Amithlon & GFX-cards: any advice?

[Ratte]

Methuselas wrote:

It was a wrapper written for WinUAE that emulates 3D acceleration with Warp3d. I'm not sure how they did it, but I tested it and it worked, rather nice. Slower than dog sh!t, running Windoze *AND* UAE, but fairly impressive, nonetheless.

It won't work here, I'm sure, since the driver requires one (or something else, rather) on the Windoze side.  :-(

You need a PCI-Virge next to your AGP-Card, AGP must init FIRST (BIOS-Setting).
And some Mediator-Files.

Uncompress the Elbox archive, and choose "Install".
WARNING! WARNING! WARNING!
This will trash your P96 setup. So make sure you have a backup to go back to if things don't work out, or if you just want P96 back. You have been warned!

When the install is complete, quit and restart. If all went well, you will now see the Cybergraphics logo appear on the monitor connected to the Virge, and then have Workbench appear on it. Hooray! You are now running Cybergfx, and the card is fully under the control of the Elbox driver. You can do everything with it that you could do with a "real" Mediator and Virge --- define your own modes with cgxmode, run software on it, drag screens.....

.... Warp3D (without dragable screens).

[DrBombcrater]

@Ratte

Thanks for the clear statement,I asked many times on amithlon-open and didnt get any responce.

I don't read or reply on that list any more because too many people used it to demand I do things...

But ... hey ... i repeat my self and you got this bugreport last year ... and you promised a "bugfree" kernel for end 2006.

I know all about that bug, almost to the point of hating it. There is no 'bugfree' kernel because I have not been able to fix the bug, despite spending way too much time trying. If you check the mailing list archives you'll see that when talking about the next kernel I made it clear the Radeon pointer bug had not been fixed. That's still the case today.

To be honest, the Radeon driver was a bad mistake on my part. I've always tried to be clear that the purpose of the new kernel drivers is to make it easier to build or buy a PC that runs Amithlon well, while also being useful for other things. So the GeForce FX driver already made it possible to build an Amithlon machine that has good 3D support. Strictly speaking, the Radeon driver was then unnecessary but I released it anyway, on the assumption that Radeon owners would regard even a low-performance, buggy driver as being better than VESA mode. But the storm of complaints suggests I was wrong on that point. I apologise to anyone who exected a perfectly working driver.

Its up to you .. it s your time and your hobby.
But i am a little bit angry about this "late" statement.

Okay, let me spell out my position here:

My work on the kernel is done purely to help the Amiga community, as a way of enabling people to run AmigaOS when otherwise they might not be able to. The whole project is done on a 'best effort' basis - I just do what I can. By all means report bugs or ask for some specific bit of hardware to be supported, but don't get pissed off if the bug remains unfixed or the hardware unsupported.

I have very limited time to work on the kernel (further reduced by recent periods of ill heath) and the work itself is nightmarish. You try writing drivers for undocumented hardware that run on top of a ancient kernel and have to interface with an almost undocumented and abandoned closed-source emulator, which hosts an old and abandoned OS, all of which communicates via a set of closed-source pseudo-drivers who's inner workings are unknown to all but the one person who wrote them.

That the results are sometimes a little ragged is, I hope, excusable given those circumstances.

[humppa]

That the results are sometimes a little ragged is, I hope, excusable given those circumstances.

Excusable? The results are _very much_ appreciated! Looking at all the past work you did for Amithlon, I just _don't_ want to imagine where we would stand without your great contributions and support.

I am here running Amithlon on an Athlon XP 2900+, fully working on-board sound and LAN (Nforce2 chipset), working DMA, 768MB of RAM and (tomorrow if I am lucky) even with Geforce FX accelerated graphics. So a big "Thank you!" for that.

[Ratte]

I understand your point of view.

So its not easy to ask you ...
.. can you "please please" remove the (forgotten) test-routines from the RV350 part?
(i hope you remember my movie with the broken graphics after screenswitching)
The RV350 pointerbug can be fixed by picasso96 settings (softsprite NON x86-p96-code)

Can I get the kernel-sources for debugging?

[DrBombcrater]

@Ratte

The RV350 pointerbug can be fixed by picasso96 settings (softsprite NON x86-p96-code)

No. That's not fixing the bug, just making it less obvious. The 'pointer bug' will cause errors any time lots of drawing operations are performed in a small area, so there are potentially lots of applications that could be affected.

Can I get the kernel-sources for debugging?

Yes. My snapshot of the 3.10 source seems to be broken, but I've uploaded a snapshot taken sometime between 3.00 and 3.10 here.

3.10 source will follow when I find out why it's not compiling anymore.

[Tenacious]

Hi DrBombcrater.

Is the Acer Aspire 1360 series still available?  Are there other laptops that have a high compatibilty with your latest kernal?

I bought Amithlon years ago and have yet to try it.  A laptop that runs Amiga OS without being hosted in Windows is too good to be true.

Thanks for your efforts to keep Amiga OS on modern hardware!

[DrBombcrater]

@Tenacious

Thanks to you, and the others who've commented, for the kind words. They're much appreciated.

The 1360 familiy is a few years old now, so it's not possible to buy them new. I doubt it's actually possible to buy any brand new laptop with GeForce FX graphics anymore. They do show up on Ebay from time to time.

But if you can find detailed specifications it's not that hard to tell if a laptop is suitable. It needs :

Processor: Single-core, preferably AMD, but Intel ones should be okay.
Chipset: VIA only.
Graphics: GeForce FX Go 5200, 5300, 5600 or 5700.
Ethernet: VIA Rhine II, VIA Velocity or Realtek 8139.
Audio: VIA VT1612, VT1616, or Realtek ALC6xx/ALC8xx.

[Ratte]

DrBombcrater wrote:

Can I get the kernel-sources for debugging?

Yes. My snapshot of the 3.10 source seems to be broken, but I've uploaded a snapshot taken sometime between 3.00 and 3.10 here.

3.10 source will follow when I find out why it's not compiling anymore.

Thanks Gary.
But it seems to be a snapshot of a nvidia "only" upgraded kernel.
Could you please send me an link for your latest ati kernel.
And also a hint about your "forgotten" screenswitching testcode and where I can find it.

Keep up to good work.

[jj]

Slightly OT, but does anyone know anyone willing to sell me a copy of amithlon

[DrBombcrater]

@Ratte

Could you please send me an link for your latest ati kernel.

That's the most recent one I can give you right now, because it's the last working snapshot I have. The 3.10 snapshot is missing a whole bunch of files because the disk it's stored on seems to have filled up half-way through the copy process, and the copy script just failed silently :oops:

The kernel copy I'm working on right now has the experimental memory-map patch that fails on about 90% of systems, so it's pretty much useless until I get that picked out of the code.

And also a hint about your "forgotten" screenswitching testcode and where I can find it.

Sorry, I'm not sure what you're talking about. What screen switching code?

[humppa]

Bah, FX5200 didn't arrive yet, so I thought I'll benchmark my Geforce 6800 before removing it to kill some time. ;-)

It's actually performing quite well in some modes while being dog-slow in (apparently unaccelerated) other functions:

| GFX system....: Picasso96               |
| Resolution....: 1024 x 768 x 24         |
| Depth/Colors..: 16777216 colors         |
| Testlength....: 13                      |

.============= SPEEDRESULTS ==============.
| RectFill()................    647 op/s  |
| RectFill() Pattern........    651 op/s  |
| WritePixel().............. 2252845 op/s |
| WriteChunkyPixels().......   4937 op/s  |
| WritePixelArray8()........   4936 op/s  |
| WritePixelLine8()......... 171056 op/s  |
| DrawEllipse().............  89452 op/s  |
| DrawCircle()..............  87446 op/s  |
| Draw()....................  23326 op/s  |
| Draw() Hor/Ver............  50647 op/s  |
| ScrollRaster() X..........      2 op/s  |
| ScrollRaster() Y..........      2 op/s  |
| PutText().................  40289 op/s  |
| BlitBitMap()..............    219 op/s  |
| BlitBitMapRastPort()......    218 op/s  |
| BitMapScale().............    196 op/s  |

ScrollRaster seems equally slow as on Shadowwolf's 6600GT, so I actually don't believe that it's just because you fried your card.

The only thing really killing the joy on VESA-only cards is the jerkyness of v-scrolling internet sites and text windows.
I'm already curious how those benchmarks will look with the FX5200. :-)

[Shadowolf]

Too bad that it's not that the 6600GT is fried...

My wife went to bed early now and I just could
remove the 5900XT from her PC for a little test:


| Resolution....: 1024 x 768 x 24         |
| Depth/Colors..: 16777216 colors         |
| Testlength....: 13                      |
.============= SPEEDRESULTS ==============.
| GF4200TI                          | GF5900XT
| RectFill()..........    3818 op/s |    4676 op/s
| RectFill() Pattern..     651 op/s |     635 op/s
| WritePixel()........ 1658235 op/s | 1477204 op/s
| WriteChunkyPixels().    5964 op/s |    5956 op/s
| WritePixelArray8()..    5972 op/s |    5960 op/s
| WritePixelLine8()...  122431 op/s |  119790 op/s
| DrawEllipse().......   66897 op/s |   62853 op/s
| DrawCircle()........   66385 op/s |   62325 op/s
| Draw()..............   17519 op/s |   17418 op/s
| Draw() Hor/Ver......   43759 op/s |   55315 op/s
| ScrollRaster() X....     365 op/s |     522 op/s
| ScrollRaster() Y....     368 op/s |     526 op/s
| PutText()...........   28155 op/s |   27965 op/s
| BlitBitMap()........   23365 op/s |   26780 op/s
| BlitBitMapRastPort()   21985 op/s |   25180 op/s
| BitMapScale().......     810 op/s |     823 op/s


Now this really looks good compared to the TI4200.
So the top card to get for Amithlon now should be
some FX5900 based one - and I just got one
for me on EBay.  :-D

And while it still has a fan at least the 5900XT
we already have is a lot less noisy than the TI4200.

Have fun - Shadowolf

[humppa]

And while it still has a fan at least the 5900XT we already have is a lot less noisy than the TI4200.

If I remember correctly, the MSI and Creative Labs (identical) 5900XT models had relatively quiet fans.Do you have one of those? If there would only be a completely silent model with a heatpipe in the 5900-range such as my Gigabyte GV-68128DH.

[Shadowolf]

If I remember correctly, the MSI and Creative Labs (identical) 5900XT models had relatively quiet fans.Do you have one of those?

The one I have here is from Leadtek and it uses the
reference design from NVidia.

The one I just bought is from Creative and although I
have no information what specific modell it is,
it looks exactly like the Leadtek card.

This is it:

http://www.nvnews.net/reviews/3dblaster_fx_5900/index.shtml

So I guess MSI and Creative also used the reference-design.

If there would only be a completely silent model with a heatpipe in the 5900-range such as my Gigabyte GV-68128DH.

Remember the days when gfx-cards did not even
had a heatsink and certainly not an additional
power-supply socket?
I hope we see much more fanless equipment in the
next years.

[Ratte]

DrBombcrater wrote:

The kernel copy I'm working on right now has the experimental memory-map patch that fails on about 90% of systems, so it's pretty much useless until I get that picked out of the code.

And also a hint about your "forgotten" screenswitching testcode and where I can find it.

Sorry, I'm not sure what you're talking about. What screen switching code?

I reported some differences between 3.0.0t1 and 3.10 on amithlonopen (I made a movie for you)

If I switch between two different screens (DOpus -> WB) I get some elements from DOpus drawn at the WB.
You wrote to me, that this is caused by some forgotten testroutines inside 3.10.

(amithlonopen message #5824)
Re: [amithlonopen] Re: Kernel 3.10 released!

----- Original Message -----
From: rejuvenatora1000
To: amithlonopen@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, September 07, 2006 10:26 PM
Subject: [amithlonopen] Re: Kernel 3.10 released!

> The movie is showing the 800x600 screen-mode-bug, the pointer-bug,
> screen-flip-bug and
> some graphic-bugs (p96-speed).

Okay, I'll address these one-by-one :

- 800x600 16/32-bit modes can be fixed by adding the line 'Setconfig >NIL:
P96_Widthstep 1' to your startup-sequence. The root cause of this is that
modern graphics cards require a screen width divisible by 64 pixels for
hardware acceleration to work correctly, and 800 isn't divisible by 64.

- the screen-flip/screen trash and P96 problems are down to a typo in the
driver. I forgot to comment out some experimental code... oops :-)

- the pointer bug is something I've been aware of for a while, but simply
have not been able to fix.

- on 8-bit modes in general : all 8-bit screen modes have various issues
with the Radeon driver. Avoid them for now if you can (this goes for colour
depths below 8-bit, too, as they are really 8-bit screens at hardware
level).

GC

A kernel 3.11 (3.10 without testroutines) would be very nice.


br
Andre

[humppa]

Today I finally received my FX5200, hooked it up, booted into Amithlon and only got a black screen.

Then I found out that DVI is not working! Analogue VGA display works well though. Am I really the first one who can't get DVI to work on a Geforce FX?

Do I have to change any settings in order to get DVI working?

Here is some information, maybe that helps tracking down the problem which is hopefully not hardware-related (DVI works in Windows):

When booting, I get this:
"rivafb: nvidia device/chipset 322"
"rivafb: RIVA MTRR set to ON"

At the end of booting, the text "Opening framebuffer: no such device" is displayed. The FX is well detected and HW-acceleration is working:
"xcat /proc/fb    0   GeForce FX 5200"
I can select between the "builtin" screenmodes and "NVIDIA-1" screenmodes.
With "vga=***" I tried different modes, but I think these only have any effect for VESA cards, right?

Do I have to set "video=***" to something? Somewhere I found the setting "video=rivafb:640x480,flatpanel=1" but that only resulted in two black modes (VGA and DVI) when I tested it.

I could also try different "setconfig >NIL: p96_accell" settings, but I don't really know where to start or if those have any effect at all.

Another oddity with "kern310":
"xcat /proc/version" gives me:
"3.0.0-test1(2.4.19-pre4) compiled 19 Dec 2005"
Am I using an old kernel or is it just a version number/date that wasn't bumped?

Thanks for any help in advance!

This is the GFX-card that I bought.