S3 Trio 64

LimeFrog · Posted: Mon May 05, 2003 7:01 pm Post subject: S3 Trio 64

Hi, i'm asking this on behalf of a friend of mine who has tried to install both Mandrake 9.1 and Slackware 9 with the same result. He never got X running.
The graphic card is "S3 Trio 64", anyone heard anything about this?

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AlterEgo · Veteran Joined: 25 Apr 2002 Posts: 1619

Use the Vesa Xfree driver.
Works 100%, but not very fast.

plate · Posted: Tue May 06, 2003 10:09 am Post subject:

I had the same problem a few months ago and didn't get it solved at the time. Interestingly enough, I tried a Knoppix CD once with this graphics card, and it got picked up and initialised correctly by the corresponding Xfree 3.something server included on the CD, but I have never found a way to run Xfree 4.x with the s3 driver. I'm very much into using old hardware until it breaks, but in this case I'd probably invest 10 in a Matrox Millennium or somesuch and be done with it...

LimeFrog · Posted: Tue May 06, 2003 12:11 pm Post subject:

Ok, i'll tell my friend to try out the Vesa driver and see if that works out.

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I don't believe in God, but I'm afraid of him!

AlterEgo · Veteran Joined: 25 Apr 2002 Posts: 1619

I do have a working XF86config for the S3 Trio 64. (XFree 4.3).
Just in case :wink:

LimeFrog · Posted: Tue May 06, 2003 12:45 pm Post subject:

Great, that will probably come in handy.

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I don't believe in God, but I'm afraid of him!

tukem · Posted: Tue May 06, 2003 1:56 pm Post subject:

No wonder that XF86Config works when it uses Vesa driver. You can tell your friend to check out this page and then check whether his graphics card got a chip supported by xfree 4.3.0 or does he need xfree 3.3.6.

With Vesa driver it works in either case but it's slow.

akauppi · n00b Joined: 23 Feb 2003 Posts: 23 Location: Finland

This issue is important not only for the actual graphics cards but also because S3 Trio64 is the emulated hardware of Virtual PC (running x86 stuff on my mac).

I like to compile & test my software on x86 linux (gentoo) but so far, i've been unable to get Gentoo go graphic. Will check if the config given here helps.

Yes, the Knoppix CD worked for me too.

joshua · Posted: Sat Mar 19, 2005 8:54 pm Post subject:

Great, just found this thread, copied

akauppi · n00b Joined: 23 Feb 2003 Posts: 23 Location: Finland

This thread is really old?

I do have fbsplash working on S3 (emulated) Virtual PC. Not using that image much, though, but if you want specifics, please ask. I recall having made it (elaboratevely!) at the time fbsplash was new, and there were multipage hack-like instructions to get it done. Eventually, it did.

With nowadays Gentoo, it most likely should be easier.

-ak

joshua · Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2005 1:19 pm Post subject:

Thanks for your reply!

Yes, these days getting fbsplash to work in gentoo is fairly easy.
Im interested to see what options you pass to your kernel to make
it work (like vga=... and/or video=...). Somewhere Ive read that
there used to be a special fb-module for these cards, but obviously
that was a long time before 2.6.
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http://danielhaus.de

akauppi · n00b Joined: 23 Feb 2003 Posts: 23 Location: Finland

Booting my Virtual PC image, and pressing 'e' (edit kernel options) shows:

root (hd0,0)
kernel /bzImage-15-nov-03-parport root=/dev/hda3 vga=0x314
initrd=/initrd-800x600

As you know, fbsplash involves the initrd image, too, and some other places. In fact, seeing this list (GRUB 0.92) is already using a framebuffer, but that's just grub.. right?

-ak

joshua · Posted: Tue Mar 22, 2005 7:42 am Post subject:

Thanks a lot for your help, but I cant get it to work.
It doesnt even change the display mode any of those
vga=... commands fail.

The machine will be a easter gift for a friend of mine, who
cant afford a computer at all. I just put all my old trash
together into a box and installed gentoo. If theres no
fbsplash, no one really cares. It just wouldve been a little
bit nicer.

Well, happy easter-eggin!
_________________
Daniel Haus
http://danielhaus.de