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#1 2009-08-28 04:03:28

methuselah
Member
Registered: 2007-10-02
Posts: 570

Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

I have 3 different settings in my BIOS for Dedicated Video Memory (Phoenix BIOS):

32MB
64MB
128MB


When I use the 64MB or the 128MB option, I get this from dmesg:

Checking aperture...
No AGP bridge found
Node 0: aperture @ e0000000 size 32 MB
Aperture too small (32 MB) than (64 MB)
Your BIOS doesn't leave a aperture memory hole
Please enable the IOMMU option in the BIOS setup
This costs you 64 MB of RAM
Mapping aperture over 65536 KB of RAM @ 20000000
PM: Registered nosave memory: 0000000020000000 - 0000000024000000
Memory: 3781836k/4980736k available (3571k kernel code, 1049180k absent, 148788k reserved, 1250k data, 464k init)

But when I use the 32MB setting I get this:

Checking aperture...
No AGP bridge found
Node 0: aperture @ 4e0000000 size 32 MB
Aperture beyond 4GB. Ignoring.
Your BIOS doesn't leave a aperture memory hole
Please enable the IOMMU option in the BIOS setup
This costs you 64 MB of RAM
Mapping aperture over 65536 KB of RAM @ 20000000
PM: Registered nosave memory: 0000000020000000 - 0000000024000000
Memory: 3781836k/4980736k available (3571k kernel code, 1049180k absent, 148788k reserved, 1250k data, 464k init)

Then further down I noticed my used/total vesafb memory:

for 32MB:

vesafb: framebuffer at 0xd0000000, mapped to 0xffffc20000600000, using 6144k, total 32768k

for 64MB:

vesafb: framebuffer at 0xd0000000, mapped to 0xffffc20000600000, using 6144k, total 65536k

for 128MB

vesafb: framebuffer at 0xd0000000, mapped to 0xffffc20000600000, using 6144k, total 131072k

So, I'm confused at how much Dedicated Video Memory I want and if I should add something to my kernel line in my /boot/grub/menu.lst file?

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#2 2009-08-28 05:46:25

hunterthomson
Member
Registered: 2008-06-22
Posts: 794
Website

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

Well to answer your main question.... Like you guessed. Unless your computer dosen't work you want to use the most video memory and if there is a problem with that then fix that problem and keep using the most video memory.

Now for your "Is there a problem, this looks strange?" Yes it dose look strange to me too. However, you may just be over analyzing this. Dose video work? If you said yes then forget about this and use 128. I meen this is talking about the vesa frame buffer... Who cares if there is a small problem with it? It is just rendering text on the screen. Just as long as your real video driver works in Xorg, all is well. Losing 64MB of RAM is not a big deal.

However, I could be a dumbass so maybe someone will tell you I am all wrong and have the solution for you hmm

Last edited by hunterthomson (2009-08-28 05:51:45)


OpenBSD-current Thinkpad X230, i7-3520M, 16GB CL9 Kingston, Samsung 830 256GB
Contributor: linux-grsec

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#3 2009-08-28 05:54:42

methuselah
Member
Registered: 2007-10-02
Posts: 570

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

hunterthomson wrote:

Well to answer your main question.... Like you guessed. Unless your computer dosen't work you want to use the most video memory and if there is a problem with that then fix that problem and keep using the most video memory.

Now for your "Is there a problem, this looks strange?" Yes it dose look strange to me too. However, you may just be over analyzing this. Dose video work? If you said yes then forget about this and use 128.

Yes, video works fine with 128MB and 64MB (I forgot to check with 32MB but I'm sure it would of been working also), I just wasn't sure that this setting affects my NVIDIA GeForce 7150M / nForce 630m card that has up to 1071MB Total Available Graphics memory.

I don't know much about these things, but isn't vesa framebuffer only for my console screen? And that made me wonder if I had waisted a large chunk of memory for my console screen since it looked like vesa was using only 6144k out of a total of 131072k?

Or is that just what vesa uses out of a dedicated 131072k, leaving the rest to my NVIDIA card?

Last edited by methuselah (2009-08-28 05:57:09)

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#4 2009-08-28 06:03:39

hunterthomson
Member
Registered: 2008-06-22
Posts: 794
Website

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

methuselah wrote:
hunterthomson wrote:

Well to answer your main question.... Like you guessed. Unless your computer dosen't work you want to use the most video memory and if there is a problem with that then fix that problem and keep using the most video memory.

Now for your "Is there a problem, this looks strange?" Yes it dose look strange to me too. However, you may just be over analyzing this. Dose video work? If you said yes then forget about this and use 128.

Yes, video works fine with 128MB and 64MB (I forgot to check with 32MB but I'm sure it would of been working also), I just wasn't sure that this setting affects my NVIDIA GeForce 7150M / nForce 630m card that has up to 1071MB Total Available Graphics memory.

I don't know much about these things, but isn't vesa framebuffer only for my console screen? And that made me wonder if I had waisted a large chunk of memory for my console screen since it looked like vesa was using only 6144k out of a total of 131072k?

Or is that just what vesa uses out of a dedicated 131072k, leaving the rest to my NVIDIA card?

Ya vesa is just the console though I think you can use it for Xserver too. So, I really would not be concerned about it even if it is wasting some memory.

I will say that even though your card can use up to 1071MB you will still get better performance out of 128MB dedicated EVEN if vesa is some how messed up. It is just like, it is always better to have as much dedicated video memory as possible.

Last edited by hunterthomson (2009-08-28 06:05:33)


OpenBSD-current Thinkpad X230, i7-3520M, 16GB CL9 Kingston, Samsung 830 256GB
Contributor: linux-grsec

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#5 2009-08-28 06:15:08

methuselah
Member
Registered: 2007-10-02
Posts: 570

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

hunterthomson wrote:

I will say that even though your card can use up to 1071MB you will still get better performance out of 128MB dedicated..

That's good to know, it had been on 64MB for the last year without me knowing that if I changed it to 128MB that it would give me a performance boost (I figured that the default settings had been for best graphic performance available). I was messing around in my BIOS today trying to figure out if I could speed up my boot or fix my AGP issue.


And I did notice this has change in my NVIDIA X Server Settings, so this is probably a good thing:

for 64MB:

Graphics Processor: GeForce 7150M / nForce 630M
VBIOS Version:  05.67.32.16.17
Memory:            256 MB
Bus Type:           Integrated

for 128MB:

Graphics Processor: GeForce 7150M / nForce 630M
VBIOS Version:  05.67.32.16.17
Memory:            512 MB
Bus Type:           Integrated

Last edited by methuselah (2009-08-28 06:17:50)

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#6 2009-08-28 06:28:01

hunterthomson
Member
Registered: 2008-06-22
Posts: 794
Website

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

Ya that looks like a vary good thing tongue

Will you really see a preformace boost? Um I don't know how these things are set up but I would guess at how they should be set up....

i.e.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
video card with dedicated and undedicated video memory.

1071MB total and of that you can dedicate upto 128MB

If the system has 1071MB of RAM free the Video card can/will use all of it.
So if you had 64 dedicated or 128 dedicated it would not matter because you have 1071MB free and your video card is using 1071MB ether way....


However,

If the system doesn't have 1071MB available even less then that.... lets say your running an application that is eating ALL memory that it can. Then if you had 128MB dedicated you would get better video then if you only dedicated 64MB.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


However, form the output you put up it looks as though this is not how it is working..... It looks like it is just flat out much better to dedicate 128MB. Keep the 128  512MB video memory is WAY WAY better then 256MB.

As for BIOS settings... Any setting that will quicken the boot possess has always caused problems for me.

Keep in mind that the BIOS is the most POS "I can't believe this is in the market place !?!" Software you will ever use. ALL BIOS on ALL motherboards are total buggy POS code. I meen Microsoft could not write worse code then the quality of code in your BIOS. So, don't "Tweek" it at all. DO go through it when you get a new computer and see what options there are in the CMOS setup and you will almost always want to change some default setting in the CMOS setup but don't mess with options that Speed things up. You BIOS can barely handle the boot process as is.

Last edited by hunterthomson (2009-08-28 06:46:11)


OpenBSD-current Thinkpad X230, i7-3520M, 16GB CL9 Kingston, Samsung 830 256GB
Contributor: linux-grsec

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#7 2009-08-28 07:01:48

methuselah
Member
Registered: 2007-10-02
Posts: 570

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

This BIOS is a Phoenix BIOS and it's been a problem already. I had to send my computer back because my Vista partition has this HP utility built into it for hardware updates (like a new BIOS version). Long story short, I went ahead with the suggested BIOS upgrade and it ruined my computer. They sent it back with a new BIOS chip in it..... I don't know if my BIOS start screen was this slow when I first got this computer..... but now-a-days it takes 8 seconds from the press of the button to the point that I finally see a BIOS menu, and then another 7 - 8 seconds to my GRUB menu..... this is the real reason I was in my BIOS messing around today..... I was hoping there was a way to make this start faster.

I disabled the floopy boot, and the internal network book, and I put my hard disk book at the top of the list..... but it didn't improve anything. Still 8 seconds of a completely blank screen before I see my HP screen with the BIOS setup f2/f9/f10 menu.

But at least I might have improved my NVIDIA with the 512MB of mem!

Last edited by methuselah (2009-08-28 07:02:29)

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#8 2009-08-28 12:01:10

LeoSolaris
Member
From: South Carolina
Registered: 2008-03-30
Posts: 354

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

If you can code, I remember reading about an open source program that allows you to mess with PhoenixBIOS. It will even let you practice on a virtual startup (like VMware or vbox) so you do not break your system.

It sounds like the BIOS they flashed to your motherboard either did not have "fast boot" (skipping some/most of the POST checks, which might not be wise if you have a large delay before the POST checks even start...) or it did not completely overwrite the prior broken BIOS flash.

You may want to look into re-flashing the BIOS with something other than the built in tool HP provided.

Good luck, and I hope you get your BIOS settled. Most of them are annoying and poorly written, but there are a few out there...


I keep getting distracted from my webserver project...

huh? oooh...  shiny!

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#9 2009-08-28 19:24:03

methuselah
Member
Registered: 2007-10-02
Posts: 570

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

LeoSolaris wrote:

If you can code, I remember reading about an open source program that allows you to mess with PhoenixBIOS. It will even let you practice on a virtual startup (like VMware or vbox) so you do not break your system.

It sounds like the BIOS they flashed to your motherboard either did not have "fast boot" (skipping some/most of the POST checks, which might not be wise if you have a large delay before the POST checks even start...) or it did not completely overwrite the prior broken BIOS flash.

You may want to look into re-flashing the BIOS with something other than the built in tool HP provided.

Good luck, and I hope you get your BIOS settled. Most of them are annoying and poorly written, but there are a few out there...

Thank you for the info. I'm a bit hesitant to mess with it because my warranty has expired. If it gets worse then I could try to flash it again (not using that HP utility), or I'll look into the VMware way that you mentioned.

Thanks again for the info.

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#10 2009-08-28 22:22:31

hunterthomson
Member
Registered: 2008-06-22
Posts: 794
Website

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

methuselah wrote:

This BIOS is a Phoenix BIOS and it's been a problem already. I had to send my computer back because my Vista partition has this HP utility built into it for hardware updates (like a new BIOS version). Long story short, I went ahead with the suggested BIOS upgrade and it ruined my computer. They sent it back with a new BIOS chip in it..... I don't know if my BIOS start screen was this slow when I first got this computer..... but now-a-days it takes 8 seconds from the press of the button to the point that I finally see a BIOS menu, and then another 7 - 8 seconds to my GRUB menu..... this is the real reason I was in my BIOS messing around today..... I was hoping there was a way to make this start faster.

I disabled the floopy boot, and the internal network book, and I put my hard disk book at the top of the list..... but it didn't improve anything. Still 8 seconds of a completely blank screen before I see my HP screen with the BIOS setup f2/f9/f10 menu.

But at least I might have improved my NVIDIA with the 512MB of mem!

Ya, it sounds like your BIOS is taking too long. I would try to flash BIOS in this new one and hope it doesn't brick the board. Ya, I guess there are safe things you can do to speed up the boot processes. I was thinking of the Fast boot stuff that skips some checks.

You know CoreBoot ? If you plan on getting a new motherboard make sure to get one that is supported by CoreBoot wink
There is a good video about it on google. It is a BIOS built on the Linux Kernel. Way Way better than any BIOS you would get on any board. You can do all kinds of cool stuff too. Like have a BIOS level shell with scripting capability cool You can have the Linux Kernel that is in your BIOS mount you /root filesystem so your box boots crazy fast. You have all kinds of crazy cool control over the hardware on your mother board.

Last edited by hunterthomson (2009-08-28 22:27:17)


OpenBSD-current Thinkpad X230, i7-3520M, 16GB CL9 Kingston, Samsung 830 256GB
Contributor: linux-grsec

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#11 2009-08-29 02:47:56

methuselah
Member
Registered: 2007-10-02
Posts: 570

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

I'm just going to leave it be.

My year long warranty has already expired, I've already had to send the computer back once for a new BIOS chip, I think I'll just put up with the 8 second BIOS wait and continue focusing on making my Linux boot as fast as possible. I've already backgrounded my DAEMONS, and I have used this /etc/inittab:

#
# /etc/inittab
#

#  Runlevels:
#    0    Halt
#    1(S)    Single-user
#    2    Not used
#    3    Multi-user
#    4    Not used
#    5    X11
#    6    Reboot

## Only one of the following two lines can be uncommented!
# Boot to console
#id:3:initdefault:
# Boot to X11
id:5:initdefault:

rc::sysinit:/etc/rc.sysinit
rs:S1:once:/etc/rc.single
rm:2345:once:/etc/rc.multi
rh:06:once:/etc/rc.shutdown
su:S:once:/sbin/sulogin -p

# -8 options fixes umlauts problem on login
c1:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -8 38400 tty1 linux
c2:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -8 38400 tty2 linux
#c3:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -8 38400 tty3 linux
#c4:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -8 38400 tty4 linux
#c5:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -8 38400 tty5 linux
#c6:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty -8 38400 tty6 linux

ca::ctrlaltdel:/sbin/shutdown -t3 -r now

# Example lines for starting a login manager
#x:5:respawn:/usr/bin/xdm -nodaemon
#x:5:respawn:/usr/sbin/gdm -nodaemon
#x:5:respawn:/opt/kde/bin/kdm -nodaemon
#x:5:respawn:/usr/bin/slim >& /dev/null
x:5:once:/bin/su MY_NAME -l -c "/bin/bash --login -c startx >/dev/null 2>&1"


# End of file

I guess I can try a few of the tips (the ones that I haven't done yet), suggested on this wiki page: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Twe … .2Finittab


But thanks for all of the help, I didn't know that my last broken BIOS could be the problem with this new BIOS. Maybe I should have gotten more than a year warranty.

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#12 2009-08-29 05:11:55

hunterthomson
Member
Registered: 2008-06-22
Posts: 794
Website

Re: Quick question about BIOS and vesafb: framebuffer

methuselah wrote:

But thanks for all of the help, I didn't know that my last broken BIOS could be the problem with this new BIOS. Maybe I should have gotten more than a year warranty.

Build your next file server. That way if the mother board is bad or go's bad you just RMA or replace the mother board but the HHD's and everything you don't have to mail or take anywhere. You'll probably have a replacement part so your computer will have no real down time.

If you are just sick of it or don't trust it or something. I would look at the specs of the computers hardware and get a better motherboard for that computer. Buy an ASUS board and get a CoreBoot supported one if you can.

Last edited by hunterthomson (2009-08-29 05:20:21)


OpenBSD-current Thinkpad X230, i7-3520M, 16GB CL9 Kingston, Samsung 830 256GB
Contributor: linux-grsec

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