Running X on an old ThinkPad...
Forum: X and Fluxbox
Topic: Running X on an old ThinkPad...
started by: Iain
Posted by Iain on June 15 2006,05:13
Hi all... post # 1 
I spent all of $35 on a ThinkPad 755CX:
Pentium 75
24 MB memory
Video chip is WD90C24
DSL is installed to the hard drive. I've tried all flavors of xsetup, but on running "startx" always get:
X10: fatal error 104
xinit does this with ANY parameters I pass, valid or otherwise
Hunh? After many nights googling, I found this:
< http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/WD90C24 >
...which says:
"This chip is not supported by X.org, the best you can get is 640x480 with 16 colors with the 'vga' driver as part of the X.Org distribution".
Well - I had tried Debian on this same machine: while the perf running X was dreadful (unsurprisingly) DID run. But... this used XFree86 I believe, which does have some driver support.
So it looks like I need to set up the vga driver as mentioned above, but I don't know:
- if its even included in DSL
- if it isn't, how I should install it
Basic 640x480 and 16 colors would be just fine with me - its a great old laptop, the network connection is excellent via PCMCIA 802.11, and I'd love to keep it going.
I'm going to continue with my research, but if anyone could suggest some helpful hints, I would appreciate it greatly!
Regards,
-Iain
Posted by kerry on June 15 2006,08:02
Well you can try and install the Xfree86.dsl and set it up like this->< http://www.angelfire.com/nt/sucks/XF86Config.html >
It does say it supports vesa and dsl uses xvesa.
You've tried the 800x600 in all modes(8,16,24,32)? How about vga=normal?
Posted by hs7sv on June 15 2006,08:32
< This thread > may be helpful. Good luck 
Posted by skaos on June 15 2006,10:35
You can use 'Xvesa -listmodes' (without quotes) to check which vesa 2.0 modes your card supports. Also, how do you boot? - I seem to remember that you will get this error message if you boot with loadlin and have some TSR's, drivers etc. loaded in ms-dos.
Posted by Iain on June 16 2006,01:34
Thanks so much for your replies - three new avenues to try I haven't yet tried 800x600 in all modes...
Didn't know about "listmodes" !!
...and in the end, I may try the alternate DSL install in the link; XFree86 most certainly did include support for my video chip, so I'm not done yet!
...not even if I hve to bug into xinit to find out the source of the error!
I'll keep you posted...
Regards,
-Iain
Posted by Iain on June 16 2006,01:38
Well Xvesa -listmodes (or any other parameter) gives a segmentation fault. Not good. Wonder if my installation is bust??On to the next avenue...
Posted by kerry on June 16 2006,02:12
If your not sure about your installation, try it from live cd. If it works there, it should work on the installed.
Posted by Iain on June 16 2006,05:21
Ha!After installing XFree86.dsl per Kerry's comment, I now have:
- A very low resolution "X" background
- A large "X" cursor that I can move around
I assume that no Window Manager is being loaded... I'm running XFree86 by typing XFree86 on the command line...
I'll press on!
Posted by kerry on June 16 2006,06:22
Did you read the download info? there should be somthing about modifying the xserver.Edit: it says change .xserverrc and change where it say's xvesa to XFree86
Posted by Iain on June 16 2006,06:58
Yep - and once I rebooted, I got a very grainy Window Manager (320x200) - so that's progress I tried "vesa" and "fbdev" for drivers: with "vesa" I get a blank screen I can't get out of, and with "fbdev" an error about can't find /dev/fbo???
Anyway, I'll persevere with vesa - I'm guessing its working but at a higher resolution/refresh rate than the LCD can take.
One other thinng I noticed - tried running Dillo - bit of HD activity, then nothing. Same for Firefox - LOT of HD activity, then nothing. Guessing that the processes ran out of memory...
Posted by kerry on June 16 2006,07:11
Ran out of memory? Did you create a swap? A swap acts as extra memory.
Posted by cbagger01 on June 17 2006,16:18
FYI,Some programs will not work unless you have a minimum of 256 colors (8 bit) for your display's color depth.