FW: Configuring Xorg for Palmax/Cyrix MediaGX

[Editor]

Thanks for your help Alan, very much appreciated. And yes, the PD1000 is
'slightly odd' in many respects I fear. In any event, it seems from what
you say that I should stay away from the Cyrix video driver. 

So, do you or anyone else have any views in this context with regard to
the Xorg "vesa" driver? 

A few weeks ago, I managed to get the PD1000 display working under DSL
(Damned Small Linux). This uses XFree86 and the old 'svga' driver.
Trouble is it's pretty much impossible to make anything else work on
Palmax using DSL! This is why I decided to try Debian Etch with all the
shiny new features that the 2.6.x kernel has to over, like Xorg.

Xorg seems to have dropped 'svga' driver and replaced it with 'vesa'
driver instead. I have already tried all the recommended modelines for
the 'svga' driver with the 'vesa' driver. None of them work. 

Is there any 'magic' to make the 'vesa' driver behave more like the old
'svga' driver? Or can one tweak the old 'svga' driver and use it with
Xorg?

Or is it back to DSL + no toys for me? :-(

Best wishes, Garf

-----Original Message-----
From: Alan Cox [mailto:alan at lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk] 
Sent: 2006 October 29, Sunday 16:25
To: Editor
Cc: xorg at lists.freedesktop.org
Subject: Re: FW: Configuring Xorg for Palmax/Cyrix MediaGX

Ar Sul, 2006-10-29 am 15:26 +0000, ysgrifennodd Editor:
> Whatever I do with the xorg.conf file - including adding relevant
> modelines - I only get a blank screen with the Cyrix driver. I have
> Googled this and read everything I could find. Unfortunately I cannot
> find any document that mentions this driver running on this machine -
> though there do seem to be a lot of doubts about the Cyrix driver
> generally.

The PD1000 has a fairly old Cyrix setup and some slightly odd video. I
doubt anyone has tested 5520 for some years and the 5520 has some
interesting requirements. Full accelerated support for the 5520 may well
require going around the BIOS if its an old one and avoiding softvga. At
the moment the Cyrix driver relies on softvga.

> Is the Cyrix driver compatible with this Cyrix chip or I am doing
> something silly? Or is there an updated version of the Cyrix driver
> lurking somewhere, newer than the one shipped with Debian Etch or Sid?

It should but afaik nobody is maintaining CS5520 support.

> I presume there *must* be a way to make this work because Alan Cox's
> Palmax touch-screen driver is included in Xorg. Delighted to post my
> xorg.conf(s) & Xorg.0.log(s) if that would help.

The 1100 is a 5530 and was working last time I tried it (which is some
time ago). I no longer have a working PD1100.