dsavitsk wrote:
> I have an old Dell GX110 (P3 667 I think). I have tried to install FreeBSD
> on it and just cannot get it to function. The basic issue is that it is
> unable to detect the graphics card.
>
> The chipset is an intel i810 which I guess is the problem. I tried building
> a custom Kernel with agp enabled, but a) it seeme to already be enabled by
> defaut, and b) the new kernel didn't change anything.
>
> Any suggestions on getting this to work? I have also tried a bunch of Linux
> flavors with no luck there, and frankly, I'd rather use *BSD anyway.
>
I just finished installing DesktopBSD 1.6 (FreeBSD 6.3+X11+KDE+packages)
on a... "mature," (i.e. 8 y.o.) Sony VAIO R505 JLK 12.1" lappy that uses
an Intel 815EM w/4MB vram.

The default install repeatedly identified the chip as vga and ended up
at the wrong resolution & color depth. I had to reconfigure xorg.conf
in part by running Xorg -configure , in part by hand. I can't stress
enough, btw, the value of the doc:

and the command dmesg for zeroing in on the exact hw and relevant driver.

In my case, I selected the 810 generic driver and specified the horiz &
vert frequencies and amount of ram. Xorg -configure didn't use
everything but, it's a good idea(tm) to have the specs up front. Xorg
-configure caught everything but...

For whatever reason, 'Section "ServerLayout"' reported the wrong monitor
value. After I edited that, everything worked out fine.

Pertinent section of xorg.conf below.

hth,

-Craig


# ************************************************** ********************
# Graphics device section
# ************************************************** ********************

# Any number of graphics device sections may be present

# Standard VGA Device:

Section "Device"
Identifier "Standard VGA"
VendorName "Unknown"
BoardName "Unknown"

# The chipset line is optional in most cases. It can be used to override
# the driver's chipset detection, and should not normally be specified.

# Chipset "generic"

# The Driver line must be present. When using run-time loadable driver
# modules, this line instructs the server to load the specified driver
# module. Even when not using loadable driver modules, this line
# indicates which driver should interpret the information in this section.

Driver "vga"
# The BusID line is used to specify which of possibly multiple devices
# this section is intended for. When this line isn't present, a device
# section can only match up with the primary video device. For PCI
# devices a line like the following could be used. This line should not
# normally be included unless there is more than one video device
# intalled.

# BusID "PCI:0:10:0"

# VideoRam 256

# Clocks 25.2 28.3

EndSection

# Device configured by xorgconfig:

Section "Device"
Identifier "Card0"
Driver "i810"
#VideoRam 4096
# Insert Clocks lines here if appropriate
EndSection


# ************************************************** ********************
# Screen sections
# ************************************************** ********************

# Any number of screen sections may be present. Each describes
# the configuration of a single screen. A single specific screen section
# may be specified from the X server command line with the "-screen"
# option.
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "Card0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 16

Subsection "Display"
Depth 16
Modes "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
ViewPort 0 0
EndSubsection
EndSection

# ************************************************** ********************
# ServerLayout sections.
# ************************************************** ********************

# Any number of ServerLayout sections may be present. Each describes
# the way multiple screens are organised. A specific ServerLayout
# section may be specified from the X server command line with the
# "-layout" option. In the absence of this, the first section is used.
# When now ServerLayout section is present, the first Screen section
# is used alone.

Section "ServerLayout"

# The Identifier line must be present
Identifier "Simple Layout"

# Each Screen line specifies a Screen section name, and optionally
# the relative position of other screens. The four names after
# primary screen name are the screens to the top, bottom, left and right
# of the primary screen. In this example, screen 2 is located to the
# right of screen 1.

Screen "Screen 0"