly, so you may want to consider replacing your videocard.

Otherwise, this forum is exceptionally good in helping newbies, so stick around and I am sure you'll solve the problem.

 

Hardware support in Linux has always been an issue. The lesson I've learned is that you need to check hardware compatibility lists *before* you buy. The upside of Linux is that even with older hardware you get a system which can do many things for the home user for less.

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Dear Radeon user,

 

I have experienced a lot of problems with ATI Radeon 7000 and XFree 4.3, I know a number of tweaks, I will list options available to you:

 

If you are not a power user and want to use your TV out, use the vesa driver raher than the radeon driver. The simplest way to arrange this is to edit /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 so that the driver line reads "vesa" rather than "radeon". Other suggestions along these conservative lines that may get you going are the fbdev framebuffer driver or the SVGA server in XFree 3.3.6.

 

If you are a power user, there are a number of possibilities:

 

1. Go to the URL www.xfree86.org/~alanh/drivers/x86/ and replace your XFree setup with the latest CVS (Do a file by file replacement, I recommend that you back up your old configuration just in case). I think there is a bug in the register usage which affects radeon cards manufactured by HIS, particularly if you have a VIA or SIS chipset based mainboard, this is addressed by a patch in the CVS branch.

2. Go to the URL http://gatos.sourceforge.net/ and replace your XFree radeon driver by the Gatos radeon driver as per the instructions on that website. I think there is also a HOWTO.

 

3. Go the the ATI Website: They have Linux drivers for some of their cards that even includes a version of Catalyst. I have fears that the driver may not fully support cards made by third party manufacturers using ATI chips.

 

4. There is a commercially available driver that replaces XFree, I do not remember the website, but I am sure you can track it from altavista or google.

 

Another word of caution: Unfortunately the Mandrake X configurator, as well as the Red Hat X configurator or xf86config in Slackware may not correctly identify all of your monitor settings. Try to enter all modes manually. Alternatively, the Knoppix 3.3 and SuSe 9.0 X configurator software can do a better job. You may be able to boot with the Knoppix or SuSe Live Eval CD, if X starts there copy the appropriate stanzas of the XF86Config or XF86Config-4 file that they create to your Mandrake setup and this may get you going.

 

Finally:

1. Are you sure that agpgart is enabled in your kernel or is loaded as a module. Please double check this point. A mistake here will prevent you from using any driver other than framebuffer.

 

2. Are you sharing an IRQ between your graphics card and mouse or other hardware (modem)? Via chipsets are particularly fussy about this. Via issues Windows patches for this but as far as I know, no specific Linux patches are available. I have had colleagues changing from a PS/2 mouse to a port mouse to circumvent this.

 

Good luck

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