Why don't we start harassing Dell and Gateway since this is a known problem with the BIOS. If we start with a standard petition email that clearly states what is wrong and what needs to be done to fix it that might work. A little bad press by sending this petition to other groups and areas letting other open source users know that X will not work on these laptops and to avoid buying them. Stephen -----Original Message----- From: xfree86-admin@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:xfree86-admin@xxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Donald G. Knecht Sent: Tuesday, December 16, 2003 7:49 AM To: xfree86@xxxxxxxxxxx Subject: RE: Can't start X with I830M chipset, 8MB preallocated video RAM Join the club, sorry I can't be any help, I have same problem after gateway "upgraded" my bios, I was hoping xfree v4.4 drivers would resolve this, but I see you have tried it with no luck Maybe the anser is to get intel to pressure dell and gateway to quit F***'n Around with the bios on these laptops, by the time the developers figure out how to get it working the mfg's change the bios and it quits working.... .....BTW as a non-coder, I'd like to thank all developers for their Work on xfree86, keep up the good work! -----Original Message----- From: xfree86-admin@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:xfree86-admin@xxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Gabriel Bauman Sent: Monday, December 15, 2003 5:32 PM To: XFree86@xxxxxxxxxxx Subject: Can't start X with I830M chipset, 8MB preallocated video RAM Hello, I can't get XFree86 to start up on my laptop with an Intel 830M video chipset. I'm running kernel 2.4.22 and XFree86 4.3.99.901 (4.4 RC1). I've built and installed the latest DRI kernel stuff. AGP GART support is in the kernel. My video bios pre-allocates about 8MB of shared video RAM, which should be more than enough for 1024x768x16 graphics. My video hardware and flat panel are all detected perfectly by the X server. No matter what I put in my config file, XFree86 still dies with "No Video BIOS modes for chosen depth"... It doesn't matter how low I set my resolution and color depth, I still get the error. One problem seems to be that the driver's attempt to tell my BIOS about the extra video RAM it's allocated for X's use is failing. The thing is, the BIOS knows about ~8MB of video RAM without the driver telling it anything, and that should be enough for 1024x768x16. agpgart also sees 8MB of video ram at boot, so I SHOULD be able to at least get a screen running! If it helps any driver developers, the BIOS I'm working with is inside a Dell Inspiron 2600 laptop and is release A09. I would go harass Dell but I don't know what to ask for. If anyone can confirm my take on this issue, I'd appreciate it. I've attached the full log and config file. Sure hope someone out there can help! Thanks, Gabe _______________________________________________ XFree86 mailing list XFree86@xxxxxxxxxxx http://XFree86.Org/mailman/listinfo/xfree86 _______________________________________________ XFree86 mailing list XFree86@xxxxxxxxxxx http://XFree86.Org/mailman/listinfo/xfree86
