Nvidia based MSI FX5600 card won't install

tjdtjd · 08-20-2003, 02:15 AM

The card in the subject line has been installed in a box which happily ran redhat 8 and nine on a GF4 Ti4200 card until same cooked itself.

It twinview'd, it 3d'd it did all singing all dancing stuff, and then died. Such is life.

New card has faster processor and 128 meg of ram and should blister, and indeed, under windows its fine. But try to install any flavor of Linux, and all kinds of trouble ensue.

1. Can't install using graphical interface.

so text install ...

2. Completes install ok, then boots, gets to the x server boot and flicks over and over trying modes until it finally stops with a screen message saying "Out of freq range", and indeed, at 15 x 25 MhZ, it sure nuff is.

So far ... installed new drivers from Nvidia (wot a breeze the new installer is), modified the XFConfig file a thousand ways, went looking for the bit of the kernel wrap that looks at the card.

That's where I am . . . lost in the bit between the kernel and the hardware ....help?

crashmeister · 08-20-2003, 05:23 AM

Try this first to see if your kernel driver is loaded.
bash-2.05b# cat /proc/driver/nvidia/version
NVRM version: NVIDIA Linux x86 nvidia.o Kernel Module 1.0-4363 Sat Apr 19 17:46:46 PDT 2003
GCC version: gcc version 3.2.3 20030422 (Gentoo Linux 1.4 3.2.3-r1, propolice)

Try this to see if the correct settings are detected
bash-2.05b# cat /proc/driver/nvidia/agp/card
Fast Writes: Supported
SBA: Supported
AGP Rates: 8x 4x
Registers: 0x1f000e1b:0x1f004112

This shows you the agp status
bash-2.05b# cat /proc/driver/nvidia/agp/status
Status: Enabled
Driver: NVIDIA
AGP Rate: 8x
Fast Writes: Enabled
SBA: Disabled

Thats the card that should be detected
bash-2.05b# cat /proc/driver/nvidia/cards/0
Model: GeForce FX 5600
IRQ: 5
Video BIOS: 04.31.20.38.00
Card Type: AGP

If the output you get there is about the same (some things like agp 8x depend also on the motherboard and the xfree config) then you know that your card is detected and your driver and kernel module are up and running.Should be a problem with the monitor settings then.

tjdtjd · 08-25-2003, 06:46 AM

Yeh. The vendor descriptor (10e hex) isn't recognised, so it's text install, then a manual edit of the Xconfig file

Works fine. Tks

qrayq · 10-17-2003, 07:39 PM

sorry ppl, i'm a totally newbie in this hobby.
i installed linux using text mode. after restarting it, the screen just went blank when, i think what is called, loading the x-window. well, it's the same problem as tjdtjd. however, i don't know how to proceed further as crashmeister stated. can someone direct me detailly? any help would be appreciated.
i have the same msi fx5600 card.