I'm having a total lack of success setting up my new PC with Mandrake 9.2. Irritatingly, Windows 2000 is running very well, using half the disk.

The problem is, I cannot get a workable video system. The video card is an NVIDIA FX 5200. Completing the standard Mandrake installation using the driver for NVIDIA generic FX results in a few blue and white lines in the bottom inch of the screen as soon as the graphical interface is started.

I tried working through all kinds of combinations of video driver, screen resolution, etc, testing each one, without finding anything that tested OK.

Also, I have installed the NVIDIA generic driver, including installing the kernel headers. After that was done, I checked the XF86Config-4 file and added Load "glx". The driver was already set to "nvidia", presumably by the NVIDIA driver installation. After all that, all I got was a few blue and white lines in the bottom inch of the screen!

The screen is a Philips 17 inch TFT panel. It is running perfectly with Windows at 1280x1024 with 32 bit true colour and 60 Hz refresh.

With Mandrake Linux, I can't do anything graphical at all!! Any suggestions for what else I can try?

Best regards, Martin

First DISABLE the DM service on startup temporarily.

E.G. as root

chkconfig --del dm

Remove any references to NVIDIA modules in /etc/modules.conf so that they are not autoloaded. (you'll be using a different AGP driver AFAIK...)

Then COLD BOOT the machine. Shut it down and disconnect the power cord.

Next press the power button to discharge it.

Now power it back up Make sure it only comes up to the text prompt.

Download the appropriate NVIDIA drivers from their web site and run the installer script.

Modify the XFree configuration file as indicated.

Once done type

X

from the console and see if the screen clears and you get the Xwindows background.

If you do hit move the mouse. Does it work?

If so hit ALT-BACKSPACE

and finally

chkconfig --add dm

and you can try restarting your machine to check everything out.

Thanks very much. Unfortunately, no, it didn't work. I disabled dm as suggested, removed the one line in modules.conf that referred to NVIDIA and cold booted. The NVIDIA driver install ran smoothly, and I couldn't see anything further to configure in XF86Config-4 as the NVIDIA install seemed to have done it.

But then typing X just gave me the same mess of blue, white and black lines in the bottom inch of the screen. So I'm afraid I still seem to be as stuck as ever!

Could I be on the wrong track? Could it be the AGP driver that is wrong rather than the video card driver? Although everything works well enough for the Linux install, using whatever basic drivers that relies on. I don't know what to think.

Yes this could be an AGP issue.

Sometimes the Mandrake installation chooses the wrong AGP driver to install.

E.G. one of my systems needed the NVIDIA supplied AGP driver while another needed a kernel AGP driver for Intel Chipsets.

I haven't a clue what to do about this. Any suggestions?

service dm stop

then

rmmod the existing AGP and video drivers in memory reported by

lsmod

then try

modprobe xxx

another AGP driver and run "X" again.

Once you see a clean background, you'll have fixed the problem.

I had the same problem on a friend's PC (messy blue/white line on the buttom when starting X) with the same graphic card.

I found a lame temporary workaround:

- Once my screen is frozen I log in another PC on the LAN.

- I ssh (or telnet) the PC with the frozen screen

- I "kill -1 " the X process

- Then I come back to the 1st PC and realize gnome is starting with a perfect X display!

Go figure...

I'll try few other hacks next time I'll go visit my friend... Will let you know if I find sth interesting

Glad to know I am not alone!

Thanks for the detailed suggestions, but how do I know which of the loaded modules is the AGP driver? None of them have any telltale signs.

Also, how do I know what alternative AGP drivers are on the system?

(The motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-7S748)

If you've let updatedb run to completion...

type

locate agp | more

to list possible AGP drivers. You'll note that there are many available.

If you haven't let updatedb run via it's CRON scheduled jobs, as root type in

nohup updatedb &

It will scan your hard drives and build a database which can be used to locate files.

Your MB uses the SiS chipset so you'll need the SiSAGP drivers provided by the kernel.

Type

lsmod | grep agp


to see which ones are actually loaded

Thanks very much for the help. Not a great many files are listed in response to "locate agp | more". All but one of them look like source files. The only thing that looks at all like a driver is:
/lib/modules/2.4.22-10mdk/kernel/drivers/char/agp/agpgart.o.gz

Is this actually installed as a driver (it is evidently gzipped)?

The command "lsmod | grep agp" does not yield any output. Just typing "lsmod" produces a list of modules, but none of them have any obvious connection with AGP.

Where can I go from here?

Oops sorry, I'm utilizing the 2.6 kernels which have a slew of different agp drivers.

Out of curiosity, what happens when you give the kernel the noagp arguement?

Does X work then?

Sorry, I'm not at all expert in the use of Linux. What does giving the kernel the noagp argument mean? Where would I do that?