H/W : Intel G35 chipset, "just works" ... or not ?

[ep45nm]

Vincent wrote:
> ... the G35 suits my needs perfectly.
> Question: Has a driver even been released for it yet ? Does it "just
> work", or are there some bits/functionalities that don't work, or have
> annoying bugs ? 

Vincent,

First let me say that I'm reasonably new to Linux (although I have some
expert help nearby :)

I have an Asus P5E-VM-HDMI motherboard that features the G35 chipset. I
started using a default Kubuntu install (7.10) which has the 'intel' driver
version 2.1.0 (IIRC) from intellinuxgraphics.com. This does not support the
G35 properly, and my IGP was detected as an older G945. During boot I get a
display, and the kubuntu logo with a loading progress bar appears properly.
However, when the login screen should be present I just get a black screen
on the HDMI output (connected via a HDMI-DVI connector to my LCD monitor).
My monitor doesn't even want to display its on-screen menu anymore,
indicating the mode is out of range.

I played around with updating to a more recent driver version 2.2.0 from the
'hardy' ubuntu version, but this did not help. In the end I even rebuilt the
driver from sourcecode as the website indicates, with the same black screen.
The only difference is that it does actually recognize the G35 chipset, but
can't seem to make use of it (this may have already happened with the 2.2.0
from hardy, I can't remember for sure).

When I changed /etc/X11/xorg.conf to use the 'i810' driver instead of the
'intel' it does work, but I get a bad video quality (some form of
antialiassing) on the digital output, and it only goes up to 1600x1200 (my
LCD monitor does 1920x1200). The bad quality is not related to the
non-native resolution as I set the panel to 1:1 mapping so it doesn't do any
scaling.

Interestingly, I also installed Windows XP, and before installing the
official intel drivers (from the CD supplied with the motherboard) I also
got a bad antialiassed video quality on the digital output, while it was
fine afterwards. This leads me to suspect that for proper digital video
quality from the G35 some G35-specific settings are required.

In the end, I switched to the analog output on my motherboard which I can
also connect to my LCD, using the 2.2.0 'intel' driver from hardy.
Ironically this gives a better image quality than using the digital output
with the antialiassing artifacts of the old driver (though it still looks
like a classic fuzzy CRT :( ).

If anyone can help troubleshoot the situation that would be helpful. I can
send a copy of the Xorg.0.log file if that may help anyone. From what I can
see in it, it finds a G35 chipset, but cannot find any valid resolutions to
use even though it reads the support-info from my monitor properly. There
are a lot of lines marked 'Not using default mode ...', and it finds a lot
of supported modes (printing Modelines). In the end it says:
(II) intel(0): Setting screen physical size to 519 x 324
which I guess explains why my monitor doesn't display anything and has
trouble...

By the way, the audio works fine here, although I'm only using stereo output
through the front-output of my case so far.

Maarten.

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