I have been trying in vain so far to install the drivers from ati for a radeon 9800 pro on rh9, kernel 2.4.20-20.9. This is the output I receive when trying to install the rpm package.

*** Trying to install a precompiled kernel module.
*** WARNING ***
Tailored kernel module for fglrx not present in your system.
You must go to /lib/modules/fglrx/build_mod subdir
and execute './make.sh' to build a fully customed kernel module.
Afterwards go to /lib/modules/fglrx and run './make_install.sh'
in order to install the module into your kernel's module repository.
(see readme.txt for more details.)

As of now you can still run your XServer in 2D, but hardware acclerated
OpenGL will not work and 2D graphics will lack performance.

failed.
*** Error: no kernel module build environment - please consult readme.
Installed: qt3 (gcc 3.2) based control panel application
===
ATI display drivers successfully installed
please run 'fglrxconfig' now

Before I start messing around and probably breaking the OS beyond repair could someone advise me what I have to do to get these drivers insatalled.
Presumably I have to build a tailored kernel but I have no idea what exactly is required from this output.
I am very new to linux so dont be too harsh!

Welcome to the "I can't get my ATI Radeon card to work in Linux" Club.

I get that same error and I think people on this forum are sick of us ATI Radeon users as nobody seems to know exactly how to solve this problem.

Just use Windows XP for graphic intense needs.

Yes I can see from searching around now its not an uncommon problem. I didnt want to stray from nvidia in the first place but was talked into it, now I really wish I hadnt.

I've got SUSe 8.2 and hence the same problem, I am new to linux but I'm quite sure that after pointing make.sh to the correct includes for my kernal, that everything will work.
Oh what Joy's to play around with such a thing.
And regarding that just using xp comment, My Suse GUI isn't hardly usable because the gfx looks awful.

I have a Radeon 8500 and I got it to work without big problems. However the installation procedure for ATI's drivers is the same for all Radeon's. I think you must have the build tree for your current kernel available and if you're not familiar with building kernels I suggest you read the howto. This link is Debian specific but contains some great info that might help you some if your systems support dpkg.

http://space.virgilio.it/flavio.stan...installer.html