ydl 3.0 on a 17" iMac

[John Howland]

I purchased the Geek Edition and found that no graphical
installer would run so I installed everything via text
installer and that went ok except that it installed
a copy of /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0
as /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth1 which caused
problems until removed.  The promo stuff for 3.0 says
iMac's with NVIDIA hardware are supported, but I'm having
difficulties.  I have a fair amount of Linux experience with
XF86Config files, but am unable to get X going on this one.
I've read the list archives (lots of questions on this but
no answers), so here goes again.  How do you get X going?

Hardware/Software

[root@Helene root]# cat /proc/version
Linux version 2.4.20-8d (dburcaw@skyfox.terraplex.com) (gcc version 3.2.2 20030217 (Yellow Dog Linux 3.0 3.2.2-2a)) #1 Sat Mar 15 19:38:12 EST 2003
[root@Helene root]# cat /proc/cpuinfo 
cpu             : 7450, altivec supported
clock           : 800MHz
revision        : 2.1 (pvr 8000 0201)
bogomips        : 797.90
machine         : PowerMac4,5
motherboard     : PowerMac4,5 MacRISC2 MacRISC Power Macintosh
detected as     : 271 (Unknown Pangea-based)
pmac flags      : 00000000
L2 cache        : 256K unified
memory          : 256MB
pmac-generation : NewWorld

[root@Helene proc]# cat pci
PCI devices found:
...
  Bus  0, device  16, function  0:
    VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV17 [GeForce4 440 Go] (rev 163).
      IRQ 48.
      Master Capable.  Latency=248.  Min Gnt=5.Max Lat=1.
      Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0x91000000 [0x91ffffff].
      Prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0x98000000 [0x9fffffff].
      Prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xf1000000 [0xf107ffff].
...

[root@Helene proc]# fbset --info

mode "1440x900-72"
    # D: 100.000 MHz, H: 67.568 kHz, V: 71.880 Hz
    geometry 1440 900 1440 900 8
    timings 10000 16 16 16 16 8 8
    rgba 8/0,8/0,8/0,0/0
endmode

Frame buffer device information:
    Name        : OFfb NVDA,Displ
    Address     : 0x98004000
    Size        : 1382400
    Type        : PACKED PIXELS
    Visual      : STATIC PSEUDOCOLOR
    XPanStep    : 0
    YPanStep    : 0
    YWrapStep   : 0
    LineLength  : 1536
    Accelerator : No

I can get an /etc/X11/XF86Config file which doesn't crash X,
but the resulting display is unusable.  However, with gdm running
(after a config change) I can connect to the machine with another
X server.  The supplied display tools are not usable (since
they start and stop the local X server).

You can run redhat-config-xfree86 through a ssh session to the machine
from a machine with a working X server.  When I do this, I get the message:

[root@Helene root]# redhat-config-xfree86 --output=XF86Config
* ddcprobe returned bogus values:
ID:   APP279c
Name: None
HorizSync: None
VertSync:  None

However, running ddcprobe from the command line I get:

[root@Helene root]# ddcprobe

Videocard DDC probe results
Description:  OFfb NVDA,Displ
Memory (MB):  16

Monitor DDC probe results
ID: APP279c
Width (mm): 370
Height(mm): 230

As you can see, ddcprobe reports 16MB (not 32MB).

Any attempt to change any parms while running
redhat-config-xfree86 result in various errors such as:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/share/redhat-config-xfree86/xConfigDialog.py", line 161, in configure_monitor
    self.state.recalc_mode()
  File "/usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/rhpl/xhwstate.py", line 432, in recalc_mode
    self.colordepth = availableDepth[-1]
IndexError: list index out of range
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/share/redhat-config-xfree86/xConfigDialog.py", line 140, in ok
    self.state.set_colordepth(depth)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/rhpl/xhwstate.py", line 440, in set_colordepth
    self.recalc_mode()
  File "/usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/rhpl/xhwstate.py", line 432, in recalc_mode
    self.colordepth = availableDepth[-1]
IndexError: list index out of range

Once an error such as this has occurred, redhat-config-xfree86 won't
write its output.

John

-- 
________________________________________________________________
John E. Howland        url: http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~jhowland/
Computer Science     email: jhowland@ariel.cs.trinity.edu
Trinity University   voice: (210) 999-7364
715 Stadium Drive      fax: (210) 999-7477
San Antonio, Texas  78212-7200