[KLUG Members] Can't load Linux on my Compaq Preasrio 5340!

[Adam Tauno Williams]

> I have spent the last three days trying to load SuSE 10.0 on my
> Compaq Presario 5340!!
> I can load it just fine, but when I login and start poking on
> stuff, the system will hang.
> If I open a console window and do a bunch of command line stuff
> (ls, cd, grep, etc), it works just fine.
> BUT, when I grab the window title bar and wiggle the window back
> and forth, the screen (the window I'm moving, and everyplace the
> window was) looks like I sprinkled white sand everywhere.  

This is called artifacting.

> After
> about a dozen window wiggles, I can't read the contents of the
> window.  If I collapse/un-collapse the window, it clears up!  And,
> very soon, the system will hang!!
> Since the PC has 4M shared video memory of the total 384M
> installed, I'm thing Linux isn't calculating the available system
> memory correctly.

Probably a problem with the video driver selected.

> I have tried various kernel boot parameters, but no luck.  For
> example...
> knoppix mem=300M
> knoppix vga=normal

Kernel parameters probably have nothing to do with this,  the problem is
likely in the X configuration.

If you run yast, which you can do on a console,  what video card is
detected?  Also in your BIOS do you have any AGP related options?

> AGP Controller
>       Bus 1, Device 0, Function 0                       SiS 86C306
>     Memory 40000000-4000FFFF   Exclusive      SiS 530/620
>     Memory 40000000-400FFFFF   Exclusive      SIS Processor to AGP
>     Memory 40800000-40FFFFFF   Exclusive      SIS Processor to AGP
>     Memory 40800000-40FFFFFF   Exclusive      SiS 530/620
>     Memory 50000000-5FFFFFFF   Exclusive      SIS Processor to AGP
>     Memory FFDFF000-FFDFFFFF   Exclusive      SiS 7001 PCI to USB
>     Port 03B0-03BB             Shared         SiS 530/620
>     Port 03B0-03BB             Undetermined   SIS Processor to AGP
> Controller
>     Port 03C0-03DF             Shared         SiS 530/620
>     Port 03C0-03DF             Undetermined   SIS Processor to AGP