Some Questions and Answers

# 13 Some Questions and Answers

Contents of this section

Q: I noticed that X11 Release 6 has been announced. Can I use it on Linux?
A: Please look at appendix The Future of XFree86 above. You should not use it at the moment.

Q: I started X by running '`X`'. I get the stippled background, but no window at all. What am I doing wrong?
A: Running X starts only the server, no window-manager and no applications. The usual way to start X is running '`startx`'.

Q: Is there support for 16-bit or 24-bit colour modes?
A: No, there is only support for 1-bit, 4-bit and 8-bit colour in the moment. The 4-bit server (`XF86_VGA16`) is in an experimental stage, so there are bugs and problems using it. Most of the known problems are mentioned in the manpage.

Q: I have a Logitech serial mouse but it does not work with the `Logitech` keyword.
A: The `Logitech` keyword is for older Logitech serial mice, more recent Logitech serial mice use the `MouseMan` or `Microsoft` keyword. Logitech serial mice plugged into a ps/2 port use the `ps/2` keyword.

Q: My server is unable to find some of the fonts (e.g. font `fixed` cannot be loaded at startup).
A: First check that the directories in the font path in the `Xconfig` file are named correctly and contain fonts. If that is the case, running mkfontdir in all of those directories may help you.

Q: I have the problem that the fonts are not restored correctly after leaving X. My screen looks totally garbled.
A: This is not yet completely resolved. There are utilities called runx , restoretext,... coming with svgalib (`sunsite:/pub/Linux/libs`) that help in most cases. In the S3 server from XFree86 2.1.1 this bug is fixed.

Q: I have a s3 card and it does not work properly. The screen gets distorted when dragging windows and it frequently locks up.
A: First try to use options `nomemaccess` or `nolinear`. If both does not help and you have a s3 928, try specifying chipset s3_generic in your `Xconfig`. If nothing helps, it might be a incompatibility problem between your graphic card and your motherboard. Try to see if the card works in a different system, if you can get your hands on one.

Q: I had a normal SVGA card up to now with 1 MB of video RAM. With it I could do a virtual resolution of 1152x900 or 1024x1024. Why does it not work on my new s3 card?
A: All but the most recent revisions of the s3 chips cannot use a line length of 1152, so a length of 1280 is used for this resolution in XFree86 2.0. The later versions can use the line length of 1152 for the more recent revisions. If you have a new revision, grade up to 2.1.1 and it should work. Furthermore the s3 server needs 1k for the cursor, so a virtual resolution using 1MB will not work. Note that you will need some memory on the graphics card for font and pixmap caching if you want to get maximum performance from your graphic card. So the memory is not wasted, but will get you a great performance boost. Try running some font or pixmap specific mode of x11perf with maximal allowed virtual resolution (e.g. 1024x1023) and with 1024x768 and compare the results! Recommended resolutions are 1024x768 and 1152x800 for 1MB cards. With the older chip revisions the latter resolution leaves not too much memory to the font cache, so you will have a performance loss using large fonts. For normal use with fonts up to 18 points it should be OK, though.

Q: I have a s3 Localbus card and the server cannot find a high memory area. Then it disables direct memory access. What should i do?
A: There are some strange problems with Localbus cards. It is being worked upon. If you are using XFree86 2.0, put `option "nolinear"` and `option "memaccess"` into your `Xconfig` file. This will enable the server to use the 64k aperture that is supported even for ISA cards. This will furthermore prevent the following problem (this bug is only in XFree86 2.0): Due to a bug in the linear frame buffer code, the s3 processor is not reset correctly, once a large (e.g. 1024k) linear frame buffer is found. Thus the server will not work after that if it fails to find the high memory area until a hard reset is sent to the chip (i.e. even a normal reboot will not reset the system).

Q: I have a WD90C3x based graphic card. XFree86 2.0 seems not to probe the clocks correctly. What can I do?
A: Yup, there is a bug in the clock probing code in XFree86-2.0. It is fixed in 2.1. Grade up!

Q: I have a Diamond Viper card. Why does it not work?
A: In addition to being a Diamond product, this card is based on the P9000 chip by Weitek. This chip is not yet supported by XFree86, so you have only a chance to get it working with one of the generic servers (i.e. Mono or VGA16). You will have nevertheless the clock setting problem that prevents the other diamond cards from working.

Q: I have a card with the Compaq AVGA chip. It does not work.
A: The AVGA support seems to be completely broken in 2.0. This is fixed in 2.1.

Q: I have a busmouse and am running selection. The server has problems with recognizing the mouse.
A: Selection has some problems with busmice. XFree86 cannot open the mouse device if selection is running on it. So kill selection before starting XFree86.

Q: The server dies with the message "Cannot find a free VT".
A: XFree86 needs a free VT to run on. So if you have put a getty process on every virtual console in you `/etc/inittab`, XFree86 will not be able to start. I suggest to let `/dev/tty8` (for kernel messages) and `/dev/tty7` (for XFree86) free of a getty process.

Q: Why is the `XF86_Mono` server not working with my hercules card, I thought this card was supported?
A: The hercules driver (as well as the BDM2 driver) is not part of `XF86_Mono` by default. Get the LinkKit and you can include it. You will need about 4 MB free disk space and about 5 minutes for building the server (on a 486/30).

Q: I have problems with the backspace and delete keys.
A: You can solve this using either loadkeys or xmodmap. In your shell initialization file (`.bashrc`, `.zshrc`, ...) you have to set the right behaviour of the shell using stty. Please read the manpages how to do that.

There are a lot strange phenomena reported that cannot be handeled here. If your card has a switch for bus waitstates, it helps in many cases to put this to the 1WS setting. You should also look at the remarks above on setting some BIOS values. As many reports (especially on BIOS setting) are contradicting, you should try several settings.

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