Nforce2 clarification

jpc82 · Guru Joined: 09 Mar 2003 Posts: 326

I would just like to get some clarification how well my new system will work with gentoo.

Abit NF7-S
AMB 2500+ Barton
ATI 9500Pro
On board audo and NIC

From what I read the NIC is now auto detected by the newest LiveCD, so I will not need to use PCI NIC. Once I get the system going I will need to emerge nv-net. Is there anythign I need to do after I emerge nv-net?

I can't seem to find up to date info on the Audio portion of the Mobo. Can anyone tell me what I need to do to get audio working.

What is currently the best Kernel to use with Nforce2 mobo? I normally use ck-sources.

I assume the 9500 will work without much problem, 3d acceleration would be a bonus but is not a must. I will keep windows for when I want to play games.

Thank you for any info you can give me.

Glorandar · Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2003 7:33 pm Post subject: I prefer vanilla-sources (2.4.21)

I am using an ASUS A7N8X-deluxe (nforce2 based) motherboard.

APIC -- Given that I am playing with APIC support, I currently like the vanilla-sources (2.4.21) kernel as its APIC seems both functional and stable.

I have also had good success with gentoo-sources-r5. However, its APIC support (my current interest) doesn't seem as stable as the stock 2.4.21 kernel's.

IDE -- Both gentoo-sources and vanilla-sources support the nforce2 IDE controllers. I own both ATA66 and ATA100 drives and they both operate flawlessly.

AGP -- Given that I am using an gforce4 ti4600 video card, I am not having any issues with the 2.4.21 kernel's agpgart's lack of nforce2 support. This is because I use the media-video/nvidia-kernel ebuild.

This would seem to be a problem for your setup, so you might want to try one of Alan Cox's 2.4.21 kernels as they are documented to have agpgart support for the nforce2 chipset (and thus enable AGP access to non-nvidia video cards).

NICs -- Through emerging nv-net, I have successfully (with gentoo-sources-r5) used the broadcom based onboard NIC. However, I am currently using the 3COM onboard NIC (the ASUS board has both), as its fully supported by both gentoo-sources and vanilla-sources, without any external ebuild.

AUDIO -- I haven't used the onboard audio, although I understand that you have to fiddle with the kernel's ac97 driver and then emerge nvidia-audio.

SMBus -- (aka sensors) Forget this item for now. While the latest CVS lm_sensors has support for the nforce2 chipset's SMBus hardware, the last time I looked my board's sensors' kernel drivers were still hanging.
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----- Glorandar

TheAgent · n00b Joined: 23 May 2003 Posts: 29 Location: Waukesha, WI

I am using an NForce2 board (FN41 of Shuttle's SN41G2 system) and I haven't had any problems using the gentoo-sources kernel... emerge nforce-net, nvidia-kernel, and nvidia-glx... and i'm using alsa-drivers for 5.1 sound support...

everything works great, so i wouldnt worry, if i were you... even if you have problems, there are alot of linux-nvidia forums across the net...
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TheAgent
Total Linux N00b

Shuttle SN41G2:
Athlon XP 2100+
512 MB Corsair PC2700
40GB Maxtor
NForce2 Soundstorm, VGA, Network

jpc82 · Guru Joined: 09 Mar 2003 Posts: 326

when you say "Enable AGP access" do you meen access to AGP features, or AGP itself.

If I don't get AGP working at first will I not be able to use my 9500, or will it just be slower?

Glorandar · Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2003 3:05 am Post subject: What AGPGART does for you

By "enable AGP access" I mean access the video accelerating features of the AGP bus (specifically the mobo's agpgart hardware).

In the worst case, you can always use your video card's VESA compliant features, via the generic vesa drivers. However, the performance would truly suck.

The kernel's agpgart driver is specific to the your mobo's chipset and it is generally independent of the video card itself.

The kernel's agpgart driver is used to provide very fast access to the video card's onboard memory. Thus it has real uses for both 2D, but especially 3D, video acceleration.

Is an operating agpgart driver required for your video card? Well, that depends on the video driver you are using with that card. It is notable that the agpgart driver is used heavily by the DRM (direct rendering manager) variants of xfree86.

Unfortunately, only nvidia's closed source video driver has stable (ie. not still in testing) support for the nforce2's agpgart features. This is circa July/2003.

I cannot speak about the ATI driver issues, as I use one of nvidia's cards.

Here is the nvidia video card driver situation:

The xfree distribution comes with support for the nvidia cards. Further, this support doesn't require (or use?) an operating agpgart. However, its 2D, and especially 3D performance is fairly slow (some might say pathetic).

This is where nvidia's closed source, yet freely available video driver comes in. It has two parts. The first part is within the media-video/nvidia-kernel ebuild, which is the kernel resident portion, including support for the nforce2 chipsets's agpgart hardware. This driver can use either its own agpgart support, or use the kernel's agpgart driver. It can thus work with a fairly wide variety of motherboards.

The second part is within the media-video/nvidia-glx ebuild which provides the userland resident xfree86 driver. This driver includes 2D, and 3D acceleration, that is quite good.
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----- Glorandar

taskara · Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2003 4:35 am Post subject:

should work GREAT

use 2.4.21 vanilla or 2.4.21-ac1

and btw use intel8x0 driver for alsa

jpc82 · Guru Joined: 09 Mar 2003 Posts: 326

Thanx for all your help.

I will probably be getting my new parts this weekend, hopefully everything goes ok

taskara · Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2003 9:43 pm Post subject:

you'll be right

just flash to the latest bios

make sure you get GOOD ram and a barton core athlon, then you can run at 200mhz fsb

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jpc82 · Guru Joined: 09 Mar 2003 Posts: 326

Ok thanx for all your help so far with everything, but I have one last question.

I just got my new system and i'm about to start installing gentoo on it, however I would just like to know one last thing.

Can anyone give me a list of things I need to make sure are included in the kernel. For example I'm pretty sure that Nforce's USB host controller is OHCI right?

what other things are required?

paulisdead · Guru Joined: 10 Apr 2002 Posts: 510 Location: Seattle, WA

I had to build Support For USB with preliminary USB FS, EHCI (for USB 2.0), OHCI, and HID, all as modules. For some reason if I built them into the kernel my USB would lock up, but as modules they work fine for some reason. I've got an Abit NF7-s rev 2.

I'm using the gaming sources with nvagp for nvidia display drivers, but you might need to use the AGPgart patch or a kernel that has nforce2 agp support (don't remember which ones do, I believe development or mm sources might).

The install CD wouldn't work with the NIC for me, maybe you'll have better luck. And until the latest driver release a few weeks ago, the NIC wouldn't work at all in Linux. But maybe you'll have better luck than me.

have a look at this thread to get ALSA working with 4.1 speakers mirrorring the front speakers to the rear https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=59072 I don't think true 4.1 4 channel audio is supported by ALSA with these boards, but that beats the nforce-audio drivers, since they only do stereo.

Also, X wouldn't start form me unless I disabled acpi and used bios irq when loading my kernel.

append="pci=noacpi pci=biosirq"

for lilo in the kernels section in lilo.conf, not sure about grub, been awhile since I've used that.
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moby dick · Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2003 7:47 am Post subject:

moby dick · Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2003 7:48 am Post subject:

oh - and I use the gs-sources-2.4.21-r6
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jpc82 · Guru Joined: 09 Mar 2003 Posts: 326

I installed gentoo last night and everything went pretty good. NIC was found by LiveCD fine, and overall everything went fine.

I used ac-sources as my kernel and I found almost all the options that you guys gave me except i missed EHCI and AMD Viper support.

After the installation I emerged nforce-net and added nvnet to /etc/modules.autoload and my nic worked perfect after boot

Now my current job is to get AGP working. I so far have emerged xfree-drm and ati-drivers. Do I need to emerge nvidia-kernel and nvidia-glx if I am using an ATI card? or are these only used if you have a Nvidia vidcard also?

Wedge_ · Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2003 1:02 pm Post subject:

The nvidia-kernel and nvidia-glx packages are only for nVidia cards, you won't need them.
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deprecated · Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2003 2:02 pm Post subject:

Hello everyone,

I have the Asus A7N8X (an nForce2 board), and I used the cvs version of lm_sensors and i2c, and it works beautifully without hanging. From my playing around with it if you don't install the cvs version of i2c it hangs and if you left any old i2c components in the kernel it hangs. Although if you really want to the cvs does include instructions for patching the kernel.

Anyways, its still not stable so I guess your milage will vary, but for those of us that love sensors and are willing to risk it, go to http://www2.lm-sensors.nu/~lm78/download.html and scroll down to find the instructions for getting the source from cvs.

--Dep