Re: [TCLUG:15028] G400 Update

[Mike Hicks <hick0088@tc.umn.edu>]

Well, I actually discovered a magic sequence that appears to work for
running TV-out on a G400.  The (pretty bare) instructions at
http://platan.vc.cvut.cz/~vana/matroxfb.html show a good example of what
order to install the modules in, but that was about it..

For anyone who would like to try, here's a basic sequence to follow (no
guarantees, though)  I've only tried this stuff on 2.3.99-pre2, though I
think there is code 2.2 for this stuff..

Anyway

1) Go to the Character Devices section and enable I2C support.  This can
be a module if you want.  Also, be sure to enable I2C bit-banger(?!)
support, as that is the type of interface that the I2C bus on the video
card uses.  Next, enable the Matrox stuff in the Framebuffer seection
under Console Drivers.  Now, cross your fingers and hope everything
compiles ;-)

2) Get the matroxset utility and con2fb from the site listed above

3) If you have the framebuffer stuff as modules, insmod/modprobe them.. 
I had basic Matrox framebuffer stuff built in, but left some other
Matrox drivers as modules.  For me, the following worked:

  modprobe i2c-matroxfb
  modprobe matroxfb_maven   # This one takes a few seconds or so..
  modprobe matroxfb_crtc2

4) It took me a while to figure out the right magic combination of
commands for displaying stuff on a TV, but I think this should work.

  matroxset 2
  con2fb /dev/fb1 /dev/ttyN

The first command sets the second head to do NTSC out (1=PAL, 2=NTSC,
128=Monitor).  The second command sets /dev/ttyN (accessible through
ALT-F[N]) to display on /dev/fb1 (fb0 is the first head, fb1 is the
second)  You can fix things by running

  con2fb /dev/fb0 /dev/ttyN

Which should put ttyN back on fb0 (the primary head)  When you run
con2fb, it seems to set the second head to 640x480 32bpp (very slow, for
some reason).  You can also have fun with the `swapped' and `normal'
scripts that come with the matroxset utility.  If you set a tty that is
on fb0 to be running at a high resolution (via the `fbset' command) you
can run `swapped' and the ttys that were on fb0 will now be on fb1, and
the ttys that were on fb1 will now be on fb0.  That way you can run your
high-resolution desktop scaled down to 525 lines interlaced (well, less,
since TVs cut off so much stuff), but I can't guarantee it being
readable at all ;-)


Well, just thought I'd send that out now before I forget everthing.. 
G'night all..
-- 
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 [ Mike Hicks | http://umn.edu/~hick0088/ | mailto:hick0088@umn.edu ]