hi,

i just got my Dell d500 with all the new centrino stuff in it, and i am having some trouble stting up the display in xwindows on mandrake.

basically, the mandrake install program picked it up as a vesa device, and gave me a flat panel 1024x768 display.

sounds fine you say, however i cannot get the display to switch above 640x480 no matter what resolution is selected

any help would be apreciated

the pre-installed windows says its a:
Intel 82852/82855 gm/gme graphics controller

any ideas?


thanks
antken

try to change colors bit to 24 or 16bit
sometimes its help then its will acept resolution more then 640-480

I'm having the exact same problem you're getting on my Gateway laptop. I'm using the same Intel chipset with Mandrake 9.1 (and now SuSE 8.2), and both versions only let me go up to 800x600 at 256 colors.

I've been doing extensive research into this and tracked down a few culprits that I haven't been able to solve but nevertheless, this infor might help.

First, go to intel.com and do a search / browse for the intel unified linux graphics drivers for the 828** series chipsets. Once you find it, you should be able to download an RPM package called dripkg-xxxxxx.i386.rpm and install it. However, whenever I do that, the RPM fails or its effects are null because I'm still stuck in 800x600. In an effort to attempt to debug this i tracked down what the rpm was trying to do and found an install script in the /etc folder (i forget where it was exactly) that was trying to reference a particular /dri folder from the kernel source root (apparantly in an attempt to rebuild a portion of the kernel or something) and that fails. Thus, the drivers are never fully installed correctly.

I've not been able to find a solution to this but I'm working on it every week. I'm kinda new to linux and the innards of it are still mysterious to me so I have a learning curve I'm trying to get over.

Anyway, I'd say to try to download that intel package and see how it goes. If you find a solution, please post it back on here so I can see what you did!!

Thanks.

hello,


i have just been messing with it actually, i managed to crack up the resolution to 1024x768, by dropping the colours down to 8bit ( not an ideal solution, i know, but at least i can see what i am doing now )

i have messed around with what was my mandrake over the past few days so much, that when it finally works i will be screeming 'its alive, it's alive'

i have just been messing with 2.6.0-test3
might i say, excellent work kernel team and i look forward to the full 2.6.0 series kernels

i just compiled the kernel, and presto; acpi worked !
i also spotted some stuff in xconfig that mentioned 'dri'

so as far as i can see, once 2.6.0 is released centrino will be better supported

Awesome! So you were able to upgrade to the 2.6 kernel with mandrake? I didn't think it would be that easy to do. I've never recompiled my kernel but maybe now's the time to learn!

go for it,
remember, always keep a backup of a previous kernel ready to go in you lilo config

if your are going to do one now and because its your first time i would recommend trying an older kernel

first get you self a version of the kernel from www.kernel.org
probably 2.4.21 is the latest non test version
get a copy of the kernel how-to from tldp.org read it through so you understand the process and then have a play

just one note of caution:
if you have a ext3 root file system, make sure you compile into the kernel ( not a module ) support for ext3 otherwise you will get a kernel panic

any luck with this problem? I've spent 2 days trying to get my colour depth to at least 16bit in 1024X768.

as of the time of this post no, i have not had any further luck

however i have decided to wait until the 2.6 kernel series is complete until i attempt to play with it again.

from what i have read on the web intel have some instructions on their website as regards the video driver, and a possible download to try.

by all means give it a try

I found the following fix to this problem - seems to work 100% in 1024x768x16bpp - 24bpp messes with text mode a little but possibly still usable

http://www.chzsoft.com.ar/855patch.tar.gz
http://www.mail-archive.com/devel@xf.../msg02247.html

I'm finding my d500 to be a disappointing mess of unsupported hardware - nice to finally be able to run X in more than 256 colours

hi,

i shall be trying those later, yes it is a shame that new hardware is largly unsupported when it comes to linux, but as linux is going up more and more ( getting more users and stuff ) and as the userbase grows the hardware should come with it.

i think its some times fear, for example i think dell are fearful that if they sell a computer ( workstation ) with linux on it they are going to get a barrarge of calls to the support desk, and then to solve them you have to spend a couple hundred beans re-training them ( i say beans as opposed to dollars, pounds, or euros )

or microsoft have their finger up dells ass telling them what to do.

support will come eventually, infact just around the corner in the 2.6 kernel i have noticed that there is loads of support for intel speedstep technology, and the p4 processor in general.
( speedstep being a large part in centrino stuff )
i think once the feature freeze has been lifted by linus and the kernel team ( because of the current 2.6-test ) we will see support for stuff like centrino come flooding in.

i am sure if intel just released the full specs on the chipset there would be a driver come right along, its pretty much the same with most hardware, and there are few that do give away the specs on demand.

the wireless is my next goal after the display driver

i will let you know my findings


thanks
antken

ok. so im running mandrake 9.1 on a gateway M305 laptop, also with the 82852 chipset. i cant even get it to 1024x768. i downloaded intel's drivers, did exactly as their instructions told me to, and it stil wont work.

i'd be glad to get just 16bit at 1024x768...800x600 is a pain to use. how do i get at LEAST 1024x768 in 16bitmode, like you guys did ? do i have to go into the XF86Config-4 file and edit around there, or can i use the mandrake control center in 9.1 ??? so i have to bootup in maintnence mode ? or can i do it from xwindows ? basically, i need some detailed instructions on how ou did it.

hi,

yeah the display is a bit of an arse isnt it?

i have a dell d500 with the 855 chipset, apparently there is a problem/design fault/quirk within the chipset basically when the video wants to switch a higher mode the bios for some reason cannot get more memory to allocate to the video.

so some smart guy ( Christian Zietz <czietz@gmx.net> ) has written a little program that alters the memory registers ( ) and allows it to switch to a higher video mode.

i was pulling my hair out trying to get it to work, i replaced one package and started on a long chain of dependency problems. but once again thanks to linux questions and some ones helpful posts i found 855patch.

all i do at the command line is:
855patch <video ram in KB to allocate>

it allocates the memory and like magic it all works.
now, intel have said ( so i believe ) that if they get enough requests they will release an official linux driver for the centrino stuff.

search through linux questions and there should be a link to 855patch some place.

i must point out that in the source file the author has put the following lines in there:

/* This version should be quite safe to use, but don't blame me */
/* if something bad happens. *?

i hope this helps, please keep us apprised of your situation
antken

p.s. if you cannot find the source let me know and i ( with the permission of the author ) will put it on my server for download

i downloaded the files, and now the display wont open at all. it completely messes it up. not even 640x480 with 256 colors will load.