Large number of VESA modes missing for Intel graphic cards

[tonestone57]

I believe there is a bug in the VESA driver for Intel because many VESA video modes are left out from the VESA BIOS list in syslog.

I noticed that for Intel video cards there are lots of 0 x 0 x 0 modes (missing resolutions) when looking at my syslog and another user's Intel video syslog.

Video cards from ATI, Nvidia & VIA have their VESA modes fully defined with actual resolutions in their VESA list in syslog.

To understand what I am saying look at these syslogs:

Intel: ​http://dev.haiku-os.org/attachment/ticket/5865/syslog-acpi#L9

​http://dev.haiku-os.org/attachment/ticket/5866/syslog#L1027

ATI Radeon: ​http://dev.haiku-os.org/attachment/ticket/5843/syslog#L6

Nvidia: ​http://dev.haiku-os.org/attachment/ticket/5703/SYSLOG00.TXT#L11

VIA: ​http://dev.haiku-os.org/attachment/ticket/5877/syslog#L12

You see both Intel video cards have many 0x0x0 video modes listed with only about 1/4 of all modes actually supported by VESA.

You will notice that any similar modes are defined in VIA syslog and undefined (0 x 0 x 0) in Intel syslogs.

[jackburton]

If anything, this would be a bug in the Intel VESA BIOS. But I think it's just that the BIOS supports less resolutions. Anyway:

​http://www.haiku-os.org/about/faq#12

[axeld]

Indeed, there is nothing we can do about this.

[tonestone57]

Ok, thanks guys.

I checked with Linux to confirm and only had 1024x768, 800x600 & 640x480 modes available. Crazy how other video card vendors offer 3 times or greater number of VESA modes on their graphics cards compared to Intel.

I used two methods in Linux: vga=0x9999 and sudo hwinfo --framebuffer. Details here: ​http://www.firerouter.com/2009/07/28/high-resolution-console-in-linux/

Seeing 0x0x0 for Intel video cards in syslog and not for the other graphic card vendors gave me impression that something was wrong with VESA driver.

[tonestone57]

I decided to quickly test my Atom 330 with i945G (older) graphics but with Debian. It listed additional modes from the Ironlake (Core i3 - newer) graphics. Leading me to believe something is really wrong - maybe Intel video BIOS issue? I will have to wait for newer Linux distros and test out Intel Ironlake again in the future. ie: older Intel graphics chips should not have more and higher resolution VESA video modes than newer Intel graphics card. Highest VESA resolution available for Ironlake is 1024x768.

i945G output from hwinfo in Debian:

02: None 00.0: 11001 VESA Framebuffer                           
  [Created at bios.450]
  Unique ID: rdCR.NXWrGsjj2h9
  Hardware Class: framebuffer
  Model: "Intel(r) 82945G Chipset Family Graphics Controller"
  Vendor: "Intel Corporation"
  Device: "Intel(r) 82945G Chipset Family Graphics Controller"
  SubVendor: "Intel(r) 82945G Chipset Family Graphics Chip Accelerated VGA BIOS"
  SubDevice: 
  Revision: "Hardware Version 0.0"
  Memory Size: 7 MB + 832 kB
  Memory Range: 0x80000000-0x807cffff (rw)
  Mode 0x0361: 800x480 (+1600), 16 bits
  Mode 0x0362: 800x480 (+3200), 24 bits
  Mode 0x033c: 1920x1440 (+1920), 8 bits
  Mode 0x034b: 1600x1200 (+3200), 16 bits
  Mode 0x035a: 1600x1200 (+6400), 24 bits
  Mode 0x0307: 1280x1024 (+1280), 8 bits
  Mode 0x031a: 1280x1024 (+2560), 16 bits
  Mode 0x031b: 1280x1024 (+5120), 24 bits
  Mode 0x0305: 1024x768 (+1024), 8 bits
  Mode 0x0317: 1024x768 (+2048), 16 bits
  Mode 0x0318: 1024x768 (+4096), 24 bits
  Mode 0x0314: 800x600 (+1600), 16 bits
  Mode 0x0315: 800x600 (+3200), 24 bits
  Mode 0x0301: 640x480 (+640), 8 bits
  Mode 0x0303: 800x600 (+832), 8 bits
  Config Status: cfg=new, avail=yes, need=no, active=unknown

I also should check in Haiku with i945G to see if I get access to these modes or not.