[9fans] dell 2001fp vgadb entry

[9fans] dell 2001fp vgadb entry

[Russ Cox]

Anyone have any success using a Dell 2001FP flat panel yet?
I have it connected to a Geforce4 MX4000 card.  It works at
low resolutions (e.g., 1280x1024), but when I try for 1600x1200
the screen is filled with a solid color.  I haven't determined the
pixel that gets used for the solid color, but it's somewhere near
the border: with no windows it is rio grey, with a big window the
size of the screen it is the border color.

This is with some guesses as to the vgadb entry.  Other settings
work less well -- the dell2000fp 1600x1200 entry doesn't put anything
on the screen at all.

Russ

Re: [9fans] dell 2001fp vgadb entry

[Russ Cox]

> I have a Dell 2001FP on my desk at work now, and so am interested in
> any progress you make with this.  The machines came with built-in i810
> graphics, so no DVI output, but we're likely to fix that with a
> replacement vga card next week.

The important point is that you need a card capable of
driving the DVI at a 165MHz pixel clock (the standard
1600x1200 at 60Hz requires about 162MHz).  Some Nvidia
cards (and maybe others) skimp on this and the only way
they work is by reducing the blanking times drastically,
but Nvidia hasn't released details on how to program the
card for this.  I tried for about a day and eventually gave up.
Under Linux the proprietary binary-only Nvidia driver can
do 1600x1200 at 60Hz (presumably using the reduced 
blanking times) just fine.

The MX440 chip seems to work well in this respect.  The 
Geforce4 MX 4000 does not.  The MX 440 are on their
way out -- stock up now.  My guess is that you have to go
high end to make it work nowadays.

Russ