Puppy 1.0.3 with Xfree86-4.4.0 iso released

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Puppy 1.0.3 with Xfree86-4.4.0 iso released

#1 Post by Guest »

I am pleased to announce that last night I uploaded a version based on 1.0.3 with a very cutdown XFree86-4.4.0 Xserver. This is limited to vesa as no other modules\drivers others than those required have been included. The gfx response is alot quicker than using the framebuffer.

To avoid confusion the boot options are 1, 2 and 5 as per standard puppy.

You must type xwin to start the gui interface after booting

Scroll mouse support is not included yet, but it is a simple matter of editing /etc/X11/XF86Config......I'll have to search my notes for the config values

Hopefully this should work on a wide range of machines, the binaries are the ones available directly for the XFree86 sight, precompiled binaries.

The usr_cram.fs is around about 3MB larger than the standard and the ramdisk (image.gz) is 16MB as opposed to 11-12MB but the madwifi drivers have also been included.

http://www.edgarbrits.net/puppy/cd-pupp ... theros.iso

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BarryK
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#2 Post by BarryK »

bladehunter, that's great!
I'm keen to download it, problem is, I'm on dialup right now,
a very slow dialup.
I have to go to my daughter's place to access adsl,
so have to wait until Monday :(

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pakt
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Re: Puppy 1.0.3 with Xfree86-4.4.0 iso released

#3 Post by pakt »

bladehunter wrote:I am pleased to announce that last night I uploaded a version based on 1.0.3 with a very cutdown XFree86-4.4.0 Xserver. This is limited to vesa as no other modules\drivers others than those required have been included.
Nice work, bladehunter!

Was it difficult to do? Perhaps a similar Xserver could be made for the i810...

XFree86-4.4.0 has built-in support for the i810 graphics chipset family.

I would be willing to give it a try...is it something even a compiling newbie like me could do?

What is needed (compiling environment, source code, etc)?

Alternatively, if you've got a setup to make the vesa version, perhaps it would be a simple matter to replace the vesa modules/drivers with the i810 ones (i810, agpgart, int10 are the ones I know about).

If you need more info, I'm running Kanotix on my Dell 510m laptop. I can check the XFree86 log file to see exactly which modules get loaded.

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#4 Post by Guest »

I'm pretty sure the vesa driver should work for that chipset.


Are you in a position to give an vesa config a whirl ?

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pakt
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#5 Post by pakt »

bladehunter wrote:I'm pretty sure the vesa driver should work for that chipset.
Edited: I haven't actually tried bladehunter's iso since I have a slow dial-up, so I should have written:

It will probably work for the i810, however, I would most likely get the poor resolution that I get with puppy's standard Xvesa, ie 640x480x16 :(

That is why there is a separate i810 driver included in XFree86-4.4.0. Ref: Release Notes for XFree86[tm] 4.4.0 : Drivers

This i810 driver uses the int10 module to allocate more video memory, then the agpgart module makes it appear as linear memory.

The vesa driver does not use these extra modules which are required for the i810, i810-DC100, i810e, i815, 830M, 845G, 852GM, 855GM, and 865G chipsets.
Last edited by pakt on Mon 27 Jun 2005, 06:31, edited 1 time in total.

Glitchman

Doesn't work on my Intel 815 chipset :(

#6 Post by Glitchman »

Since I have an Intel 815 chipset, and the standard Puppy gives me very limited video options, I was naturally curious to try this out. As soon as I typed xwin and hit Enter, my screen went red and had lines everywhere. Fearing that it might damage my monitor, I Control-Alt-Backspaced out. No luck here. :(

Do I have any other options, or does this only work with an Intel 810 chipset?

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Flash
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Re: Doesn't work on my Intel 815 chipset :(

#7 Post by Flash »

Glitchman wrote:Since I have an Intel 815 chipset, and the standard Puppy gives me very limited video options, I was naturally curious to try this out. As soon as I typed xwin and hit Enter, my screen went red and had lines everywhere. Fearing that it might damage my monitor, I Control-Alt-Backspaced out. No luck here. :(

Do I have any other options, or does this only work with an Intel 810 chipset?
Ditto for me. FIC Sabre 815t.

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pakt
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Re: Doesn't work on my Intel 815 chipset :(

#8 Post by pakt »

Glitchman wrote:Since I have an Intel 815 chipset <snip>
Do I have any other options, or does this only work with an Intel 810 chipset?
Glitchman (and Flash), please read my post just above yours about using the i810 driver instead of the vesa driver.

Check this page. It clearly says that the i810 driver supports the i810, i810-DC100, i810e, i815, 830M, 845G, 852GM, 855GM, and 865G chipsets.

I'm hoping bladehunter can help us out with this as he has managed to get XFree86-4.4.0 (with the vesa driver only) working with puppy. :wink:

Glitchman

Re: Doesn't work on my Intel 815 chipset :(

#9 Post by Glitchman »

pakt wrote:Glitchman (and Flash), please read my post just above yours about using the i810 driver instead of the vesa driver.
That's essentially my question: How do I use the i810 driver? All I know is that it's obviously something I must do at the command prompt, since I cannot get into the GUI with xwin.
pakt wrote:I'm hoping bladehunter can help us out with this as he has managed to get XFree86-4.4.0 (with the vesa driver only) working with puppy. :wink:
I will be anxiously awaiting as well. I guess I'll just have to be patient for now. :)

Guest

#10 Post by Guest »

Ok guys this may work with a known working XF86Config
(ie another distro you may have used on that machine)

Puppy includes the agpgart kernel module, dunno about the int10 module.

I guess you'd modprobe agpgart first before starting the xserver

copy the known good config to /etc/X11/

untar the tarball to /usr/X11R6/lib/modules/drivers

then give it a whirl

Failing that I'll try a , ahem, full install of XFree86 from the binary tarballs on the xfree86.org site


BTW ignore the keymap and font errors it should work fine...well my machine does.......

Oh yeah only try the above with my XFree86 version of puppy
Attachments
i810_drv.tar.gz
XFree86 4.4.0 i810 driver
(65.43 KiB) Downloaded 1119 times

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pakt
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#11 Post by pakt »

Thanks, bladehunter. I've downloaded the driver and am downloading cd-puppy-XFree86-4.4.0-atheros.iso right now using my slooow dial-up. Should have it in 3-4 hours...

I'll get back to you with the results. Keep your fingers crossed. ;)

Guest

#12 Post by Guest »

Cool, if you need any additional stuff just let me know, we'll get ya cooking :)

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Lobster
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#13 Post by Lobster »

Good luck

How exciting! :) Really hope it works for you . . .
Puppy Raspup 8.2Final 8)
Puppy Links Page http://www.smokey01.com/bruceb/puppy.html :D

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pakt
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#14 Post by pakt »

Progress! We're almost there :)

It's only running at 640x480x16, but that's because of a (hopefully) small problem.

Checking the XFree86 log, module i810 loads fine. It then loads sub-module int10 OK. Then I get an error:

Unable to open /dev/agpgart (no such file or directory)

I checked and this device is missing in the puppy-XFree86-4.4.0-atheros iso. I compared with Kanotix which does have this device in /dev.

agpgart is the memory manager that 'organizes' the scattered extra memory that int10 has coerced from the BIOS, into linear memory that can be used by the i810 module (Kanotix reports 832KB before agpgart runs - 8MB after agpgart has done its job).

That's what's not happening here - only the pre-allocated 832KB is available, limiting the video mode to 640x480x16.

Unfortunately, I don't know how to 'get' this device. It is a file of 0 bytes...
We're sooo close...anybody know how to fix this :?

Guest

#15 Post by Guest »

did you modprobe agpgart before starting the Xsession ?


I'd assume if that module isn't loaded the device wont be there ?


If that fails start up a known working distro

#ls -l /dev/agpagart

and relay the output

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pakt
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#16 Post by pakt »

bladehunter wrote:did you modprobe agpgart before starting the Xsession ?
Oops! :oops: Did miss the 'modprobe agpgart' part, but it didn't make any difference in the end as /dev/agpgart is still missing.

Output from 'ls -l /dev/agpgart' is:
crw-rw---- 1 root video 10, 175 Feb 9 18:40 /dev/agpgart

I checked my Linux books. In /sbin/MAKEDEV (the one in Kanotix - quite a convoluted file with lots of variables :? ), I found the definition (or part of it anyway) for /dev/agpgart and tried using mknod to create it.

I think I almost succeded, but the group 'video' doesn't exist. Tried defining the group, but the syntax for 'addgroup' is different from the one in Kanotix :(

in /etc/group (Kanotix):
video:x:44:paul

Guest

#17 Post by Guest »

From RedHat 9.0 & Slackware 9.1

crw-r--r-- 1 root root 10, 175 Jan 30 2003 /dev/agpgart


owner is root & group is root

mayhaps this may work ?

Guest

#18 Post by Guest »

bladehunter wrote:crw-r--r-- 1 root root 10, 175 Jan 30 2003 /dev/agpgart

mayhaps this may work ?
YES :!: We finally did it :D

I'm writing this from Puppy with a screen resolution of . . . wait for it . . . 1280x1024 on my Dell Inspiron 510m with an external 17" screen.

Wow, the icons are almost too small now ;)

Even if there are some details still left to be worked out, at least we got i810 support to work. This should help other Puppy users using this chipset :)

I created the device /dev/agpgart like this:

# mknod /dev/agpgart c 10 175

I'm using a working XF86Config from Kanotix. I have not yet tried

# X -configure

which I believe will create a new XF86Config in the home directory.

I took a screen snapshot, but the file is 189K - maybe too large to attach.

OK, time to get used to working with Puppy, now that I have a little space on my desktop for the applications ;)

Thanks to all for support and encouragement, especially bladehunter!

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#19 Post by pakt »

Whoops, that last post is from me - in all the excitement :shock: I forgot to log on during the first run of Mozilla in Puppy...

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#20 Post by Guest »

Excellent....


When you finally get a smooth running system let me know and we'll incorporate all the details into the next XFree86 release if Barry doesn't put XFree into "MainStream Puppy".

I know there is still a few issues left to play with like keybaord mapping and cleaning up the fonts and what not but least we got you going.

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