Rh8 on ze5155.

[Venkata_2]

I have installed RH8 on a ze5155. The installation went smoothly. I installed in the graphical mode and use dthe gui with no problem.
However after the installation I am unable to start the XWindows. The screen just remains black.
I used 1024x748 resolution.
Also during the installation the monitor was not detected though the video card was.
What should be the configuration ?
Thanks.

[Bruce Copeland · Accepted solution]

This seems to be a pretty common problem with notebooks--especially HP/Compaq notebooks that use ATI Radeon video hardware. Your ze5155 most likely has an ATI graphics chip with the ID 0x4336, which is not recognized by any of the current XFree86 ati/radeon drivers. [You can run lspci (as root) to find out what graphics chip you have.] As far as configuration goes, you need to select 'Generic Laptop Display Panel 1024x768' as your monitor and Generic VESA framebuffer as your driver (to get started). Alternatively you might want to look at my web page about RH 8 on a ze4100

http://www.cybersym.com/pages/linux-ze4100.html

Your hardware should be similar (though not identical). You could probably even use my current XF86Config file outright. Good luck!

Bruce

[Venkata_2]

I tried the configuration specified. The funny thing is that the XWindows starts up sometimes and sometimes it doesn't.
Also RH8 doesn't seem to know about the battery and the modem. Should I be updating the kernel ?
Thanks.

[Bruce Copeland]

I imagine the XFree86 configuration still needs some tweaking. The next time XWindows DOESN'T start, try to save the /var/log/XFree86.0.log as something before you start X again. Then include the saved log in a message here so we can try to see what is failing. [If you have to reboot when your X fails, then you'll need to boot into a console mode (level 3 or less) so that you can save the XFree86 log before X tries to start again.]

To get power management, you need to build a new kernel with ACPI fully enabled. My site gives pretty complete details.

Your modem is (hopefully) a Conexant ACLink modem. This is supported by a linmodem driver. Again that is fully documented on my site.

Bruce

[Venkata_2]

I have a slight problem. I configured linux to boot into XWindows. Since XWindows is getting stuck I tried using the other virtual consoles to login. Unfortunately I couldn't.
Are there any boot options by which the boot mode can be changed into text ?
Thanks.

[Bruce Copeland]

If your boot manager is lilo, then type linux 3 after the boot: prompt. If you use grub, you need to type e to edit and then append a space and a 3 at the end of your linux boot menu line, and finally press return.

Good stuff to be able to do any time your X is acting up!

Bruce