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Re: Debian Sparc 5.4 on Sun blade 2500



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Hello Frans & all,

Just to fast forward the bug tracking a tiny bit, here are some references:

* (incorrect) card detection should not be the problem[1]
* Joël Bertrand's attempt to get XVR-500 work on SB 2000[2]
* the problem with black strips on screen described below (it was a private
discussion, but I hope and believe Guillaume wouldn't mind to post it here as it
doesn't contain anything confidential or personal)
* there could be a working XVR-[56]00 driver for X11 in OpenBSD 4.5[3], but
  I cannot confirm or deny it. Could anybody try it out and report if it works?
  ATM I don't have a free sparc to test it on.
  Sadly, Opensolaris can't help us much as only XVR-100 is going to be
  opensourced, while XVR-[56]00 will stay closed due to Wildcat's IP.


Regards,
	Petr

[1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-sparc/2008/12/msg00002.html
[2] http://lists.debian.org/debian-sparc/2009/05/msg00090.html
[3] http://opensolaris.org/jive/thread.jspa?messageID=364919




> From: [ UNDISCLOSED SENDER ]
> To: ptrv@email.cz
> Subject: Debian and XVR 500
> Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2009 00:31:21 +0200 (CEST)
>
> Hi Petr,
>
> I'm carefully reading this thread where you try to make your XVR-500 video
> card work with Debian.
>
> Today I'm experiencing the same issue, that prevent me to install Debian
> Lenny on my Blade 2000 with 2 XVR-500 Video Card.
>
> Would you be kind enough to tell if you achieved this installation ? Was it
> necessary to use dedicated kernel for this purpose ? As of today, do you
> know if XVR 500 support is included in the compiled kernel ?
>
> Thank you very much in advance, your reply will help a lot.
>
> Guillaume
>
>
>
>> Hello Guillaume,
>>
>> first of all, please note that I've had Blade 2500 (with OBP version
>> 4.16.4), not 2000. Maybe it doesn't matter, but you can never know - Linux
>> SPARC drivers aren't tested as well as their x86 counterparts.
>>
>> Lenny 5.0.2 works for me out of the box (= without any boot parameters it
>> switches into nice high-resolution graphics mode) so yes, the XVR-500
>> driver is compiled in.
>>
>> If you're out of luck even with the recent *stable* Debian release, try boot
>> with parameter DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive. This switch Debian installer
>> into "numbered lines mode" menus so you'll be able to navigate simply by
>> entering a number of an appropriate line you're gonna choose.
>>
>> Hope it helps.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Petr
>>
>> ps.: just a side note, as I've also needed working X11, I quite cheaply
>> bought a XVR-100 (a.k.a ATI Radeon with SUN firmware) and it works nice.
>> Speed is not stellar, but for most common (graphics) programs it's good
>> enough.
>>
>>
>>
>>> Hi Petr,
>>>
>>> Thanks for your quick reply. Following this message, I tried the Debian
>>> (5.0.3) installation this week end. After an issue with the non recognized
>>> FC-AL hard drive, I finally went through.
>>>
>>> The graphic display works, but is completely unusable, because of black
>>> lines in the middle of the screen. I think the 2 XVR-500 card are a
>>> possible reason for this, so I still need to investigate.
>>>
>>> I also wonder if your were successful to change the resolution (Only the
>>> default 1280 * 1024 is available as of now) ?
>>>
>>> Best Regards,
>>> Guillaume
>>>
>>>
>>>> Hi again,
>>>>
>>>> Just for information. I attached a copy of my screen after debian install.
>>>>
>>>> Guillaume
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> Hi Guillaume,
>>>>>
>>>>> I didn't try hard running X11 (with xvr500). I guess you use fb driver
>>>>> or has Xorg released a XVR compatible driver I'm not aware of?
>>>>> Looking into guts of the driver[1] I suppose the resolution is hardwired
>>>>> for now. Do those strange black lines happen even if your xorg config has
>>>>> the same resolution as kernel driver? Have you already tried to use only
>>>>> one XVR500 card? Try to contact David on Debian-sparc or kernel mail list,
>>>>> maybe he could help.
>>>>>
>>>>> Regards,
>>>>> Petr
>>>>>
>>>>> [1] http://lxr.linux.no/#linux+v2.6.31/drivers/video/sunxvr500.c
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> Hi,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Indeed I understood it lately. The driver is the default fbdev provided
>>>>>> with Debian.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I cannot change the resolution (from xorg.cong), so all tests used
>>>>>> native 1280*1024. I also supposed that the probleme may come from
>>>>>> an inappropriate sync frequency for the monitor,but it wasn't succesfull.
>>>>>> I also removed the second XVR-500 to avoid any conflict between cards,
>>>>>> without any result.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> X is mandatory for me. I can administrate the workstation from the
>>>>>> command line but browsing the web is a bit more tricky.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I will forward this conversation to David to get his opinion on this,
>>>>>> I think he's clearly aware of this issue.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Guillaume,
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> From: davem@davemloft.net
>>>>>>> Well:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> 1) Never email me privately, we have a mailing list for users
>>>>>>>    to ask questions on, sparclinux@vger.kernel.org
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>    And if you post there, then other developers and users
>>>>>>>    can answer your question when I am very busy with other
>>>>>>>    tasks like I am now.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> 2) XVR-500 is not supported with X at the moment, sorry.
>>>>>>>    The Linux console driver itself was completely reverse
>>>>>>>    engineered, so you should be happy even that works.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>    Use a Radeon or ATI mach64 based card in your machine if
>>>>>>>    you want X.
>>>>>>>

Attachment: black_strips.tar.gz
Description: GNU Zip compressed data


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