So New I have an Umbillical Cord

[Nick]

On Saturday, February 22, 2003, at 07:27 AM, Markus Deistler wrote:

>
> YDL unfortunately just installs "XFree86-4.2.0" as an Xserver, which 
> doesn't
> support old Powermac's video hardware very well (very often 
> slooooooooow
> 16-bit-color or even 8bit-color is all you'll get though you have 4MB 
> VRAM
> for 24bit-color-video in MacOS, and quite a few old ATI cards don't 
> work in
> acclerated mode at all with XF4.0.2 and really require "Xpmac", another
> Xserver that isn't part of the newer YDL-distros anymore but can be 
> ftped
> from YDL's ftpsite).
>

Ok, so trying to assimilate what everyone is saying so far ....

a) Don't give up hope just yet, repartition the old girl and stick with 
os 8/9 (thanks Chuck)
b) its an xserver problem (thanks Markus and Suzanne)

When i started reading about xfree86 last night i started to get a feel 
for what it is and does and so now have a better idea of what you are 
all talking about. I really have no background knowledge of Linux and 
scant Unix knowledge (I'm more your Quark and Photoshop guy), but want 
to learn and like to problem solve, so if you bear with me I'd 
appreciate it.

So, here's what i need to know:

Markus: This xpmac thing sounds promising, is this a good place to get 
it, suitable documentation etc:
http://www.gtlib.cc.gatech.edu/pub/suse/projects/powerpc/xpmac/

Suzanne: Thanks for your help, I looked into the log and then  drifted 
into a codde-based-coma when it sprawled into pages. Is it a positive 
sign that i can get it to boot up in this fail-safe mode?

Everyone: an anyone tell me why on the 2.2 kernel I get a perfectly 
rendered xga penguin watching my screen startup, but on the other 
kernel it looks like the penguin is road kill? (incredibly low colour 
depth and distorted).

Again, thanks everyone, this is beginning to feel like a crusade to 
resurrect this huge piece of beige plastic.