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Multiple cards [PCIe and Onboard] on Fedora Core 9

I was trying to install two cards on my Fedora core 9 machine with following specs.

Code:

[sumod@localhost ~]$ uname -a

Linux localhost.localdomain 2.6.27.19-78.2.30.fc9.i686 #1 SMP Tue Feb 24 20:09:23 EST 2009 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux

The machine is HP Pavilion a6119h. The onboard vga card is Intel Corporation 82945G/GZ Integrated Graphics Controller and the other card (PCIe) is ASUS EN8400GS (which has NVIDIA GeForce 8400GS]. Now I want to use the onboard card for normal display and the Nvidia card for graphics programming using CUDA Library. Here is the lscpi output, when I have set the primary videocard in the BIOS as onboard. ( I also tried to install the Nvidia driver to see if it can help, but it complains that it can't find the card which is understandable).

Code:

[sumod@localhost ~]$ lspci

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 82945G/GZ/P/PL Memory Controller Hub (rev 02)

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 82945G/GZ Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 02)

00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) High Definition Audio Controller (rev 01)

00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) PCI Express Port 1 (rev 01)

00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 01)

00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 01)

00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 01)

00:1d.3 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 (rev 01)

00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller (rev 01)

00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 PCI Bridge (rev e1)

00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801GB/GR (ICH7 Family) LPC Interface Bridge (rev 01)

00:1f.2 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801GB/GR/GH (ICH7 Family) SATA IDE Controller (rev 01)

00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) SMBus Controller (rev 01)

01:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8101E/RTL8102E PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller (rev 01)

02:02.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c905B 100BaseTX [Cyclone] (rev 24)

02:03.0 Communication controller: Conexant Systems, Inc. HSF 56k Data/Fax Modem

I also got this output when I did dmesg

Code:

dmesg | grep pcie

Pre-1.1 PCIe device detected, disable ASPM for 0000:00:1c.0. It can be enabled forcedly with 'pcie_aspm=force'

pcieport-driver 0000:00:1c.0: setting latency timer to 64

pcieport-driver 0000:00:1c.0: found MSI capability

pci_express 0000:00:1c.0:pcie00: allocate port service

pci_express 0000:00:1c.0:pcie02: allocate port service

pci_express 0000:00:1c.0:pcie03: allocate port service

Instead, if I set other as primary it works, but I can't use this card.

Any ideas on how to get it working ? Thanks in advance...

This is not my speciality but here goes...

The situation is this as I understand it.

You have activated the on board graphics chip in the BIOS and configured it. The system boots and the graphics are in working order. Does it work with the Nvidia driver, or is this not important?

You have configured the 8400 card with the Nvidia driver, and this also functions? dmesg says you can force it. That is, does this card work with the on board chip activated in the BIOS, activated but not configured?

If this is so, might you not create another user with the 8400 card configured for that user? If this is possible, it would probably require that you reboot the system in order to switch from one graphics chip/card to the other as the kernel would have to load the alternative module required when making the change. However, it might be enough to switch users.

I have not tried this, but am surmising on the basis of my being able to configure either my on board LAN chip or a PCI LAN card as I wish from within my openSUSE 11.0 installation.

I would start with the on board chip configured and working, then put the 8400 card in place and set up a new user and then as that user try to change the configuration of the graphics to the 8400 card.

If none of this works, at least the post might draw the attention of someone with a better idea and it moves you up the thread. Good Luck

Hey,

Thanks for the reply...

Quote:

You have activated the on board graphics chip in the BIOS and configured it. The system boots and the graphics are in working order. Does it work with the Nvidia driver, or is this not important?

Onboard graphics card is not Nvidia....also, thats not important.

Case 1:
But yes... When on board graphics card is enabled as the primary video card. The onboard card works flawlessly.. but interestingly the other card (Nvidia) does not even get detected. (The lspci output is above) Now dmesg says (above and below)

Code:

'pcie_aspm=force'

I can force it, I googled to figure this out.. But couldn't get much help. I could try to recompile the kernel to see, if there is anything of that sort...

case 2:

Quote:

You have configured the 8400 card with the Nvidia driver, and this also functions? dmesg says you can force it. That is, does this card work with the on board chip activated in the BIOS, activated but not configured?

Yes, Now I restart my machine and enable PCIe card as my primary video graphics card in the bios, then everything works (both the free driver and with Nvidia driver), but the onboard card does not get detected (using lspci...). The dmesg message was for case 1.

So my questions,

1. Is there anyway I can get this enabled in Linux (my guess is in the kernel).
2. Is there something I need to do in BIOS to enable both, I tried searching, but could get much help either.

I don't think, it has anything to do with user.. Since I can't even get it detected, had I been able to get the card detected and it did not work, then I would have doubted the same way. But since, my lspci or dmesg can not even detect it I doubt it. I will anyways try to recompile and see, if there is any options to enable multiple pci cards...

Thanks once again...

Regd your

A quick question...

Were the results of the command "lspci" listed in your first post generated while both the on board Intel chip was activated in the BIOS and configured, and the Nvidia 8400 card was in place on the mother board, but not activated in the BIOS?

Is the BIOS setting for control of the graphics function something like "On-board graphic chip", with Activate/Disable? There is no other setting for a graphics card, only a setting for the on board chip?

Could you repeat the command with the above hardware configuration as "lspci -vv" and in addition run the command "lshw"? If you do not have lshw it should be in the Fedora repository.

It seems to me that according to dmesg, the 8400 card is presented to linux as it boots, but according to lspci, it is not present in the linux version that has been booted. That is the 8400 is detected but bypassed because it is not configured and something else, the on board chip has its kernal module loaded. I assume that Fedora 9 should be able to configure the 8400 card if it can be commanded to search the hardware and find another graphics card to configure. In some distros this is done with the command "Xorg-configure".

In openSUSE 11.0 there is the command "sax2" that has this function for the graphics and screen, allowing a reconfiguration of the system to new hardware. There might be a Fedora RPM for this command. You might also google for Fedora 9 and Xorg or xorg-config if you have not done so. If Fedora can find the card, it should load the "nv" module and give you a basis function to work from.

It occures to me that you may need two kernals, one for each user, to make this work, but I don't know if this is true. Two kernals could be a solution to any problem of linux finding the 8400 card upon booting. Each kernal would load only the one and correct module because that one video card would be in the Xorg-config file, but one kernal might be made to load different modules selectively, and have more than one video card in its Xorg-config file. I don't know.

I googled and I seem to find that forcing refers to the ASMP function and not to the chip/card itself.

We need more eyes on this problem.