Yant

[schrodinger]

Yet Another Nvidia Thread

Getting a blank screen when I start Xorg, Nvidia 5200 AGP graphics card and AMD Athlon CPU.

Generated a default config with

# Xorg -configure

Tested with

# X -config /root/xorg.conf.new

Blank Screen and unhappy chappy.

FreeBSD archon.hyperion.xnet 8.0-RELEASE FreeBSD 8.0-RELEASE #0: Sat Nov 21 15:48:17 UTC 2009 
root@almeida.cse.buffalo.edu:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/GENERIC  i386

[...]

archon# cd /usr/ports/x11/nvidia-driver-173/
archon# make showconfig
===> The following configuration options are available for nvidia-driver-173.14.20:
     FREEBSD_AGP=off "Use FreeBSD AGP GART driver"
     ACPI_PM=off "Enable support for ACPI Power Management"
     LINUX=on "Build with support for Linux compatibility"
===> Use 'make config' to modify these settings

[...]

nvidia0: <GeForce FX 5200> on vgapci0
vgapci0: child nvidia0 requested pci_enable_busmaster
vgapci0: child nvidia0 requested pci_enable_io
nvidia0: [GIANT-LOCKED]
nvidia0: [ITHREAD]

archon# kldstat
Id Refs Address    Size     Name
 1   14 0xc0400000 b6dfe0   kernel
 2    1 0xc0f6e000 14540    geom_journal.ko
 3    2 0xc4eb5000 26000    linux.ko
 4    1 0xc50c0000 6e2000   nvidia.ko

archon# tail -n 1 /boot/device.hints
hint.agp.0.disabled="1"

 

[Speedy]

What do you mean by blank screen. Plain Xorg will give you black screen, yes. To run something on X you need to start it after X. For instance, by putting exec firefox into your ~/.xinitrc Firefox will be started on Xorg. This is too lean for most people, so they put something like exec twm into their ~/.xinitrc. This will start TWM - assuming TWM is installed of course.

This is another showstopper:

(WW) AllowEmptyInput is on, devices using drivers 'kbd', 'mouse' or 'vmmouse' will be disabled.
(WW) Disabling Mouse0
(WW) Disabling Keyboard0

You need to disable AllowEmptyInput or configure your input devices using HAL. Take your pick.

Edit: Why on earth your log files have txt extension? Did you save them in DOS or what? :\

 

[schrodinger]

When I say "Blank Screen" I mean a blank screen. Dark, nothing there, zip, zilch, <insert additional colloquialism>

I am well aware of the requirement for "something" to be in ~/.xinitrc

Unless something major has changed that I missed, any and every time I have ever tested XFree86 and/or Xorg with the aforementioned method (X -config /path/to/file) I was shown the well known black and gray somewhat checked layout with the "X" mouse pointer...... this is what I expected.

Also the issue of the "AllowEmptyInput" would again be relevant if I have a display in which to notice the lack of mouse/keyboard ability.

In regards the file extensions I think you need to pay attention to correct forum usage when attaching files to a post.

"Valid file extensions: bmp bz2 c cpp diff gif gz jpe jpeg jpg patch pdf png psd tar tgz txt zip"

I don't see .conf nor do I see .log

Please correct me if I am wrong. And I did transfer them to a Windows laptop using FTP at the DOS prompt so unless that against the forum rules I don't see an issue with it.

Either way I did not enable HAL. I will try that and report back if it worked or not.

 

[schrodinger]

Enabling HAL didn't work but it turns out something HAS changed.

From the FreeBSD handbook:

The next step is to test the existing configuration to verify that Xorg can work with the graphics hardware on the target system. In Xorg versions up to 7.3, type:

# Xorg -config xorg.conf.new

Starting with Xorg 7.4 and above, this test produces a black screen which may make it difficult to diagnose whether X11 is working properly. The older behavior is still available by using the retro option:

# Xorg -config xorg.conf.new -retro

Speedy I suggest just for a history lesson you run the -retro to see what I was talking about.

Either way sorry for wasting time and resources when I should have just read the handbook.

/me installs fvwm

 

[Speedy]

Speedy I suggest just for a history lesson you run the -retro to see what I was talking about.

What makes you think I need such a lesson? I'm well aware how it worked with previous Xorg versions. In fact, when I started back in 1997 it was XFree86, it came with complimentary window manager and xterm. Did I misunderstand and you need help with X86Free or some earlier version of Xorg? Next time when you ask for help please mention the software version.
Plain enabling HAL does not do, you need to create fdi files for mouse and keyboard if you choose HAL route.