Re: Framebuffer and PowerPC's
On Tue, Aug 20, 2002 at 10:28:21AM -0400, Michael D. Crawford wrote:
> I'm pretty sure a stock 8500 can only use the framebuffer driver. The 8500
> doesn't have an actual video card. It is possible to use a video card in
> an 8500, but if you're using the built-in video you have to use FBDev.
>
> It happens I got X11 reconfigured for my venerable old 8500 just today.
> Try using this for your /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 file. The resolution is
> fixed at 1024x768, 15 bit depth (thousands of colors).
It's true the 8500 doesn't come with a video "card", but the built-in
video is not nearly as broken as you claim. You are correct to say that
X must be configured to use fbdev as it's driver, but that just means
that it uses the driver in the kernel for everything. This driver can
either be offb, which is generic and very limited, or controlfb, which
directly supports this particular video chipset.
The onboard video on the 8500 (and all the other boxes using the same
motherboard, including the 7x00 and 8x00 models) can do a variety of
resolutions up to 1280x1024, and can do three different bit depths
(8,15,24) depending on the installed VRAM. These boxes usually came
with 2M installed, and could be upgraded to 4M. If you have a properly
configured kernel, you can change the resolution and bit depth at
any time with the appropriate commands or with the X configuration.
In fact, the control chip even has a hardware cursor, and can be
accelerated with various tricks, but only the MacOS driver does that.
Brad Boyer
flar@allandria.com
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