Redhat 7.3 Graphics problem with games

[jodef]

Did an install everything went fine except one issue.When i try to run tux racer or chromium system almost at standstill running in very sloooowww frames.
I have no speed horse but 500 mhz 256 mb ram video card onboard 4mb runs xp no probs I know should be able to run red hat. I believe it detected hardware correctly no other problems yet. New to linux so pls be as basic as possible. Thx

[bwkaz]

What video card?

The fact that it has 4MB of ram doesn't help a lot... other than to say that it's fairly old and probably won't run TuxRacer or Chromium well even if it does have 3D capability and you did have 3D drivers working for it.

But the problem may be that you just plain don't have the drivers installed or working.

In any case, both TuxRacer and Chromium require a 3D-capable graphics card, and a working hardware OpenGL setup.

[jodef]

Intel i752 ONBOARD VIDEO ADAPTER hardly think its a problem with the card itself it runs Mechwarrior in high graphics mode under Windows Xp.

Maybe drivers are the problem. But then everything else video wise works ok.Any ideas where to get drivers. Or better yet could it be something else.

I have another video card 32 mb ram couldn't find good drivers under xp but how hard is it to install under RedHat.

[jodef]

also have another video card how hard to install under RedHat.

[bwkaz]

Originally posted by jodef
I have another video card 32 mb ram... What is it?

Intel graphics cards probably don't have 3D Linux drivers. At least, I don't think so -- XFree86's site says "support (accelerated) exists for the i740", but that accelerated could well be 2D acceleration only. You might want to make sure you're using the "i740" driver (do a grep Driver /etc/X11/XF86Config{,-4} and see if it says anything).

[jodef]

Originally posted by bwkaz
What is it?

Intel graphics cards probably don't have 3D Linux drivers. At least, I don't think so -- XFree86's site says "support (accelerated) exists for the i740", but that accelerated could well be 2D acceleration only. You might want to make sure you're using the "i740" driver (do a grep Driver /etc/X11/XF86Config{,-4} and see if it says anything).

/etc/X11/XF86Config
under this it gives the following detail:

Driver: fbdev
vga16
vga2
svga
accel

/etc/X11/XF86Config{,-4}

Driver: keyboard
mouse
i810

Not exactly on this but where do I get the meaning of all this stuff I type.
How to copy paste from console typing all this is tedious.

[bwkaz]

OK, you have both config files. This means that XF86Config-4 is the one that's being used.

The XF86Config{,-4} thing was a use of bash's path expansion. bash turns "/etc/X11/XF86Config{,-4}" into two words, one with the stuff before the comma, and one with the stuff after the comma (so it turns into "/etc/X11/XF86Config /etc/X11/XF86Config-4"). It's a way to get rid of a lot of typing.

And in XF86Config-4, the driver is set to i810. I don't believe the i810 driver has any inherent 3D support, though I've never used it so I don't know for sure.

XF86Config is the config file for an older version of X.

"grep" just searches for a regular expression (in this case, just the string "Driver") in a file or set of files, and prints the lines that contain that regular expression (or string in this case).

Anyway, I think you might have more luck with the 32MB card (at least trying to play TuxRacer and Chromium, or any other 3D game), but that depends entirely on what card it is. Post that.

[jodef]

This is straight from the box of the video card:
3D Phantom XP-PCI2800
PCI VGA card
SIS 305 CHIPSET Pci Interface

Might as well ask here : using onboard video card how do I install the PCI card just talking about linux installation not hardware.

[bwkaz]

SiS 305... hmm...

You might be able to use the "sis" driver, but according to xfree86.org, that only specifically works with the SiS 300 (and a bunch of other SiS chipsets, but I didn't see the 305).

As for using the PCI card instead of the onboard one, it's not too bad. The easiest way is to turn off your onboard video inside your BIOS setup, if it has that option. If not, then you just have to figure out the PCI bus ID (/usr/sbin/lspci should tell you that), then add a BusID "PCI:X:YY:Z" in your XF86Config-4 file in the Device section for this card (replacing X with the first piece of the bus ID, YY with the second piece, and Z with the third piece).

You can get a GeForce2 for probably $30 or so, if the SiS doesn't work out, too. It has 3D drivers (at www.nvidia.com) that'll work regardless, if you can find a PCI version of the card.