From owner-freebsd-questions Thu Mar 28 09:23:14 1996 Return-Path: owner-questions Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.3/8.7.3) id JAA21055 for questions-outgoing; Thu, 28 Mar 1996 09:23:14 -0800 (PST) Received: from tamadahow.phbtsus.com (tamadahow.phbtsus.com [192.40.29.154]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.3/8.7.3) with SMTP id JAA21049 for ; Thu, 28 Mar 1996 09:23:11 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199603281723.JAA21049@freefall.freebsd.org> Received: by tamadahow.phbtsus.com (1.38.193.4/16.2) id AA03087; Thu, 28 Mar 1996 10:30:03 -0700 From: Earl Bryner Subject: Video Card Question To: questions@freebsd.org Date: Thu, 28 Mar 96 10:30:02 MST Mailer: Elm [revision: 70.85] Sender: owner-questions@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk I have recently been attempting to install FreeBSD 2.1 from the January 96 release, and have encountered significant trouble configuring X. I have a PCI bus 100Mhz Pentium with a ATI graphics Expression video card. The first trouble encountered is that I had to dissable all my serial ports to keep the boot from messing with the video card. I am aware that the ATI card uses com4, but attempts to probe any com port causes the video adapter to display a 'melting snow' pattern and then go blank. ( this happens @ boot time ). Once I dissabled all serial ports, it will at least boot, but all attempts to run startx fail in various forms. If I try to use the mach64 Xserver, my screen goes blank ( after running startx and all attempts to abort fail even CTR ALT BSP ). My question is: Is there a patch available for the ATI Graphics Expression card? if so, will it support a very new version of the card? ( I unserstand that ATI recently changed the chip on the card ) Secondly: If buying a different video card is the best alternative, what kind of card would give me the best support running on FreeBSD and WindowsNT? Any suggestions / comments would be appreciated.