From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org ([208.92.234.80] helo=lists.gentoo.org) by finch.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1NZanu-0004Nn-Qd for garchives@archives.gentoo.org; Tue, 26 Jan 2010 02:05:19 +0000 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id E615CE0E14 for ; Tue, 26 Jan 2010 02:05:09 +0000 (UTC) Received: from lo.gmane.org (lo.gmane.org [80.91.229.12]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C8A19E09CE for ; Tue, 26 Jan 2010 01:05:07 +0000 (UTC) Received: from list by lo.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.50) id 1NZZrd-0003r3-1m for gentoo-amd64@lists.gentoo.org; Tue, 26 Jan 2010 02:05:05 +0100 Received: from ip68-231-22-224.ph.ph.cox.net ([68.231.22.224]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Tue, 26 Jan 2010 02:05:05 +0100 Received: from 1i5t5.duncan by ip68-231-22-224.ph.ph.cox.net with local (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Tue, 26 Jan 2010 02:05:05 +0100 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ To: gentoo-amd64@lists.gentoo.org From: Duncan <1i5t5.duncan@cox.net> Subject: [gentoo-amd64] Re: video driver / system state question Date: Tue, 26 Jan 2010 01:04:42 +0000 (UTC) Message-ID: References: <5bdc1c8b1001251520x3aae67b6ld7ba028d365eb757@mail.gmail.com> Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Linux mail X-BeenThere: gentoo-amd64@lists.gentoo.org Reply-to: gentoo-amd64@lists.gentoo.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: ip68-231-22-224.ph.ph.cox.net User-Agent: Pan/0.133 (House of Butterflies) Sender: news Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Archives-Salt: a1c8d82f-e01e-4410-b5fe-d250314d08f4 X-Archives-Hash: 4682460b8b313937a71ac2a3d5e401b0 Nikos Chantziaras posted on Tue, 26 Jan 2010 02:10:23 +0200 as excerpted: > On 01/26/2010 01:20 AM, Mark Knecht wrote: >> Hi, >> I've been working on trying to get this new machine to run X. So >> far no luck =3D:^( >> but I'm learning so it's interesting. =3D:^) >> My quick question goes like this - if I boot with no drivers I get >> a VGA console. If I modprobe a frame buffer driver at boot time then I >> get a nice looking but slow frame buffer console. All good so far. >> However my graphics adapter is supposed to use the i915 driver and whe= n >> I modprobe that - either in auto-load or at the command like after >> logging in - my screen goes 'black'. I'm wondering what I do - other >> than look at what's in dmesg - to figure out what state the machine is >> in. Is the screen turned off? Is the driver running and putting out >> 'black'? >=20 > I might be wrong, but it sounds like the driver tries to use KMS (kerne= l > mode setting) which conflicts with other framebuffer drivers (KMS > provides a fast framebuffer console on its own). Yes. See below... > So two things to try here: >=20 > A. Completely disable the vesafb driver. > B. Disable KMS in the i915 driver: > . When built as a module, use the "modeset=3D0" parameter . When bu= ilt > in the kernel, use "i915.modeset=3D0" in Grub >=20 > Of course this assumes that KMS is indeed the problem. I'm using the Intel X driver on my netbook now, so am beginning to follow= =20 it, but I don't know as much about it, particularly the xorg.conf setting= s=20 as so far I've been running entirely xorg.conf-less, as I do the radeon=20 freedomware driver I use on my desktop. However... If I'm remembering what I've been reading correctly, the newest Intel=20 drivers are KMS *ONLY* -- they have *NO* non-kms mode. Of course, the=20 kernel vgacon should still work for text mode, but once X starts, you'll=20 get, probably, a black screen, unless you're running KMS. KMS being the=20 only choice, you better make sure that's what the kernel is using, no=20 vgacon, and no vesafb (thus choice A above). That said, "newest" is new enough it's probably not yet gentoo-stable, so= =20 if you're running stable, you can probably use choice B, if desired. But= =20 it's probably wise to get KMS working now, since that's soon to be the=20 only choice (unless you want to run the unaccelerated X vesa-framebuffer=20 driver, IDR the exact name ATM, instead of the intel driver).=20 --=20 Duncan - List replies preferred. No HTML msgs. "Every nonfree program has a lord, a master -- and if you use the program, he is your master." Richard Stallman