Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

[Giuseppe Bilotta]

Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2004 00:37:58 +0100
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Hello,

I have recently started to migrate to Linux on my DELL laptop; 
everything is going pretty smoothly, but one thing I can't seem to 
enable is the framebuffer to take advantage, in console, of the high 
resolution my video card and monitor can afford.

The video card is an nVidia GeForce 2 Go, on a Dell Inspiron 8200, 
and the monitor is their UXGA monitor (1600x1200). The system BIOS is 
version A11, which means the video card BIOS is up to version 
3.11.01.44.D1.

The system I'm running is a Debian testing/unstable updated every two 
or three days.

I tried the following things with the kernels 2.4.22, 2.6.0, 2.6.1, 
2.6.2, 2.6.3 (self-compiled) more or less always with the same 
results:

1. The vga framebuffer works. I can even bring the monitor to 800x600 
in tweaked VGA mode.

2. The VESA framebuffer does not work. Apparently, the card is not 
detected as VESA-compatible. (I'm not 100% sure about this --how can 
I check if this is indeed the case?)

3. The Riva framebuffer doesn't work either. It detects the video 
card all right, understands that I'm running on a laptop and thus 
with an LCD monitor, but as soon as I "touch" it (be it even just 
with a fbset -i to find the information), the screen goes blank or 
has some very funny graphical effects (fade to black in the middle, 
etc). The system doesn't lock up (I can still blind-type and reset 
it), but I can't use it.

Does anybody know what could be wrong?


The only thing which I can think of is that even Windows drivers have 
problems with this particular setup; the only documentation I could 
find on the matter is here

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/

(Go to "Dell laptop owners")

HTH,

-- 
Giuseppe "Oblomov" Bilotta

Can't you see
It all makes perfect sense
Expressed in dollar and cents
Pounds shillings and pence
                  (Roger Waters)

Re: Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

[James Simmons]

> 1. The vga framebuffer works. I can even bring the monitor to 800x600 
> in tweaked VGA mode.

Cool :-) I assume you mean the vga16fb driver.

> 2. The VESA framebuffer does not work. Apparently, the card is not 
> detected as VESA-compatible. (I'm not 100% sure about this --how can 
> I check if this is indeed the case?)

Are you sure. Take a look at your vga= parmeter. What is its value?
 
> 3. The Riva framebuffer doesn't work either. It detects the video 
> card all right, understands that I'm running on a laptop and thus 
> with an LCD monitor, but as soon as I "touch" it (be it even just 
> with a fbset -i to find the information), the screen goes blank or 
> has some very funny graphical effects (fade to black in the middle, 
> etc). The system doesn't lock up (I can still blind-type and reset 
> it), but I can't use it.
> 
> Does anybody know what could be wrong?

That is a bug in fbcon layer. Now that I have my home system back up I 
plan to test my radeon card to track down the bug that was preventing the 
layer from properly resizing the screen.

Re: Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

[Giuseppe Bilotta]

James Simmons wrote:
> 
> > 1. The vga framebuffer works. I can even bring the monitor to 800x600 
> > in tweaked VGA mode.
> 
> Cool :-) I assume you mean the vga16fb driver.

Yes :)

> > 2. The VESA framebuffer does not work. Apparently, the card is not 
> > detected as VESA-compatible. (I'm not 100% sure about this --how can 
> > I check if this is indeed the case?)
> 
> Are you sure. Take a look at your vga= parmeter. What is its value?

I tried vga=ask, and no VESA modes are detected.

> > 3. The Riva framebuffer doesn't work either. It detects the video 
> > card all right, understands that I'm running on a laptop and thus 
> > with an LCD monitor, but as soon as I "touch" it (be it even just 
> > with a fbset -i to find the information), the screen goes blank or 
> > has some very funny graphical effects (fade to black in the middle, 
> > etc). The system doesn't lock up (I can still blind-type and reset 
> > it), but I can't use it.
> > 
> > Does anybody know what could be wrong?
> 
> That is a bug in fbcon layer. Now that I have my home system back up I 
> plan to test my radeon card to track down the bug that was preventing the 
> layer from properly resizing the screen.

Is there a particular reason why it would blank out even when just 
asking for information, without changing any setting?

-- 
Giuseppe "Oblomov" Bilotta

Can't you see
It all makes perfect sense
Expressed in dollar and cents
Pounds shillings and pence
                  (Roger Waters)

Re: Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

[Giuseppe Bilotta]

> > > 2. The VESA framebuffer does not work. Apparently, the card is not 
> > > detected as VESA-compatible. (I'm not 100% sure about this --how can 
> > > I check if this is indeed the case?)
> > 
> > Are you sure. Take a look at your vga= parmeter. What is its value?
> 
> I tried vga=ask, and no VESA modes are detected.

Ok, I'm stupid. I tried vga=ask, told him to scan, still got no VESA 
modes in the list, but thenand tried 318; it gave me 1024x768 (so did 
718 too, any reason why?). Can't get to 1600x1200, though (or at 
least I don't know how.)

> > > 3. The Riva framebuffer doesn't work either. It detects the video 
> > > card all right, understands that I'm running on a laptop and thus 
> > > with an LCD monitor, but as soon as I "touch" it (be it even just 
> > > with a fbset -i to find the information), the screen goes blank or 
> > > has some very funny graphical effects (fade to black in the middle, 
> > > etc). The system doesn't lock up (I can still blind-type and reset 
> > > it), but I can't use it.
> > > 
> > > Does anybody know what could be wrong?
> > 
> > That is a bug in fbcon layer. Now that I have my home system back up I 
> > plan to test my radeon card to track down the bug that was preventing the 
> > layer from properly resizing the screen.
> 
> Is there a particular reason why it would blank out even when just 
> asking for information, without changing any setting?

Now that I can work with the VESA driver, I'm feeling much better, 
but if I load the rivafb driver I *still* get the problem (I cannot 
touch it, not even with fbset -i). Using 2.6.4;

Just for reference, these are the logs from vesafb, rivafb and lspci:

>From vesafb:
===
vesafb: framebuffer at 0xe0000000, mapped to 0xd0807000, size 16384k
vesafb: mode is 1024x768x32, linelength=4096, pages=1
vesafb: protected mode interface info at c000:d6a0
vesafb: pmi: set display start = c00cd6e5, set palette = c00cd76a
vesafb: pmi: ports = b4c3 b503 ba03 c003 c103 c403 c503 c603 c703 
c803 c903 cc03 ce03 cf03 d003 d103 d203 d303 d403 d503 da03 ff03 
vesafb: scrolling: ypan using protected mode interface, yres_virtual=
4096
vesafb: directcolor: size=8:8:8:8, shift=24:16:8:0 
===

>From rivafb:
===
rivafb: nVidia device/chipset 10DE0112
rivafb: On a laptop.  Assuming Digital Flat Panel
rivafb: Detected CRTC controller 1 being used
rivafb: RIVA MTRR set to ON
rivafb: PCI nVidia NV10 framebuffer ver 0.9.5b (nVidiaGeForce2-G, 
32MB @ 0xE0000000) 
===

In this case, fbset -i returns (well, doesn't because the screen goes 
black, but the computer is still fully functional):

===
mode "640x480-60"
    # D: 25.176 MHz, H: 31.469 kHz, V: 59.942 Hz
    geometry 640 480 640 480 8
    timings 39721 40 24 32 11 96 2
    accel true
    rgba 8/0,8/0,8/0,0/0
endmode

Frame buffer device information:
    Name        : nVidiaGeForce2-G
    Address     : 0xe0000000
    Size        : 33554432
    Type        : PACKED PIXELS
    Visual      : MONO01
    XPanStep    : 1
    YPanStep    : 1
    YWrapStep   : 0
    LineLength  : 0
    MMIO Address: 0xfc000000
    MMIO Size   : 16777216
    Accelerator : nVidia RIVA TNT  
===

In all cases, lspci returns this (long):

===
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale) Chipset Host 
Bridge (rev 04)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale) Chipset AGP 
Bridge (rev 04)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM USB (Hub #1) (rev 02)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM USB (Hub #3) (rev 02)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BAM/CAM PCI Bridge (rev 42)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82801CAM ISA Bridge (LPC) (rev 02)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801CAM IDE U100 (rev 02)
00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM AC'97 
Audio Controller (rev 02)
00:1f.6 Modem: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM AC'97 Modem Controller (rev 
02)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV11 [GeForce2 
Go] (rev b2)
02:00.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905C-TX/TX-M 
[Tornado] (rev 78)
02:01.0 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI4451 PC card Cardbus 
Controller
02:01.1 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI4451 PC card Cardbus 
Controller
02:01.2 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Texas Instruments PCI4451 IEEE-1394 
Controller

============================================================

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale) Chipset Host 
Bridge (rev 04)
	Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
	Memory at e8000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=64M]
	Capabilities: [e4] #09 [d104]
	Capabilities: [a0] AGP version 2.0

00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale) Chipset AGP 
Bridge (rev 04) (prog-if 00 [Normal decode])
	Flags: bus master, 66Mhz, fast devsel, latency 32
	Bus: primary=00, secondary=01, subordinate=01, sec-latency=32
	I/O behind bridge: 0000c000-0000cfff
	Memory behind bridge: fc000000-fdffffff
	Prefetchable memory behind bridge: e0000000-e7ffffff

00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM USB (Hub #1) (rev 02) 
(prog-if 00 [UHCI])
	Subsystem: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 4541
	Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 11
	I/O ports at bf80 [size=32]

00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM USB (Hub #3) (rev 02) 
(prog-if 00 [UHCI])
	Subsystem: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 4541
	Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 11
	I/O ports at 1000 [size=32]

00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BAM/CAM PCI Bridge (rev 42) 
(prog-if 00 [Normal decode])
	Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
	Bus: primary=00, secondary=02, subordinate=10, sec-latency=32
	I/O behind bridge: 0000e000-0000ffff
	Memory behind bridge: f4000000-fbffffff

00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82801CAM ISA Bridge (LPC) (rev 02)
	Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0

00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801CAM IDE U100 (rev 02) (prog-
if 8a [Master SecP PriP])
	Subsystem: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 4541
	Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 11
	I/O ports at <ignored>
	I/O ports at <ignored>
	I/O ports at <ignored>
	I/O ports at <ignored>
	I/O ports at bfa0 [size=16]
	Memory at 10000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=1K]

00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM AC'97 
Audio Controller (rev 02)
	Subsystem: Cirrus Logic: Unknown device 5959
	Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 11
	I/O ports at d800 [size=256]
	I/O ports at dc80 [size=64]

00:1f.6 Modem: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM AC'97 Modem Controller (rev 
02) (prog-if 00 [Generic])
	Subsystem: Conexant MD56ORD V.92 MDC Modem
	Flags: medium devsel, IRQ 11
	I/O ports at d400 [size=256]
	I/O ports at dc00 [size=128]

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV11 [GeForce2 
Go] (rev b2) (prog-if 00 [VGA])
	Subsystem: Dell Computer Corporation: Unknown device 00d4
	Flags: bus master, VGA palette snoop, 66Mhz, medium devsel, 
latency 32, IRQ 11
	Memory at fc000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
	Memory at e0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=128M]
	Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled] [size=64K]
	Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 2
	Capabilities: [44] AGP version 2.0

02:00.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905C-TX/TX-M 
[Tornado] (rev 78)
	Subsystem: Dell Computer Corporation: Unknown device 00d4
	Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 11
	I/O ports at ec80 [size=128]
	Memory at f8fffc00 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=128]
	Expansion ROM at f9000000 [disabled] [size=128K]
	Capabilities: [dc] Power Management version 2

02:01.0 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI4451 PC card Cardbus 
Controller
	Subsystem: Dell Computer Corporation: Unknown device 00d4
	Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 168, IRQ 11
	Memory at 10001000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
	Bus: primary=02, secondary=03, subordinate=06, sec-latency=176
	Memory window 0: 10400000-107ff000 (prefetchable)
	Memory window 1: 10800000-10bff000
	I/O window 0: 00004000-000040ff
	I/O window 1: 00004400-000044ff
	16-bit legacy interface ports at 0001

02:01.1 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI4451 PC card Cardbus 
Controller
	Subsystem: Dell Computer Corporation: Unknown device 00d4
	Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 168, IRQ 11
	Memory at 10002000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
	Bus: primary=02, secondary=07, subordinate=0a, sec-latency=176
	Memory window 0: 10c00000-10fff000 (prefetchable)
	Memory window 1: 11000000-113ff000
	I/O window 0: 00004800-000048ff
	I/O window 1: 00004c00-00004cff
	16-bit legacy interface ports at 0001

02:01.2 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Texas Instruments PCI4451 IEEE-1394 
Controller (prog-if 10 [OHCI])
	Subsystem: Dell Computer Corporation: Unknown device 00d4
	Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 11
	Memory at f8fff000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=2K]
	Memory at f8ff8000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
	Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2
===

Hope this gives some extra information on what might the problem be.


-- 
Giuseppe "Oblomov" Bilotta

Can't you see
It all makes perfect sense
Expressed in dollar and cents
Pounds shillings and pence
                  (Roger Waters)

Re: Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

[James Simmons]

> > I tried vga=ask, and no VESA modes are detected.
> 
> Ok, I'm stupid. I tried vga=ask, told him to scan, still got no VESA 
> modes in the list, but thenand tried 318; it gave me 1024x768 (so did 
> 718 too, any reason why?). Can't get to 1600x1200, though (or at 
> least I don't know how.)

For some reason it never list the VESA modes with vga=ask. I just go by 
the does in Documentation/fb/vesafb.txt to set my mode. Let me look...

I need to add more info to the docs on what modes are supported. 
	1600x1200		
	---------
256	0x119	  0x145	
32K	0x11D	  0x146
64K	0x11E
16M		  0x14E

For lilo translate them to decimal number. I'm curious if the 14X numbers 
work.
 	
> Now that I can work with the VESA driver, I'm feeling much better, 
> but if I load the rivafb driver I *still* get the problem (I cannot 
> touch it, not even with fbset -i). Using 2.6.4;
> 
> Just for reference, these are the logs from vesafb, rivafb and lspci:

> >From rivafb:
> ===
> rivafb: nVidia device/chipset 10DE0112
> rivafb: On a laptop.  Assuming Digital Flat Panel
> rivafb: Detected CRTC controller 1 being used
> rivafb: RIVA MTRR set to ON
> rivafb: PCI nVidia NV10 framebuffer ver 0.9.5b (nVidiaGeForce2-G, 
> 32MB @ 0xE0000000) 
> ===
> 
> In this case, fbset -i returns (well, doesn't because the screen goes 
> black, but the computer is still fully functional):

That a bug I have to work. I have a newer driver but I need to run more 
test.

Re: Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

[Giuseppe Bilotta]

James Simmons wrote:
> 
> > > I tried vga=ask, and no VESA modes are detected.
> > 
> > Ok, I'm stupid. I tried vga=ask, told him to scan, still got no VESA 
> > modes in the list, but thenand tried 318; it gave me 1024x768 (so did 
> > 718 too, any reason why?). Can't get to 1600x1200, though (or at 
> > least I don't know how.)
> 
> For some reason it never list the VESA modes with vga=ask. I just go by 
> the does in Documentation/fb/vesafb.txt to set my mode. Let me look...
> 
> I need to add more info to the docs on what modes are supported. 
> 	1600x1200		
> 	---------
> 256	0x119	  0x145	
> 32K	0x11D	  0x146
> 64K	0x11E
> 16M		  0x14E
> 
> For lilo translate them to decimal number. I'm curious if the 14X numbers 
> work.

I guess I would have to input 31e or 34e at the vga=ask prompt, 
right? Well, I never managed to get a code with letters to work :( I 
will try again ...

> > Now that I can work with the VESA driver, I'm feeling much better, 
> > but if I load the rivafb driver I *still* get the problem (I cannot 
> > touch it, not even with fbset -i). Using 2.6.4;
> > 
> > Just for reference, these are the logs from vesafb, rivafb and lspci:
> 
> > >From rivafb:
> > ===
> > rivafb: nVidia device/chipset 10DE0112
> > rivafb: On a laptop.  Assuming Digital Flat Panel
> > rivafb: Detected CRTC controller 1 being used
> > rivafb: RIVA MTRR set to ON
> > rivafb: PCI nVidia NV10 framebuffer ver 0.9.5b (nVidiaGeForce2-G, 
> > 32MB @ 0xE0000000) 
> > ===
> > 
> > In this case, fbset -i returns (well, doesn't because the screen goes 
> > black, but the computer is still fully functional):
> 
> That a bug I have to work. I have a newer driver but I need to run more 
> test.

If you want, I can try and test it on my computer too (if you can 
guarantee it doesn't format my hard drive and give my syphilis ;))

-- 
Giuseppe "Oblomov" Bilotta

Can't you see
It all makes perfect sense
Expressed in dollar and cents
Pounds shillings and pence
                  (Roger Waters)

Re: Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

[James Simmons]

> > I need to add more info to the docs on what modes are supported. 
> > 	1600x1200		
> > 	---------
> > 256	0x119	  0x145	
> > 32K	0x11D	  0x146
> > 64K	0x11E
> > 16M		  0x14E
> > 
> > For lilo translate them to decimal number. I'm curious if the 14X numbers 
> > work.
> 
> I guess I would have to input 31e or 34e at the vga=ask prompt, 
> right? Well, I never managed to get a code with letters to work :( I 
> will try again ...

No. vga = 793
	= 797
	= 798
 
Give those a try.

> If you want, I can try and test it on my computer too (if you can 
> guarantee it doesn't format my hard drive and give my syphilis ;))

Nah. I'm working on those bugs.

Re: Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

[Giuseppe Bilotta]

James Simmons wrote:
> 
> > > I need to add more info to the docs on what modes are supported. 
> > > 	1600x1200		
> > > 	---------
> > > 256	0x119	  0x145	
> > > 32K	0x11D	  0x146
> > > 64K	0x11E
> > > 16M		  0x14E
> > > 
> > > For lilo translate them to decimal number. I'm curious if the 14X numbers 
> > > work.
> > 
> > I guess I would have to input 31e or 34e at the vga=ask prompt, 
> > right? Well, I never managed to get a code with letters to work :( I 
> > will try again ...
> 
> No. vga = 793
> 	= 797
> 	= 798
>  
> Give those a try.

(I was talking on the prompt I get at boot time when vga=ask :))


-- 
Giuseppe "Oblomov" Bilotta

Can't you see
It all makes perfect sense
Expressed in dollar and cents
Pounds shillings and pence
                  (Roger Waters)

Re: Framebuffer with nVidia GeForce 2 Go on Dell Inspiron 8200

[Giuseppe Bilotta]

I wrote:
> > >From rivafb:
> > ===
> > rivafb: nVidia device/chipset 10DE0112
> > rivafb: On a laptop.  Assuming Digital Flat Panel
> > rivafb: Detected CRTC controller 1 being used
> > rivafb: RIVA MTRR set to ON
> > rivafb: PCI nVidia NV10 framebuffer ver 0.9.5b (nVidiaGeForce2-G, 
> > 32MB @ 0xE0000000) 
> > ===
> > 
> > In this case, fbset -i returns (well, doesn't because the screen goes 
> > black, but the computer is still fully functional):

James Simmons replied:

> That a bug I have to work. I have a newer driver but I need to run more 
> test.

Any news on this? I tried 2.6.7, which has the EDID patch from 
Guido included, but I still have this error ...

-- 
Giuseppe "Oblomov" Bilotta

Can't you see
It all makes perfect sense
Expressed in dollar and cents
Pounds shillings and pence
                  (Roger Waters)