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XFree86 3.3.6 released 154

kornyone writes "Freshmeat listed XFree86 3.3.6 as being released, among new features: "Highlights of the new release include: support for the ATI Rage128. support for the ATI Rage Mobility, support for the SiS 540/630 and SiS 300, support for Silicon Motion Lynx chipsets, support for the Savage2000, support for the NVIDIA GeForce, support for the Intel i810 (not enabled by default as it needs a kernel module), and fixes to several drivers." "
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XFree86 3.3.6 released

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  • by norpan ( 50740 )
    So any news on when 4.0 _really_ is coming. This is just some boring bugfix stuff...
  • Now if it only works.

    I have had a GeForce sitting in the box on the shelf for months now. Now I can really frag.

  • by sec ( 20916 )
    It's a little more interesting if you have a card, like my Voodoo Banshee, which has a buggy 3.3.5 server. Sure, a fixed version is available at 3dfx's website, but still, it's nice to have working drivers in the 'official' version.
  • Lynx. Pine. Vi. MC. What the fsck is this XFree-whatever crap?


    :-)
  • Now that is really what I like seeing from the Opensource community. GeForce drivers before the thing has become mainstream.
    If the 3D co-processor in the GetForce catches on then Linux will be right there with big boys as far as compatibility. Now all we have to do is convince people to starts using OpenGL instead of DirectX, and come one lets see Mesa nVidia TNT2 drivers already
  • It was anounced previously that 3.3.6 would quickly follow up (reportedly @ the same time ) as the 3.9.17 snapshot. This baby has been on the mirrors for a while now so is ready for test driving. 4.0 is supposedly released in Q2 of 2000, and judging by the buggyness (got a geforce, it worked but netscape and many motif&other apps crashed like a feather in a 2^10 G vacum space), they better take there time fixing it. I'd rather have a working release later, then a buggy-as-hell(Tm) release now. Also keep in mind that all the agp and DRI hooks for the kernel are also in way-beta-stage and likely to crash ur machine on there own..

    -- Chris Chabot
    "I dont suffer from insanity, i enjoy every minute of it!"
  • by COLUG ( 22898 ) on Monday January 10, 2000 @04:35AM (#1387072) Homepage
    Freshmeat has a stale link. The 3.3.6 release notes are here [xfree86.org].
  • Its pretty great that this comes hot on the heels of the Nvidia driver update announcement. It means that those people with GeForces can update their X server nice and cleanly with a XFree binary package from their preferred supplier without having to go through any scary patch your X | install this binary only special driver | build this from source stuff.

    In short all those Christmas newbies with their latest "hot" video cards should be able to get Linux installed pretty painlessly without going through the "Why doesn't X work for me" woes that were so common last yuletime round.

    Thanks for the hard work XFree guys, eagerly awaiting version 4.0

  • I've seen these cards working, they really rock... (and frag of course).
    Now all we need is support for X (which should "work" now) and support for framebuffers (which works, but is awfully slow and results in many bugs).
  • Lynx. Pine. Vi. MC. What the fsck is this XFree-whatever crap?

    Bah. Real Programmers use nothing fancier than ed, and what's wrong with telnetting to ports 25 and 110 anyway? Darn these whippersnappers...

  • What we want, in the long run, is to see XFree86 Version 4.

    The deadly question is, how much time does a 3.3.x release consume that could have been spent making 4.x available sooner?

  • Yes, yes, I LOVE a new Xfree release and so beautiful new supported cards, BUT, when 4.0 comes out, will it have working competitors?

    Please, I know you Berlin and other people are reading this, so, will I have an alternative?
  • Hey, there's a smiley on his post. I don't think he deserved worse than an "Off-topic", and perhaps it was even worth a "Funny".
  • Can you please link the random complaint generator that you used? I know of a few, but this one is pretty cool.
  • I agree with you for 99%
    Now 1% of reality:
    1) I've not yet seen framecapable text browsers
    2) I like to play a game now and then, i've not yet seen a svgamode quake 3 version
    3) there is no spoon

    Other 99%
    1) Textmode works much faster than having to grab that mouse every now and then
    2) Textmode takes up much less memory (does it takes up any memory?)
    3) I don't want to see vi in an Xterm :)
  • Hehe, seriously, I always telnet to port 110... It's either that or set up fetchmail for Pine, and I really don't feel like it.

    -----------

    "You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."

  • I just tried out the Rage Mobility driver on my Rage Mobility M. Still get corrupted video. I guess this one isn't supported? They probably should have clarified which revisions they support.
  • Could someone explain the logic in the XFree96 versioning numbers?

    A quick gander at their faq [xfree86.org] says nothing about this.

    Specifically, what is the difference between:

    • 3.3.x (such as 3.3.6)
    • 3.9.x (such as 3.9.17)
    • 4.0.x (yet to be released)

    thanks,
    donfede

  • Does anyone know if 4.0 will support new keyboards like the logitech internet keyboard. I beleive these keyboards send multiple byte key sequences.
  • by Anonymous Coward
    I hate to shine a little skepticism on the GeForce lovers out there(as i happen to be one), but if you read the README it says nothing about supporting the GeForce(supports the Riva 128, TNT, and TNT2).
    I have the patch and will be attempting to get my GeForce working, but somehow I doubt that I'll be seeing X smiling at me before the day ends.

    Any success stories to prove me wrong? (plz!!!)

    -laMEduck BTW - 3.9.17 _does_ have support for the GeForce, but the readme is total fiction. I'm hoping that they're consistant with thier inconsistancies and this bit of cynicism is misplaced.

  • The 3.3.x releases are stable/production. The 3.9.x releases are the pre-release 4.0 snapshots.
  • by Diskena ( 10972 ) on Monday January 10, 2000 @04:58AM (#1387090)
    Dude. Real programmers use

    $ cat > a.out
  • by Intosi ( 6741 ) on Monday January 10, 2000 @04:59AM (#1387091) Homepage
    3.3.x == the stable release branch, and is X11R6.3 based;
    3.9.x == the development branch, is X11R6.4 based;
    4.0.x (or 4.x) == the forthcoming stable release branch (the first stable version of the 3.9.x branch ;-) ), although I think the first 4.0 will be somewhat unstable (unless they fix a lot of bugs the next few months). 3.3.x and 3.9.x are out now, 4.x will be released somewhere this year. Regards, Edwin

    Intosi

  • 3.3.x is the current "stable" release. 4.0 will be the next stable release, when it's ready. 3.9.x are snapshots of the developing 4.0 source tree, and I'd guess wouldn't be usable by the average user.
  • Well, kinda like the versioning with the Linux kernel: 3.3.x is the stable release, 3.9.x is the development release which, eventually, is going to be the 4.0.x release. Oke, it is *not* like Linux with even/odd numbers, but you get the idea...

    Thimo
    --
  • 1) I've not yet seen framecapable text browsers

    Emacs does this. ctrl-x 2 I think. And if you use the framebuffer with a matrox card you can get a lovely 44x148 (or better) text console (in graphics mode) which is great for displaying two files side by side.

    Of course Emacs is not a text browser or editor. It is an operating environment :-)

  • Dosen't Pine have a pop mode built in?

  • Does it?? Oh, that would make me very happy. Thanks for the tip, I'll look into it.

    -----------

    "You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."

  • Is anyone aware if XFree86 3.3.6 supports SiS6326, which is mostly used on onboard chipsets for motherboards. I've had a heck of a time finding relevent information about this thing (even the scant SiS web page [sis.com.tw] is only half-useful), and have only been able to find a half-working SuSE XFCom driver.
  • This is funny. I think this should be incorporated into the posting guidelines as an Emily Postnews style article.

    cid is http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00/01/10/08372 00&cid=9.

    However, the metawronka guy is just a sad and pathethic individual with no originality. Kid, a tip: layoff the automatic complaint generator. It was only funny the first time and that was a long time ago.

    dave
  • 1) I've not yet seen framecapable text browsers

    Look at w3m [yamagata-u.ac.jp], which converts frames into tables to display them.

  • pardon my stupidity (the coffee hasn't really kicked in yet).. but can i install 3.3.6 binaries over top of my existing install (whatever is the default for slackware7) simply by using pkgtool? or are the .tgz files in the binaries/linux-x86-glibc2.1-whatever dir simply that... .tgz with no additional pkgtool parts?

    have mercy on me.. i have a dell behind me with exchange server on it, so my outlook[1] for the day/week is already bleak.

    [1] no, that was not an intended pun.[2]
    [2] wow, now i think i'm gonna be sick.
  • These great new drivers are ready for release. XFree 4.0 is not ready for release. If the XFree team didn't put out another series 3 release, the owners of these cards would be forced to wait to use their hardware.So everyone please stop bitchin' about this not being 4.0. The XFree team did the right thing.
  • by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 10, 2000 @05:22AM (#1387106)


    Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Trollin'
    Trollin', Trollin', Trollin' , Trollin', Trollin', Trollin'
    Slashdaaahhht!

    Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Though the Karmas swollen
    Keep them Post's a Trollin'
    Slashdaaahhht

    Firsts and grits and daily, Hellbent for Natalie, Wishin' my gal was by my side
    All the things I'm missin', Good flames, opensource and petrified'
    Are waiting at the end of my ride

    CHORUS
    Post 'em on, Mod 'em up, Mod 'em up, move 'em on
    Move 'em on, Mod 'em up, Slashdaaahhht
    Karma out, Trollin' in, First post in, AC's out
    Mod 'em up, trollin's in , Slashdaaahhht

    Keep trollin', trollin', trollin', Though they're disapprovin'
    Keep them doggies trollin', Slashdaaahhht
    Don't try to understand 'em, Just join 'em, post and cheer 'em
    Soon we'll be postin' high and wide
    My hearts calculatin', My first post will be waitin'
    Be waitin' at the end of my sig

    Hyaa!

    CHORUS
    Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Trollin'

    Hyaa!
    Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Trollin', Trollin'
    Hyaa!
    Slashdaaahhht!

    Slashdaaahhht!
    .

    .

    Trollmastah

  • The Deadly Question? Sounds like a cheesey MST3K movie.

    Honestly, I think you're being overdramatic. Maybe it did take up some time from developers that could have been working on version 4. But keep in mind the developers that you're talking about. Most of them (AFAIK) are doing it for free. They're working on the parts that they want to work on as much as they're working on the parts that need to be worked on.

    I don't know much about the internals of XFree, but after 4.0 comes out, will there be any reason to continue using 3.x? Isn't this just like Linux 2.2 still being updated, even though 2.4 is just around the corner. Some people will continue using 3.x for a number of reasons, so it just makes sense to add the support for newer cards.

    -----------

    "You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."

  • by RPoet ( 20693 ) on Monday January 10, 2000 @05:24AM (#1387108) Journal
    ftp://ftp.sunet.se/pub/Linux/distributions/mandrak e-devel/oxygen/Mandrake/RPMS/

    They were built yesterday, it appears. How's that for cutting edge.
  • Shouldn't that be Slashdot == Hypocrisy?

    -----------

    "You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."

  • The 6326 has been supported since, erm... 3.3.2, I believe. I am running 3.3.3 (or .4, don't recall atm) at home on a 6326, and performance is acceptable, except when switching from X to a text console the server will sometimes lock inexplicably. This may be fixed in newer versions; it hasn't been enough of a problem yet for me to try.
  • Real Programmer? *howls of derisive laughter* Toggle in bytes on a switch panel and we'll talk.(And I'm leaving this thread before we reach the "banging rocks together to make bits" stage)
  • No success story, but I do think you're looking in the wrong place. Here are the 3.3.6 release notes:
    • Support for ATI Rage128.
    • Support for ATI Rage Mobility
    • Support for SiS 540/630 and SiS 300
    • Support for Silicon Motion Lynx chipsets
    • Support for Savage2000
    • Support for NVIDIA GeForce
    • Support for Intel i810 (not enabled by default as it needs kernel module)
    • Fixes to several drivers
  • w3m is a web-browser... you'd be hard-pressed to write code in it, I think ;-)

    -----------

    "You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."

  • On reality point one: lynx copes fine with frames. It gives a link to each framed page, which is often a more convenient way to look at the site anyway. Now table-display is another story. Why oh why w3m can do it and lynx can't I don't know.
  • No. He's hoping that if he says it enough types, it will stop being false. Using assignment helps that. :)
  • How much work on support of new hardware is done by people who have no interest in development beyond getting decent performance out of their new hardware?
  • I've got a SiS 6326 working under 3.3.3.1, all it takes is the proper config file.

    If you want I can e-mail it to you.

    LK
  • Dude, Real programmers use a magnetic pin on their disks.


    BTW, didn't we already have this discussion a while ago, and didn't it end in "What, you had mitochondria? We didn't have all that fancy stuff back in the old days."
  • Support for SiS chipsets got busted in 3.3.5. Try finding either 3.3.3 or 3.3.4. The release notes for 3.3.6 mention fixes for various chipsets, let's hope SiS was one of these.

  • They played with the versioning scheme so that their first release of X11R6.4 would be Xfree 4.0.x .Thus, they moved the beta back one rev (3.9.x)
  • by Anonymous Coward
    i don't know if this will be of any use to anyone... but here's a link [intel.com] to intel's guide for installing X for the i810 - it covers the extra kernel mod needed.
  • Try the utah glx - glx.on.openprojects.net [openprojects.net]. Get a recent snapshot, Mesa 3.1, and follow the instructions. I had Quake II working with my TNT2, but I messed it up, and now it isn't working again though...
  • Has anyone managed to get a TNT2 card working with 3D accelleration with X 3.9 by any chance? I've had no 3D accelleration under Linux since I got my Viper 770, and Nvidia isn't any help.

    The key to 3D acceleration with TNT2 is the Nvidia X Server which is downloadable from their website. It's built against XFree86-3.3.5, so you'll have to have that version of XFree86 installed. They include a rather nice install script that copies the X Server and glx and GL libraries. You will also need to have Mesa installed.
  • I think that's what he meant, using 'browser' to mean 'web browser'. So a 'text browser' is not something like less(1), it's a browser that runs on a text terminal.
  • Am I the only one who has problems downloading 'extract'? The last time I updated X, I had problems downloading it, and this time I'm having similar problems. I can't download the whole file - I am consistantly missing about 30k of the file. Anyone else having similar problems? Any ideas on how to fix it? I have tried both Netscape and Opera, but to no avail. IExplorer crashed on my when installing the 200k file that allows you to view FTP sites. Typical.
  • Getting the board to function, at least in 3.3.5 and before, involves adding the nobitblt option which disables hardware accelerated block pixel transfers. Unfortunately this severely drags performance down. Don't even think trying to move a window in opaque mode.

    My big hope is that the nobitblt cripple is now longer required on the 6326. This would let the board really work.

  • Looks like they might have folded in some of 3dfx's Voodoo3 improvements to the SVGA server, as screen updates and the like are definitely looking smoother and better now. Not perfect, but definite improvement.
  • I just read the release notes and I don't know if I'm reading wrong but it blatently says that the new rage 128 chipset is still not supported.
  • by jacobm ( 68967 ) on Monday January 10, 2000 @06:04AM (#1387135) Homepage
    ...To which the standard rejoinder is:

    No way. Real Real Programmers use

    $ zcat > a.out

    'cause you can type faster that way.
  • I also don't see a .tgz anywhere for it. What's the deal with that?
  • Those release notes were never updated. The main release notes say that it now supports the ati 128, however, the ati release notes were copied from a previous version of X. The date of the file is June 23, 1999.

    I can't wait to get this downloaded and working. The SuSE workaround worked alright, but was subject to unexplained freezes, or just outright dieing. Adios

  • You're not reading wrong... It does clearly say that. Unfortunately, that's completely untrue. The Rage128 chip is now supported in 3.3.6, thanks to the work done by SuSE. IMHO, one of the biggest problems with XFree86 isn't their closed development model, but their lack of up-to-date documentation.

    Adam
  • Gotta read the release notes, not the readme. Its supported.
  • read the release notes, it tells you how to upgrade. You need xf86's extract program to extract the .tgz files.
  • There may be something strange with this particular chipset, but in general, 4megs is enough for 1600x1200x16 (1600x1200x2 = 3840000 bytes, add the other (comparably small) stuff that the board might hold in RAM, and it will -generally- still be under 4MB)... I'm currently running that resolution on a 4mb matrox mill2...

    (English needs nested parentheses!)

  • So is Linux, but yo can't live with that, you have to pretend that Linux is mainstream OS ..
  • I just finished building my new Potato system with 3dfx's Voodoo3 drivers from their site...

    I guess I have two questions...

    1. Any idea when .deb packages will be available?

    2. Are any of the Vooodoo3 specifics folded into the main release? I saw a mention of Banshee but not Voodoo3.

    It was a MAJOR pain getting the Voodoo setup with Debian and it'd be cool to have that stuff folded into the "norm" XFree distribution...

    --hunter
  • That's great but have you actually gotten full screen 3d to work? I doubt it. Mesa still lags, even with Nvidia's new server. I can't even tell if it's calling/using the new libGL.so libraries that Nvidia released. It acts like it's still using the old Mesa libraries and rendering in software. All the GL in screen savers lags terribly. Oh well, there's always XFree 4.
  • There are also binaries of 3.9.17 now, for all those, including me, who couldn't get it to compile right. Now I have a question: why does it (3.9.16) use such an insane amount of memory ? RSS is over 40 MB on my machine, having a matrox mystique with 4MB of mem. Even when just starting up it is 18MB. And it isn't just X mapping videomemory onto real memory or somesuch.
    ------------------------------------------------ --------
    UNIX isn't dead, it just smells funny...
  • Well, I didn't try XFree86 3.3.6, but their new drivers on their website are working like a charm. No probs here.
  • There has been support there since at least 3.3.5 (have one). But, I'm not sure if you can get any better then 15bit mode at high res, due to some wierdness with the S3 clocks on that board. HTH

  • Enough of this nonsense, or I might have to whip out my abacus and teach you fools a lesson
  • Will this XFree86 release make it into the soon-to-be-released-in-a-few-days Debian 2.2 (potato)?
  • *VERY HELPFULL* Dell is selling it's low end desktops with this chipset. We wanted to try it but wasn't sure how to get it to work. Never thought to check Intel's support web site... duh... Anyway THANKS!!


  • Am I the only one who is wary of how the Xfree Group handles such a important project? Don't get me wrong, I have much respect for anyone who releases useful OSS, however there are a number of things that have always bothered me about Xfree86.

    1) Xfree86 has never provided the quality of documetnation that most OSS projects of its size provide.

    2) They do not seem to try very hard to interact with user needs.

    3) They do not go out of their way to solicit users for feature requests (it is 2000 and we still don't have a decent API to change color depth or resolution on the fly!), or provide a decent forum for bug tacking/reporting (I reported a bug with ALL matrox drivers (Matrox Mill - G400MAX) where in 16bpp pixels will be dropped when using scroll bars that use the default Xfree96 widget set. This bug was reported back in 3.3.3 and as of 3.3.5 it was still a issue. (I doubt it will be fixed in 3.3.6 either).

    4) Finally, Xfree86 does not act like most other OSS groups of their size. Maybe this has something to do with their *bsd origins (no insult intended). It has been my experince that the *bsd people has always had an eleetist approch, where a group of "old school" gurus huddle in a dark cave somewhere and scheme over the "right way" (TM) to do things. (which I am not saying isn't their right to do it that way), it just does not seem to produce the type/quality of software that I (or linux for that matter) have come to depend on.

  • If you can't figure out how to program a website with functionality like slashdot, then what the heck would you do with the Source of it anyway?

  • It would be nice if Xfree would be a bit more descriptive.. rather then forcing its users to "try and see your problem has been resolved" or "read the source code".

    *sigh*
  • I'm another of the folk that can't get the
    ibm 300pl w/ s3 trio 3d with the 86c366
    chipset to run. It would appear that there
    are subtle differences in the OEM 85C366
    chipsets used in these. Some are essentially
    identical to the normal 85C365 trio 3d and
    some have an unknown (at least to me)difference.
    It's enough to make it fail but subtle enough
    that debug output shows that the xserver thinks
    everything is working fine.

    I've sent queries to IBM on this and gotten
    no response at all (surprise). I've also
    scoured the usenet groups and tried all
    suggestions found there - even the ones that
    seem silly (cargo cult diagnostics?). no
    joy.

    garyr
  • what we need is a kernel DRI driver :-)

    ---

  • If anyone has ever gotten one of these little b*st*rds to work in XFree86 in anything other than 320x240x4bit, please let me know how.

    You can even make fun of me all you want...

    You know you want to....

  • works great for me... I've been playing Quake3Arena all weekend w/o a hitch

  • 1) Nope.

    2) The 2D part of a VooDoo3 *is* a banshee

  • Wow, now there is a new XF86 with support for my card (ATi Fury) and I don't have to use the FB drivers (or the closed source SuSE drivers) anymore :*). But what I really want is one feature I've seen at the German "Linux Tag" in Kaiserslautern last year: The Dual Head support! It was working over a half year ago, so why didn't they implement it to the new version?

  • Mine works beautifully, as high as 1600x1200 at 32bpp. E-mail me if you need help.

    Adam K
    adamk@voicenet.com
  • i've been thinking about getting a v3 to replace my mach64 2d card and voodoo2. mainly because the res on my mach64 in 2d sucks (i can't get it above 1024x768 comfortably), and my v2 gets an average of 42 fps in q3.

    i need something a little better. are you happy with your v3? is it worth the money? what kind of res and refresh rate do you get in X? how many fps avg in q3?
  • A few people have taken a look at it. Apparently there are some problems with it.. but I havn't seen any patches or fixes.

    Pan
  • Actually, it is not a winmodem situation at all. Shared memory is actually faster for doing somethings where there is a lot of memory traffic on the graphics bus but little on the memory bus. I know SGI uses it on all their machines. As for X support, it depends on AGP, and I don't know X's AGP support. But if it is good as Window's then it should work fine.
  • It would be nice if Xfree would be a bit more descriptive.. rather then forcing its users to "try and see your problem has been resolved" or "read the source code".

    Exactly. I see no note about supporting the 3Dfx Banshee/Voodoo 3 in the what's new section, but those cards are listed in the supported cards section. As far as I know, this is the first release of XFree that supported the cards without downloading special stuff from 3Dfx. Or am I wrong?

  • Check out IBM's Redbook's website. This was pointed out in that IBM thread today.

    Specifically, look at this [ibm.com]. Sections 2.2 and Appendix B (Sect 16.8.1) should have what you're looking for.

    Of course, it is for a Netfinity running Redhat 6.0 or 6.1, but I'm sure you can edit it for your particulars.

  • This is exactly how far I got with this graphics card too. Nobitblt option with SiS 6326 makes my Linux XFree86 run _a lot_ slower than the Windows 98 on the same computer. If somebody manages to get the Sis6326 perform well under 3.3.6, please post here, otherwise I'll do it. I'd rather be on the leading edge than on the bleading edge. Thanks.
  • I was wondering... will there ever be a Windows version? Or wouldn't that be politically correct?
  • It is true that Direct3D is pretty bad, but it has gotten much better and AHH, is within the OpenGL ballpark now. And I take it you mean Direct3D don't you. DirectX is a fast set of libraries to access various hardware accelerated devices in a consistant way. Just what Linux DOESNT have. Even Quake 3 uses DirectInput for its input stuff.
  • Yo, moderators! Can I answer this jackass with some of his own level of crap? BeOS has a niche. Its users who want a powerful, fast, easy to use machine. Linux fills the first, nothing major as of yet fills the second, and macs fill the third. I believe that BeOS is on its 3rd year on Intel hardware, and already has a huge amount of mindshare. Question: Were hardware manufacturers making Linux drivers back in 1994? Don't count Be out just yet.
  • He doesn't release the source because that would be enabling competing websites and his userbase would lose cohesion (i.e. hits).

    Forget the complaint generator. I'm way tired of see Star Wars this and Star Wars that. It's no longer News for Nerds and it's Stuff that doesn't Matter. It's not like there is'nt any other sci-fi out there.

    Also, If you're trying to get three digit negative Karma, what good is that accomplisment? Is that like Everest in reverse?

  • Yes, you are wrong... I don't know about the Banshee but the VooDoo3 worked fine under 3.3.5

    Adam
  • The biggest competitors with XFree86 would be the commerical X servers- AccelX comes to mind.

    There is no reason to reinvent X from the ground up.

    Berlin et. al, I'm sure you guys have swell intentions, and you guys will succeed, but only if you don't aim for the standard-desktop market. It may be in your best interest to aim for a market that the clunky X servers don't dominate on, such as low-end boxes doing dedicated tasks with users, or well, something else besides trying to get onto every desktop!
    Most of the energy put into Berlin should go
    into making some quality X servers.
  • Most important are the bugfixes. XFree86's problems make linux in general look bad to endusers, even thought it has nothing to do with the linux kernel.
  • Manufacturers are writing drivers for BeOS? You gotta be kidding. Go look at NVidia's site, they have a nice big fat BeOS logo which points you right at Be for drivers! NVidia is not writing BeOS drivers, Be is! On the other hand, NVidia is writing drivers for Linux.

    Oh and manufacturers were already writing drivers for Linux back in 1994, check out the Cyclades serial card driver history :-)

    And if memory serves, BeOS development started in 1990, back then it wasn't even called BeOS and ran on the ATT Hobbit processor. So it took almost 10 years of closed source development and tens of millions of dollars in R&D just to get BeOS at this level, frankly that sucks IMHO :) I own a BeBox BTW, fun computer back when I bought it, unfortunately it's not so well supported by Be these days (and it's hella slow compared to my Athlon :). Oh well, there's always LinuxPPC and NetBSD...
  • just upgraded with the mandrake rpms and it feels very smooth
  • I no longer have time to play games nowadays, as I am a full time student and have a job at a startup company as well. :( So I dunno about Q3A. And I only use X at 1024x768, due to my crappy monitor. But I know it supports at least 1280x1024, and I think 1600x1200 as well (although I dunno if that works in X for sure). I use 75hz refresh. On the whole the Voodoo3 is good in X, but not perfect. I think there are better cards out there, Matrox maybe? The Voodoo3 should get as good FPS scores in 3d games as anything in Linux though, until the GeForce drivers are MUCH improved (the GeForce hardware is defintely superior, but the Linux drivers suck).
  • It's in the XSVGA.tgz package.

    Says it's accelerated :) Can't display fonts on my Rage128 RF based card. Just displays crap that looks like bar codes unless I disable acceleration.
    I'll be submitting a bug. Even with the funky fonts, it's much faster than the Suse (or at least it feels that way :)



  • umm... no. This basically indicates the way it *should* work but doesn't. says that standard vga is all you get until 3.3.4 after which it should work. the support in 3.3.4 was specifically to the retail 86C365 chip on a S3 card you would buy at the store. It is not for the OEM chip 86C366 which is customized a the board level by the OEM (IBM I assume in this case) and may or may not work. On some of these IBM boxes it works and on some it does not.

    I have one that it does not work on. I assume the person that made the first post does too. It's not that I (or he) don't know how to hack the config file. redbook's setup just sets it up
    to auto probe with the SVGA server and tells you to be happy with 640x480x16 if it doens't work.

    Is this the same IBM that makes all the Linux noise lately?

    garyr

As you will see, I told them, in no uncertain terms, to see Figure one. -- Dave "First Strike" Pare

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