Howdy guys, new to the boards!

So I was digging around and I found and old Gateway Solo (150 megahertz, bout 1.5/2 gigs space, etc.).
This little sucker has probally had more linux distros on it than a kernel tester, so I have had Xfree86 running in the past. (For those of you who are curious, I like WindowMaker)

Anyways, on a whim I installed Slackware 9 (good tweaker distro). So I was working on getting my X11 server up and pumping along.
So I got a nicely configured (so I thought) XF86Config file that does launch the server right. If I just launch the server (command "X") it gets running along fine (mouse works.... displays that fancy gray background nicely). However.... here's the problemo:

I'm trying to launch some sort of Xconsole or window manager. I used the Slackware xwmconfig utility to set it to TWM to start. It spazzed, X11 launches but then the mouse and keyboard freezes and TWM doesn't launch. Can't change displays or kill X. Due to there being no NIC, SSH to wack it is outta the picture.
Now, my thought was "stupid xwmconfig" so I did what any good tweaker would do, I deleted the config files and startred fresh.
The config worked yet again, same problem launching programs (in this case Xconsole).
I'd venture to say any other wm would freeze it just the same.
I've logged it and it says
CIRRUS(0): I2C Initalization failed
UseMMIO = SR17= 5

The Cirrus message appears when I just launch the X server, but the UseMMIO apears when I use "startx" (thus the xinit file).
Any idea what this fabled UseMMIO message means?

Many thanks,
Rabid Chicken