Gil Weber wrote:
I managed to put my hands on another PCI video card (emphasizing again, that's PCI, and not PCI-e). This one is a Genesis SV+ S3 Virge/DX. It is and older card but it is identified correctly by SuSE 9.3.
Howver, just as with the other PCI video card I cannot access a configuration screen for the video card or my monitor. I get the same error message as I have reported several times: <ups lost card during probing... abort>
And so it raises this question to the list: Is anyone out there successfully running **any** PCI video card (PCI, not PCI-e) with SuSE 9.2 or 9.3?
Yes, an S3 Virge, and I have absolutely no problems configuring it with SaX. The only (verifiable and identifiable) problem (*) I have had with it in 9.3 is a complete lockup of the machine during installation, at the "device configuration" stage -- as soon as the hardware probe for the video card/monitor begins, the machine locks up. (*) I say "verifiable and identifiable" because HAL also locks up my system, every time, but I have not yet been able to identify the precise reason for this. (Translation: I don't have a bloody clue what is going on with this :-D )
If not, is it possible that there is simply an incompatibility between SuSE and some/many/all PCI video cards? Is there something fundamentally conflicted in the code that renders all PCI video cards non-configurable?
For starters, the Virge (any variant) is an ancient chip, and it is perhaps understandable that it may cause some problems with the newer kernels. There are undoubtedly timing issues that, if one were to look at them in more detail, more probably would be traceable to the video card/system board combination rather than OS/hardware issues. In my case, it is more likely to be a software/hardware conflict, given the ancient motherboard I am also using (Via Apollo 82C598), but if it is a matter of combining new hardware with ancient, first I would be looking at possible hardware-to-hardware conflicts.