some problems here starting with DSL
Forum: User Feedback
Topic: some problems here starting with DSL
started by: chpnp
Posted by chpnp on Mar. 24 2008,13:48
Hi,I tried yesterday to play with a DSL CD (after running it embedded) on 4 different machines and I must say it has been a frustrating experience :-(
Machine 1: Desktop pentium 4 2,8 GHZ with a sapphire Radeon 9600 Atlantis.
The boot process starts normally it seems to configure properly then I can see it finding 2 ethernet board with the message "backgrounding" and then suddenly a number of messages show saying
I/O error: dev 08:10 sector XX
(I get probably like 2 screens of that with different values, I cannot ctrl+S but I can ctrl+C and end up in a DSL console, I can type some commands. Startx crashes the machine, (as does letting it go with no ctrl+c). By crash I mean empty (non graphical) screen and i need to power off/on.
Does that look like a cdrom (or reader) problem ? I can use the cdrom on the other machines.
Machine 2 is a Dell C400 laptop, it boots (with some issues) and i cannot get anything else than a horrible 1024x768 screen (crazy colors) of it and going to VESA, it offers me only a 640x480 resolution (with normal colors however this time, at least). I understand from doing some research that this is tied to the Intel I830 chipset, and apparently there are some solutions in terms of drivers for this, would it be complicated to add that ? I understand there are probably a very limiter number of users affected :-( and have no idea of the complexity it would involve. :-(
Machine 3 is a Sotec laptop.
The autoconfiguring devices phase is interrupted with a message saying:
modprobe: modprobe: Can't locate module block-major-2
modprobe: modprobe: Can't locate module block-major-2
Done
I say interrupted because is does not "last" as long as it did on the other machines
Then the boot continues. I do not seem to have any major problems later - except, it does not seem to recognize my NETGEAR WG511 wifi card at all. I have not been able to make it work using ndiswrapper (but I am not sure I am using it properly either).
Thanks for any hint on this.
Posted by curaga on Mar. 24 2008,15:07
1) dev 08:10 means SCSI disk in the first channel, partition 10. This machine most likely has sata dvd drive, so try booting with "dsl sata"2) there's nothing wrong with the i830 chipset, I have it in a HP laptop and it works fine. It's a hardware thing still. Did you try booting with "fb1024x768"? Or try 16-bit colors with Xvesa?
3) that means you don't have a floppy drive. harmless.
Posted by lucky13 on Mar. 24 2008,15:20
Starting backwards...Is your card Prism-based? DSL has a separate prism configuration tool.
You can probably safely ignore the block-major-2 errors. That's a floppy module; I've had the errrors on a couple computers but it didn't limit my use of any block device (including floppy). (Side note: I don't know if that's from a broken alias in modules.conf or if it's actually a hardware issue.)
The issue with video requires you to run xsetup.sh (exit to console and run it). You need to know your resolution and depth. If you over-estimate those variables, you'll get oversaturated video like that. If you have an odd resolution you can either back down to a lower resolution or use one of the extensions from MyDSL and configure it manually. BTW, you can't run startx unless you have a valid config to run from -- try running xsetup.sh before starting X manually (especially if you break the boot by escaping with ctrl-c). I don't know if you can run DSL's limited X under that video chipset without using an xorg extension.
Finally, the CD error can be due to bad media or having burned the CD too fast (or both). Less likely and pretty rare, it could be an issue with your drive (such as being out of alignment more than its tolerances allow). Edit: Or SATA -- boot with "sata" cheatcode.
Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Mar. 24 2008,15:37
Looks like a newer prism chip: < http://ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net/joomla....ist_m-n >which may be supported natively (prism54?)
Posted by chpnp on Mar. 25 2008,00:56
| Quote (curaga @ Mar. 24 2008,10:07) |
| 1) dev 08:10 means SCSI disk in the first channel, partition 10. This machine most likely has sata dvd drive, so try booting with "dsl sata" 2) there's nothing wrong with the i830 chipset, I have it in a HP laptop and it works fine. It's a hardware thing still. Did you try booting with "fb1024x768"? Or try 16-bit colors with Xvesa? 3) that means you don't have a floppy drive. harmless. |
1- was a mystery. I had a USB memory card reader and external drive. After disconnecting them that error disappeared. I do not need that for now, might have been some weak contact issue.
2- As i understand it the problem is both i830 and Dell related. The Dell C400 bios (and some others) will steal only 1mb of memory at boot (cant be change throug the Dell bios !) and hence the only Xvesa option is 640x480x16. Which works fine but who wants that ?
Playing around I could improve the whole thing by booting with option
dsl vga=773
(I believe 773) which is 1024x768 8 bits mode.
Works fine and improves image a bit but still not as satisfactory as it could be of course.
Ubuntu, (and XP for that matter) are smart enough to allocate enough memory for the graphical card. EG Ubuntu says 503 Mb of ram are available, which I understand that it reserved 8Mb of RAM for graphics (1Mb is stolen by the bios).
This is only assumption on my side of course.
To answer your questions, fb1024x768 does not help and 16bit colors with Xvesa is 640x480x16 which is the ONLY option proposed. :-(
3- thanks...
Posted by chpnp on Mar. 25 2008,01:12
| Quote (lucky13 @ Mar. 24 2008,10:20) |
| Starting backwards... Is your card Prism-based? DSL has a separate prism configuration tool. You can probably safely ignore the block-major-2 errors. ..... The issue with video requires you to run xsetup.sh (exit to console and run it). You need to know your resolution and depth. If you over-estimate those variables, you'll get oversaturated video like that. ..... Finally, the CD error can be due to...... |
For the laptop with wg511 card:
It apparently IS prism based.
I catched an error message when booting to a console
The message says:
prismp54: request_firmware () failed for 'isl3890'
eth0: could no upload firmware ('isl3890')
eth0: islpci_reset: failure
I tried the prism based configuration tool with no luck so far :-(
but I am guessing from the error message above that the problem is much before that.
I tried NDIS wrapper to load the xp driver but with no luck and I am unsure I am using it properly anyway.
For my desktop:
I could remove the error as I mentionned in another post
I still have a problem though. It boots and goes until trying to startx, from there I get an empty screen (console screen) and never see anything on the screen again ! The only thing I have been able to do is ctrl+alt+del, I think it takes two of them for the PC to eject the cdrom, from which I can hit 'enter' and the PC turns off :-(
Any clue on that ? :-s
Oh : and thanks to all who answered so far.....
Posted by curaga on Mar. 25 2008,13:25
Wow. I keep seeing more and more reasons not to use Dells. Non-working cd-drives, crippled bioses..The full X can use up to 128mb for the i830, so you would need XFree or Xorg to get more video ram.
XFree86 is in System (.dsl) or in Unc (.unc), Xorg72.uci is in Testing.
Posted by Juanito on Mar. 25 2008,13:35
| Quote |
| Wow. I keep seeing more and more reasons not to use Dells. Non-working cd-drives, crippled bioses.. |
- and yet Dell is now shipping machines with linux pre-installed
| Quote |
| The full X can use up to 128mb for the i830, so you would need XFree or Xorg to get more video ram. XFree86 is in System (.dsl) or in Unc (.unc), Xorg72.uci is in Testing. |
I would suggest the first thing is to check the dell site for the latest firmware revision for the machine - this could well improve the video story. After that, based on my own dell/intel i855 experience it could be that xfree86 will need some help to run the video properly (ref lime green screen of death), but xorg72 will work fine.
Posted by chpnp on Mar. 25 2008,15:56
| Quote (curaga @ Mar. 25 2008,08:25) |
| Wow. I keep seeing more and more reasons not to use Dells. Non-working cd-drives, crippled bioses.. The full X can use up to 128mb for the i830, so you would need XFree or Xorg to get more video ram. XFree86 is in System (.dsl) or in Unc (.unc), Xorg72.uci is in Testing. |
thanks i will try that (later) and let you know
Juanito: I am using the latest bios. Seems Dell never cared to change that.
Curaga: I absolutely LOVE my C400. It is 5 years old now so becomes a bit slow for latest XP and bells and whistles, (or for Ubuntu which dual boots here). Many other (newer) laptop that I tried frustrated me somhow, compared to my C400 ;-), (but of course they were faster too....)
Any suggestion for my Netgear WG511 wifi card ?
And any hint for my desktop empty screen ?? that one is weird too.
Thanks