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List:       opensuse
Subject:    Re: [opensuse] ATI question
From:       Roger Oberholtzer <roger () opq ! se>
Date:       2009-05-07 8:11:56
Message-ID: 1241683916.20126.44.camel () acme ! pacific
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On Thu, 2009-05-07 at 03:49 -0400, Felix Miata wrote:
> On 2009/05/07 07:36 (GMT+0200) Roger Oberholtzer composed:
> 
> > I wonder how far back Nvidia support goes? I recall a legacy driver that
> > kept support for older cards at some level. Of course, that means that
> > the cards were at least still supported at a level equivalent to when
> > they were purchased. ATI, OTOH, simply dropped their 'older' cards
> > altogether.
> 
> You guys seem to have a funny notion of the meaning of legacy support. Why
> should ATI provide proprietary driver support for old chips when the open
> source drivers get the job done?

But they don't get the job done. I cannot use any of the card's 3D
features. So no Compiz at all. The card does, I think, have the required
hardware. But it is, I am guessing, sufficiently different from newer
ATI hardware, requiring a different implementation of the driver. So,
ATI have decided to support one hardware line to the exclusion of other
ones. As a minimum, perhaps they could open source the older driver that
they no longer want to support. Or at least enough of it to let the
X.org radeonhd driver add 3D support. But I guess that is not going to
happen any time soon. 

> 
> OTOH, you NVidia users ought to check for *real* legacy support. Which, if
> any, of these are supported by your NVidia card?:
> 
> 109h   132x25 text
> 10Ah   132x43 text
> 10Bh   132x50 text
> 10Ch   132x60 text
> 
> Unless using a "legacy" card, likely none.
> 
> In contrast, ATI had proprietary 132 column text modes before the VESA spec
> offered any, and every ATI card I've checked continues to support both its
> proprietary modes, and at least one of the VESA modes.

OK. Perhaps ATI wins the 132 column race. But how many of their
customers bought things like FireGL cards for that express purpose? I am
guessing most did so for faster graphics. And 3D hardware support.

Also, as useful as I am sure it is to be able to run DOS apps, I am
interested in running Linux apps. Like Compiz.

> I run a DOS spreadsheet in 132 column mode 24/7. Without ATI, I doubt would
> be able to with a PCIe card. For support from anything other than ATI I'd
> have to have a PCI slot or an ISA slot for the gfxcard.
> 
> http://fm.no-ip.com/PC/svga132c.html
> -- 
> "A fool gives full vent to his anger, but a wise man
> keeps himself under control."	Proverbs 29:11 NIV
> 
>  Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409
> 
> Felix Miata  ***  http://fm.no-ip.com/
-- 
Roger Oberholtzer

OPQ Systems / Ramböll RST

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P.O. Box 17009
SE-104 62 Stockholm, Sweden

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