AlienWare M17x problems on fedora 11

osaka kawazaki · #1 3rd August 2009, 10:27 PM

Just got my M17x , tried installing fedora 11, got the following problems:
1- wireless adapter not detected
2- Nvidia drivers crash, all black screen, tried akmod-nvida from RPMFusion, it compiles then failes on loading , leaving a black screen

ozjd · #2 3rd August 2009, 11:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by osaka kawazaki

Just got my M17x , tried installing fedora 11, got the following problems:
1- wireless adapter not detected
2- Nvidia drivers crash, all black screen, tried akmod-nvida from RPMFusion, it compiles then failes on loading , leaving a black screen

In both cases you need to give some more details. Which wifi card and nvidia chip do you have?
Did you use the correct nvidia driver? Have a look at the nvidia thread in my signature.

osaka kawazaki · #3 4th August 2009, 07:21 AM

Wireless driver is broadcom 802.11n and the i got three nvidia GPUs one inegrated 9400M G and two 260M connected as SLI, i just activated the integrated one in bios, and tried the right akmod-nvidia driver for the 9400M G, did not work at all,, anybody tried alienware M17x before?

osaka kawazaki · #4 7th August 2009, 09:11 PM

what? no one has anything to say?

osaka kawazaki · #5 10th August 2009, 06:14 PM

now i installed windows 7 on M17x and then installed VirtualBox, imported my old fedora 9 on it, and ran compiz fusion and WOW! it feels so like native linux, very very fast. i love it. anyway thanks guys for standing silent!

dth4h · #6 25th August 2009, 06:20 AM

did you try kmod-nvidia not akmod-nvidia?

calvinallred · #7 2nd September 2009, 05:30 AM

Ok, first off to get the wireless working you need to blacklist the b43 module from loading. Edit the file /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf and add a line at the end that looks like

Code:

blacklist b43

Next I removed a couple packages that got in the way with

Code:

yum remove bcm43xx-fwcutter-006-5.fc11.x86_64 b43-fwcutter-011-5.fc11.x86_6

Next I installed broadcom-wl

Code:

yum install broadcom-wl.noarch

After a reboot it should be recognized and work. I can't remember which repo the broadcom-wl package was pulled from, but the only extra repo I have setup is rpmfusion (free and nonfree).
Hope that helps with your wireless.

Now video is a little trickier. In the bios you have an option to turn on or off hybrid and integrated video. Thus far I have only been successful with both disabled. This way it only uses your 260's, and not the 9400. I have been unable to get the DisplayPort working in this setup, but the vga and hdmi ports work great for dual displays. My xorg.conf file is below:

Code:

 
Section "ServerLayout"
    Identifier     "Default Layout"
    Screen      0  "Screen0" 0 0
    InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
    InputDevice    "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
EndSection

Section "Files"
    ModulePath      "/usr/lib64/xorg/modules/extensions/nvidia"
    ModulePath      "/usr/lib64/xorg/modules"
EndSection

Section "ServerFlags"
    Option         "AIGLX" "on"
    Option         "Xinerama" "0"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"

    # generated from data in "/etc/sysconfig/keyboard"
    Identifier     "Keyboard0"
    Driver         "keyboard"
    Option         "XkbLayout" "us"
    Option         "XkbModel" "pc105"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"

    # generated from default
   Identifier     "Mouse0"
    Driver         "mouse"
    Option         "Protocol" "auto"
    Option         "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
    Option         "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
    Option         "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
    Identifier     "Monitor0"
    VendorName     "Unknown"
    ModelName      "Seiko"
    HorizSync       30.0 - 75.0
    VertRefresh     60.0
    Option         "DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Device"
    Identifier     "Videocard0"
    Driver         "nvidia"
    VendorName     "NVIDIA Corporation"
    BoardName      "GeForce GTX 260M"
    BusID          "PCI:2:0:0"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
    Identifier     "Screen0"
    Device         "Videocard0"
    Monitor        "Monitor0"
    Option         "AddARGBGLXVisuals" "True"
    Option         "TwinView" "True"
    Option         "TwinViewOrientation" "RightOf"
    Option         "metamodes" "DFP-0: nvidia-auto-select +0+0, DFP-1: nvidia-auto-select +1920+0"
    SubSection     "Display"
        Modes      "nvidia-auto-select"
    EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "Extensions"
    Option         "Composite" "Enable"
EndSection

Again, I hope this helps you as well as others that may come across it. I believe to get the DisplayPort working for a second monitor I need to enable hybrid in the bios, but have not been able to find the right settings in my xorg.conf file to get this working. If anyone has any insight into this I would be glad to hear it.

As a side note, I am still having issues with the sound. I am able to get sound out the headphone jacks, but not out the system speakers. I do realize that there have been many sound issues with Fedora 11 and I am sure this is just an issue with it trying to use the digital out and not analog (or vice-versa). Any insight on this subject would be appreciated as well.

Thanks,

alose · #8 5th September 2009, 03:29 AM

Just wanted to state that the only way I was able to get video with the the onboard 9400m enabled was to use plane VGA graphices. It works but is subpar, otherwise disable the 9400m in Bios.

Calvin seems to have had better luck with the sound, as I have not been able to get any sound. tried with Pulse, ALSA, and OSS.

calvinallred · #9 8th September 2009, 05:32 PM

To get at least some sound I added the following to /etc/modprobe.d/dist.conf

Code:

options snd-pcsp index=-2
options snd-hda-intel model=dell-m6 enable=1 index=0
options snd-hda-intel enable_msi=1
alias snd-card-0 snd-hda-intel
alias sound-slot-0 snd-hda-intel

I am sure that the this driver (dell-m6) is not the correct one, but it does give sound through the headphone jack.

Again, if anyone has a better solution to this please let me know.

osaka kawazaki · #10 25th October 2009, 10:59 AM

Well, i tried the setting on xorg.conf with no such luck, i tried kmod-nvidia,akmod-nvidia and nvidia driver from nvidia site, but nothing is working?!? how did you work it? i got two 260m sli is this the reason?

calvinallred · #11 28th October 2009, 04:48 PM

Osaka,

First step is to install and setup the rpmfusion repo (free and nonfree).

Next step is to run a yum update so you get to the latest kernel.

Next step is to run yum install kmod-nvidia. This will install the correct nvidia driver from rpmfusion as well as a few other dependencies. You may also need to remove any other drivers installed (ie. akmod, or nvidia from source).

Check your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file to ensure every thing in there is proper. Compare it to my xorg.conf file in an earlier post.

Finally, do a full reboot, cross your fingers, and hold your mouth in a way that looks like you are eating something sour. It should work at that point.

Still, I have had no luck with sound. If anyone else has please let me know.

__________________________________________________ _
Calvin Allred
https://www.efolderonline.com/calvinallred

AssimilatorX · #12 14th January 2011, 07:04 AM

Hi! Everyone.

I know is may a stupid question, i dont have too much experiance with linux at all just installed fedora 14 x64 on my M17X-R2 i have 5870CFX and intel 5100N wifi. But i had a little hard time with the broadcomm dell 1520 card i got 2 m17x-r2 and i would like to experimenting on the old one with 4870CFX and this one has the dell 1520 wifi

THX