recovering from the 6.3 xorg mess

[peter stern]

On Mon, 17 Mar 2008, Kevin Oberman wrote:

>> Date: Mon, 17 Mar 2008 07:36:23 +0100
>> From: Kurt Jaeger <lists at c0mplx.org>
>> Sender: owner-freebsd-stable at freebsd.org
>>
>> Hi!
>>
>>> I'd appreciate suggestions on how to get a working xorg from the mess 6.3
>>> shipped with. I've been using FreeBSD since 2.2 and have never had much
>>> trouble with it until the 6 branch was released. My hardware is pretty
>>> generic Intel brand D865 motherboard, matrox g550 video. I don't customize
>>> the kernel. I do clean installs not upgrades.
>>
>> Basically, the problem is with the matrox board.
>>
>> Due to the very same reasons I had to upgrade my workstation
>> (good excuse 8-)
>>
>> Matrox provides a mga_hal binary to support the relevant resolution
>> and other gimmicks of that board. This binary works with xorg-6.x,
>> but not with xorg-7.x, because there were changes in the interfaces
>> to the low-level things.
>>
>> As far as I can see, there is no driver from mga for 7.x available
>> as of now.
>>
>> --
>> pi at opsec.eu            +49 171 3101372                        12 years to go !
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>
> I have run the Matrox G550 under both 6 and 7. I had some problems, but
> not too many. I do need to use xrandr to set up the proper resolution,
> though.
>
> #!/bin/sh
> # Set 1280x1024 mode on second display
> xrandr --addmode VGA2 1280x1024
> # Set 1024x768 mode on second port (Why? Why not.)
> xrandr --addmode VGA2 1024x768
> # Set the second port to use 1280x1024
> xrandr --output VGA2 --mode 1280x1024
>
> If you have a dual-monitor setup, you need xf86-video-mga-1.9.100. The
> version in ports is mga-1.4.7. You will have to pull the old port out of
> cvs. The version was rolled back on Jan. 2, 2008 due to problems people
> were having with the new code,
>
> Let me know if you need a copy of my xorg.conf for this beast. The
> xrandr setup is a bit different from the old one.
> -- 
> R. Kevin Oberman, Network Engineer
> Energy Sciences Network (ESnet)
> Ernest O. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab)
> E-mail: oberman at es.net			Phone: +1 510 486-8634
> Key fingerprint:059B 2DDF 031C 9BA3 14A4  EADA 927D EBB3 987B 3751
>

I was not familiar with using xrandr. I am now able to control the 
resolution and refresh rate from the command line. xrandr -v however is 
not reporting all the refresh rates that this monitor is capable of 
at higher resolutions. Am I going to have to set those manually?

This is an ugly way to have to deal with X. So this definitely means the 
mga driver is broken?

I would appreciate a copy of your xorg.conf

Thanks for your suggestions.

peter