Re. http://mail-index.netbsd.org/port-i386/2003/06/13/0005.html

I think that what you describe is similar to some snow/static I see on
my display (and S3Virge card in a regular tower PC).

I know of two ways to get rid of it:

 * Turning off the XVideo extension (which, when enabled, seems to allow
   higher performance graphic output to video memory).  This works, but
   turning it off seems to affect performance.

 * I can also affect the impact that this has by changing video modes
   (resolution and fresh frequency).

At the default mode for my card/monitory, there is always interference,
even with an unchanging display.

If I toggle one level "lower" on the resolution/frequency (winds up at
the same resolution but presumably lower refresh rate), the display is
*sometimes* okay.  By that, I mean that it is either rock-solid, or
else it has *continuous* problems with ghosting/noise (the same as at
the default/max res. & frequency).

If I do things like switch to/from the virtual console with X, I can
eventually get it to lock into a "good" display in this "second best"
resolution/frequency.


I've seen similar problems with a friend's GNU/LINUX box on an even
older PC (my video card is from about 1997 or 1998).

XFree86 definitely has some issues with trying to do too much sometimes.
I assume that the cards are *capable* of doing what X is trying to
make them do (e.g., my card "sometimes" works well), but maybe XFRee86
is just not really able to tell if the hardware can handle some things,
and they push ahead and hope for the best.

Whatever the case, if you can't get a good display at an acceptable
resolution, you might try turning off XVideo.  (Or turn it off anyway,
if you don't use the system for playing video or such.)


-- 
  "I probably don't know what I'm talking about."  http://www.olib.org/~rkr/