Live CD poor display on old hp desktop

Forum: User Feedback
Topic: Live CD poor display on old hp desktop
started by: davids45

Posted by davids45 on Dec. 04 2006,23:30

I am trying to run DSL on an old (1998) HP Pavilion 4404 desktop (256MB RAM) which has a Sis5597 chipset (on-board graphics). The monitor is an old M50 HP that came with the desktop.

I cannot get DSL X to display beyond 4 bit colour. This seems to limit available software options - for example, no browser runs, as I believe these require minimum 8 bit colour?

Ubuntu Dapper runs nicely at 16 bit colour on the old HP computer, but very slowly, as does Windows 98SE. The Live CD DSL iso runs on my newer computers with no problem. I've tried Puppy on the HP and this small Linux has the same problem as DSL but worse as the Puppy live CD dies when trying to start X (Puppy has no 4 bit colour start-up option).

How can I get better colour depth set up with DSL on the hp desktop?

Thanks for any advice.

Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Dec. 05 2006,00:57

try fb or vga= bootcodes,
or run xsetup for X options.

Posted by davids45 on Dec. 05 2006,02:39

Thanks for the reply.
I think I've already tried most vga numbers listed but none representing 8 bit or more colour show anything on my monitor.
What worked to the point of being able to install DSL on my Linux hard drive was booting "lowram" or "failsafe" with the 4 bit colour selected when asked. Other Cheatcodes also worked if they got me to the 4 bit colour option.
The frame buffer options did not display.

I'll re-try these just in case I missed one option and also have another go with xsetup.

I have looked at the xorg.conf file from Ubuntu which works perfectly graphically on this computer. Ubuntu's xorg.conf identifies the "device" as "Silicon Integrated Systems (SiS) 5597 [SiS5582]". The "driver" is "sis" and the BusID is "PCI:0:19:0".

The xorg.conf file gives details for my HP Pavilion M50 monitor - Option "DPMS", HorizSync 30-54, VertRefresh 50-100. I have found a spare non-HP/made-this-century monitor, so not quite as old as the HP M50, to see if that's any better.

How do I change the video driver used by X, if that's where my problem lays?

Thanks.

Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Dec. 05 2006,14:36

Default DSL does not use Xorg, but a tiny subset of xservers (from XFree86) called TinyX. DSL comes with xvesa or xfbdev which you can configure with xsetup. Also, I think xsetup can be used in conjunction with the fb/vga bootcodes.

Alternatively you could install a full xserver.

Did you try to increase your shared video ram via BIOS? This usually helps when you don't have a specific driver for a specific display device loaded.

256mb is plenty for DSL, so maybe it's something else - like try other bootcodes.

Posted by skaos on Dec. 06 2006,12:28

You can run "Xvesa -listmodes" (without quotes) to see which resolutions and colour depths are supported in DSL. Xvesa requires a graphics card that supports the vesa 2.0 standard, and if it doesn't support this, it only can use standard vga at 640x480 with 4 bit colour. I think there is a myDSL XFree86 3.x package that may/may not work.

Posted by davids45 on Dec. 07 2006,02:35

Thanks for those ideas and hints.
In reading elsewhere (the Xfree86 site and particularly Thomas Winischhofer's site on SIS Xorg and Linux), I think the old HP's SIS chipset is my major problem and the old computer requires the "sis" driver and only the "sis".
Apparently this chipset did not support vesa which explains why that option did nothing. I'll check the Xvesa -lstmodes query nonetheless.
I'll also look into the BIOS options, just in case there are some that may help.
As I can't access the net with the 4 bit colour DSL, what are the options to install the Xfree86 package, or any other DSL package for that matter? The HP has net access via Ubuntu and W98SE.
Thanks again.

Posted by progesterone on Dec. 22 2006,12:01

I would like to share what I solved. I hope it might be helpful.

I use DSL from bootable CD. I got crazy color in the screen after DSL was booted. The font was almost un-readable.

So, I tried like the following steps in the boot process.

1. F3 to see boot option.

2. type "dsl vga=788" and press enter.

3. choose "Xfbdev xserver"

4. choose "Yes" in USB mouse? question

5. choose "US" keyboard

6. Done! and Enjoy DSL

Good Luck