NVIDIA Geforce2 MX and X, SOLVED

Message

hika · Post by **hika** » Wed Jan 20, 2010 9:33 pm

I just encountered an annoying thing. I wanted to install Gentoo and X on one of my machines and since I have an older vidio card (NVIDIA Geforce2 MX) the manual says I need the 71 version driver. But when trying to install it says this driver is not working with X-server 1.5 and up. And the lower versions are no-longer in the tree!
The card is more then sufficient for what I do on my machine and I hate to have to buy a new card just to install X.
Half a year ago I could do such an install! Does anybody know what to do (except buying another card)

Hika

geki · Post by **geki** » Wed Jan 20, 2010 9:53 pm

install one of these?
http://gentoo-portage.com/x11-drivers/xf86-video-nv
http://en.gentoo-wiki.com/wiki/Nouveau

hika · Post by **hika** » Wed Jan 20, 2010 10:24 pm

Thanks, I put NV as vidiocard in make.conf and it installs!

Hika

Mike Hunt · Post by **Mike Hunt** » Wed Jan 20, 2010 10:31 pm

Is your box similar to this one?

Code: Select all

 ~ # lspci | grep VGA
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV11 [GeForce2 MX/MX 400] (rev b2)

~ # qlist -Iv nvidia xorg-server
media-video/nvidia-settings-180.60
x11-base/xorg-server-1.5.3-r6
x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers-96.43.14

~ # lsmod | grep nv
nvidia               4695768  22
agpgart                25880  2 nvidia,via_agp

~ # grep GLX /var/log/Xorg.0.log
(II) NVIDIA GLX Module  96.43.14  Sun Nov  8 18:24:17 PST 2009
(II) Loading extension GLX
(II) NVIDIA(0): Support for GLX with the Damage and Composite X extensions is enabled.
(II) Loading extension NV-GLX
(II) Initializing extension GLX

hika · Post by **hika** » Wed Jan 20, 2010 10:59 pm

No I have the simple geforce2 MX not the 200 or the 400. I also have a PA3000 plus (Riva TNT2 M64) lying around, but that is also the same generation.
Why? You mean to say that the 96 version driver is working on your system?

Hika

Mike Hunt · Post by **Mike Hunt** » Thu Jan 21, 2010 12:59 am

Yes, in fact, I have a box that has exactly that (in my previous post). I use it as an nfs-client to play videos all day.

I was just thinking, in case your hardware was the same then ...

I kinda remember a long time ago, having a Riva TNT2 card, and I could only use the NV driver.
I just wasn't sure which one you had.

hika · Post by **hika** » Thu Jan 21, 2010 1:10 am

I might try your suggestion. For some stupid reason it wants also to load the vesa and the fbdev driver. After emerging them too startx fails on the fbdev because it needs a busID which it obviously can't find.
Oh shit! It fails on the emerge of nvidia-drivers-96.43.13. Gonna look what it says/wants now. But probably tomorrow. It's already late. 2:00 AM here.

Hika

Gentree · Post by **Gentree** » Sat Jan 30, 2010 4:37 pm

Hi,

I'm also running hardware like Mike's

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-su-4.0#lspci | grep VGA
03:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV11 [GeForce2 MX/MX 400] (rev b2)
-su-4.0#qlist -Iv nvidia xorg-server
media-video/nvidia-settings-190.42
x11-base/xorg-server-1.5.3-r7
x11-drivers/nvidia-drivers-96.43.14

but emerge world reports:

Code: Select all

!!! The following installed packages are masked:
- x11-base/xorg-server-1.5.3-r7 (masked by: package.mask)
/usr/portage/new/profiles/package.mask:
# TomÃ¡Å¡ ChvÃ¡tal <scarabeus@gentoo.org> (23 Jan 2010)
# Obsoleted by xorg-server-1.6
# Let us know in bugs if you have some issues with 1.6

Time to file bugs before they obsolete our hardware !!

please add comments to this bug.
http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=302888

Gentree · Post by **Gentree** » Sun Jan 31, 2010 8:39 pm

Actually , I've just checked with the nvidia site and it says 96.43.14 supports MX 400 . It also says in the feature list that it has added support for xorg 1.7

uptil now, I've never had any luck with it beyond 1.5

However, I just went over this , rebuild mesa and xorg-server with nptl set rebuild all the drivers given by
qlist -I -C x11-drivers/

and lo and behold fully upto date ~x86 xorg-1.7.4 on my good old MX 400 card.

A big thanks to Nvidia for such good support for older hardware.

hika · Post by **hika** » Sun Jan 31, 2010 10:25 pm

I've actually got it working with the xf86-video-nv driver. I use this xorg.conf file for the nv driver and my screen resolution/colordepth and let the rest be defined by HAL.

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Section "ServerLayout"
	Identifier     "X.org Configured"
	Screen      0  "Screen0" 0 0
EndSection

Section "Device"
        ### Available Driver options are:-
        ### Values: <i>: integer, <f>: float, <bool>: "True"/"False",
        ### <string>: "String", <freq>: "<f> Hz/kHz/MHz"
        ### [arg]: arg optional
        #Option     "SWcursor"           	# [<bool>]
        #Option     "HWcursor"           	# [<bool>]
        #Option     "NoAccel"            	# [<bool>]
        #Option     "ShadowFB"           	# [<bool>]
        #Option     "UseFBDev"           	# [<bool>]
        #Option     "Rotate"             	# [<str>]
        #Option     "VideoKey"           	# <i>
        #Option     "FlatPanel"          	# [<bool>]
        #Option     "FPDither"           	# [<bool>]
        #Option     "CrtcNumber"         	# <i>
        #Option     "FPScale"            	# [<bool>]
        #Option     "FPTweak"            	# <i>
        #Option     "DualHead"           	# [<bool>]
	Identifier  "Card0"
	Driver      "nv"
	VendorName  "nVidia Corporation"
	BoardName   "NV11 [GeForce2 MX/MX 400]"
	BusID       "PCI:1:5:0"
	Screen      0
EndSection

Section "Screen"
	Identifier    "Screen0"
	Device        "Card0"
	DefaultDepth  16
	SubSection "Display"
		Viewport   0 0
		Depth     16
		Modes     "1280x1024"
	EndSubSection
EndSection

First I also left my monitor in but X was unstable then. It's still not fully as stable as I would want, but that I have to look further into. It might be a kernel issue.
I have also the vesa and fb drivers installed, because if I don't put the framebufferdevice in the kernel I haven't found a way to put the normal console in high resolution (with decent font).
I guess also this part could be transposed to HAL but then I need info on how to make a working profile and I haven't found anything clear about that jet.
Getting a working profile for my dutch keyboard already took me a day and it still complains. For who wants to see this or knows more about this or where to find info

10-x11-input.fdi

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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<deviceinfo version="0.2">
  <device>

    <!-- FIXME: Support tablets too. -->
    <match key="info.capabilities" contains="input.mouse">
      <merge key="input.x11_driver" type="string">evdev</merge>
    </match>

    <match key="info.capabilities" contains="input.keymap">
      <append key="info.callouts.add" type="strlist">hal-setup-keymap</append>
    </match>

    <match key="info.capabilities" contains="input.keys">
      <!-- If we're using Linux, we use evdev by default (falling back to
           keyboard otherwise). -->
      <merge key="input.xkb.model" type="string">evdev</merge>
      <merge key="input.x11_driver" type="string">evdev</merge>
      <merge key="input.xkb.layout" type="string">nl</merge>
      <merge key="input.xkb.variant" type="string"/>
      <merge key="input.xkb.options" type="string">terminate:ctrl_alt_bksp</merge>
    </match>

  </device>
</deviceinfo>

and the error

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expected keysym, got XF86TouchpadToggle: line 122 of inet
The XKEYBOARD keymap compiler (xkbcomp) reports:
> Warning:          Type "ONE_LEVEL" has 1 levels, but <RALT> has 2 symbols
>                   Ignoring extra symbols
Errors from xkbcomp are not fatal to the X server

Hika

Mike Hunt · Post by **Mike Hunt** » Sun Jan 31, 2010 10:57 pm

Gentree wrote:Actually , I've just checked with the nvidia site and it says 96.43.14 supports MX 400 . It also says in the feature list that it has added support for xorg 1.7

uptil now, I've never had any luck with it beyond 1.5

However, I just went over this , rebuild mesa and xorg-server with nptl set rebuild all the drivers given by
qlist -I -C x11-drivers/

and lo and behold fully upto date ~x86 xorg-1.7.4 on my good old MX 400 card.

A big thanks to Nvidia for such good support for older hardware.

Wow, awesome. Thanks Gentree for looking insistently into this. Updating now ...

krinn · Post by **krinn** » Sun Jan 31, 2010 11:17 pm

Mike Hunt wrote:
Gentree wrote:...
A big thanks to Nvidia for such good support for older hardware.

Wow, awesome. Thanks Gentree for looking insistently into this. Updating now ...

lol can i join the "i have an old nvidia card" club too ?

<-- EDIT: removed "crappy" word, but i keep old ! At least i must admit that one do 1024x768 when other only show 800x600 in my tv

Code: Select all

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV20 [GeForce3 Ti 200] (rev a3)

Mike Hunt · Post by **Mike Hunt** » Sun Jan 31, 2010 11:24 pm

Hehe, not so crappy. I use it on a nfs-client to play tv shows and movies all day. Works great.

hika · Post by **hika** » Sun Jan 31, 2010 11:27 pm

Besides if you're no gamer or video editor you most of the time don't need more. Those new one then just eat a lot of energy

Hika

Gentree · Post by **Gentree** » Sun Jan 31, 2010 11:33 pm

What's crap about a card that does exactly what I need, consumes very little power and does not make a noise like the winter wind blowing over russian steppes?

I got a NV28 [GeForce4 Ti 4200 AGP 8x] I payed quite a bit for but then got fed up with the noise and the fact it made feel cold just listening to it.

Since I took it out 2 or 3 years back I've realised I never needed it in the first place. Apart from trying to impress people but I always lie to the girls and tell them I have a GeForce10 and a 12" prick

Luckly Nvidia still support crap.

hika · Post by **hika** » Sun Jan 31, 2010 11:42 pm

Luckly Nvidia still support crap.

Most companies only invest in trying to convince you, you always need the newest and most expensive, so they can earn money. It definitely is laudable when they look further. A lot still do not even invest in Linux drivers or supporting others to write them.
I think I'm going to try the nvidia driver for better stability.

Hika

Mike Hunt · Post by **Mike Hunt** » Mon Feb 01, 2010 2:49 am

... and works great with xorg-server-1.7.4.901