It may be this perhaps: (from the XFree docs for NetBSD)

7.2. Aperture Driver
By default NetBSD include the BSD 4.4 kernel security feature that disable 
access to the /dev/mem device when in multi-users mode. But XFree86 servers 
can take advantage (or require) linear access to the display memory.

Most XFree86 4.1.0 card drivers require linear memory access. There are two 
ways to allow XFree86 to access linear memory:

The first way is to disable the kernel security feature by adding ``option 
INSECURE'' in the kernel configuration file and build a new kernel.

The second way is to install the aperture driver, included in source form 
in xc/programs/Xserver/hw/xfree86/etc/apNetBSD.shar in the XFree86 4.1.0 
source distribution. Unpack it in a new directory of your choice by 
running:

  sh apNetBSD.shar

http://www.xfree86.org/4.1.0/NetBSD7.html


Can someone with a INSECURE kernel comment? Is hpcmips using the pcvt cons 
if you don't enable wscons?

-andy


--On Friday, January 04, 2002 9:40 AM +1000 Sanford Barton 
<bart@tequinox.com> wrote:

> Are you using wscons?  I seem to recall that after I got wscons (virtual
> consoles) working, I had a similar problem. The only way I was able to get
> around it, and still have wscons working correctly was to replace the
> kernel.  I can't remember if I went from a snapshot kernel back to the
> kernel in the 2.4 mips distro or vise-versa. But it did clear up my
> problem. If you haven't implemented wscons though, please ignore.
>
> Bart
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Andrew Diller [mailto:dillera@sudanacid.com]
> Sent: Thursday, January 03, 2002 4:40 PM
> To: port-hpcmips@netbsd.org
> Subject: Re: Regular user starting X
>
>
> It looks like this was a problem back in 2000:
>
> http://mail-index.netbsd.org/port-hpcmips/2000/07/18/0001.html
>
>
> was it solved? Should I just use a root account for X stuff?
>
> I'd hate to do that......
>
> -andy
>
> --On Thursday, January 03, 2002 4:29 PM -0700 Chris Jones
> <chris@cjones.org> wrote:
>
>> On Thu, Jan 03, 2002 at 06:23:35PM -0500, Andrew Diller wrote:
>>
>>> Well, I thought maybe it was permissions on /dev/ttyE0, but changing
>>> them  didn't help.
>>>
>>> Startx and xinit still just result in this 'no screens found' 'X
>>> connection  to :0.0 broken'
>>
>> Try the following:
>>
>> $ script
>> $ startx
>> $ exit
>> $ less typescript
>>
>> Chris
>>
>> --
>> ---------------------------------------------------- chris@cjones.org
>> Chris Jones                                          Mad scientist at
>> large   www.netbsd.org www.postgresql.org www.schemers.org www.python.org
>
>
>
> --
> This transmission is for the intended addressee only and is confidential
> information.  If you have received this transmission in error, please
> delete it and notify the sender.  The contents of this e-mail are the
> opinion of the writer only and are not endorsed by the Mincom Group of
> companies unless expressly stated otherwise.