








 Information for S3 ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX, ViRGE/GX2, ViRGE/MX and ViRGE/VX
                                     Users

                           The XFree86 Project Inc.

                                 1 March 1998



1.  Supported hardware

With release 3.3.2 of XFree86, there are now two servers which support the
ViRGE family of chips. The XF86_S3V server is a dedicated server which supports
the S3 ViRGE (86C325), the ViRGE/DX (86C375), ViRGE/GX (86C385) and the
ViRGE/VX (86C988) chips. New with this release, the above ViRGE chipsets are
also supported in the XF86_SVGA server, which includes a new ViRGE driver mak-
ing use of the XAA acceleration architecture and also supports ViRGE/GX2
(86C357) and ViRGE/MX (86C260) chips now.

The following sections describe details of ViRGE support.  Be aware that there
are two servers described.  XF86_S3V is the ViRGE specific server and was cre-
ated first.  The new acceleration architecture support is found in the
XF86_SVGA server using the s3_virge driver.  Each has strengths and weaknesses.


2.  XF86_S3V server

The S3V server has some minor fixes since 3.3.1.  You should find that the
ViRGE server is stable at all depths.  The server supports 1 and 32 bpp pixmap
formats.  This fixes known problems with xanim and Netscape clients in early
versions of the S3V server.  It has been tested with ViRGE cards with 2 and 4MB
DRAM, ViRGE/DX 4M, ViRGE/VX 8M (4M VRAM/4M DRAM), and with a 220MHz ViRGE/VX
card with 2MB VRAM up to 1600x1200 with 8/15/16bpp.

NOTE: This driver is pretty new, and not everything might work like you expect
it to. It shouldn't crash your machine, but you may have video artifacts or
missing lines. Please report any and all problems to XFree86@Xfree86.org using
the appropriate bug report sheet.

2.1  Features:

   o Basic support for S3 ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX and ViRGE/VX video adapters

   o uses linear frame buffer

   o it should be possible to reach resolutions up to the maximum supported by
     your video card memory.  (eg. 1600x1200 at 8 and 16bpp, 1280x1024 at 24/32
     bpp for a 4 Meg. card)

   o it should be possible to use pixel depths of 8, 15, 16, 24, and 32 bits
     per pixel.



 Information for S3 ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX, ViRGE/GX2, ViRGE/MX and ViRGE/V1 Users





 Information for S3 ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX, ViRGE/GX2, ViRGE/MX and ViRGE/V2 Users



   o 32 bpp is implemented as translation to 24 bpp

2.2  Known limitations

   o No support for external RAMDACs on the ViRGE/VX.

   o No support for VLB cards.

   o No support for doublescan modes.

   o The driver only works with linear addressing.

   o For 24/32 bpp some simple dashed line acceleration is implemented, but
     sloped dash/double dash are drawn as solid lines.

2.3  Future Features (in order from highest to lowest priority)

   o there is a good chance that the SVGA ViRGE driver will replace XF86_S3V in
     future releases

   o some more hardware acceleration

   o 3d acceleration (once we work out how that's done)

   o more chipsets and RAMDACs

2.4  Configuration:

The server auto-detects RAM size, RAMDAC and ClockChip. Do not bother putting
these in your "Device" section.  The "nolinear" option is unsupported.

2.4.1  Cursor:

   o The default is hardware cursor, no option is needed.

   o "sw_cursor" switches to software cursor.


3.  XF86_SVGA server

The XF86_SVGA ViRGE driver supports all current flavors of the S3 ViRGE
chipset.  It uses the XAA acceleration architecture for acceleration, and
allows color depths of 8, 15, 16, 24 and 32 bpp. It has been tested on several
2MB and 4MB ViRGE cards, a 4MB ViRGE/DX card and a ViRGE/VX card. Resolutions
of up to 1600x1200 have been achieved. This is an early release of this driver,
and not everything may work as expected. Please report any problems to
XFree86@Xfree86.org using the appropriate bug report sheet.

3.1  Features

   o Supports PCI hardware, ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX, ViRGE/GX2, ViRGE/MX and
     ViRGE/VX.










 Information for S3 ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX, ViRGE/GX2, ViRGE/MX and ViRGE/V3 Users



   o Supports 8bpp, 15/16bpp, 24bpp and 32bpp.

   o VT switching seems to work well, no corruption reported at all color
     depths.

   o Acceleration is pretty complete: Screen-to-screen copy, solid rectangle
     fills, CPU-to-screen color expansion, 8x8 pattern mono and color fills.
     Currently, the color expansion appears to be substantially faster than the
     accel server due to the optimized XAA routines.

   o Acceleration at 32bpp is limited: only ScreenToScreen bitblit and solid
     rectangles are supported. The ViRGE itself has no support for 32bpp accel-
     eration, so the graphics engine is used in 16bpp mode.

   o All modes include support for a hardware cursor.

3.2  Known limitations

   o No support for external RAMDACs on the ViRGE/VX.

   o No support for VLB cards.

   o No support for doublescan modes.

   o The driver only works with linear addressing.

   o Lines and polygons are not accelerated yet (but XAA still provides some
     acceleration in this respect).

3.3  Configuration

The ViRGE SVGA driver supports a large number of XF86Config options, which can
be used to tune PCI behavior and improve performance.

Memory options:

   o "slow_edodram" will switch the ViRGE to 2-cycle edo mode. Try this if you
     encounter pixel corruption on the ViRGE. Using this option will cause a
     large decrease in performance.

   o "early_ras_precharge" and "late_ras_precharge" will modify the memory tim-
     ings, and may fix pixel corruption on some cards. The default behavior is
     set by the BIOS, and is normally "late_ras_precharge".

   o "set_mclk value" sets the video memory clock rate to 'value' (in MHz).
     The performance of the card is directly proportional to the memory clock-
     ing, so this may provide a performance increase. The BIOS setting for your
     card is printed at server start-up. Often, "low-cost" cards use the S3
     default of 50MHz. This can often be exceeded with faster memory, some
     cards may function reliably at 60 or 65 MHz (even higher on some recent
     /DX and /GX cards). Note that S3 only officially supports an MCLK of 50MHz
     and XFree86 does not encourage exceeding those specs.  *** Note: This
     option should not be preceded by the "Option" keyword!









 Information for S3 ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX, ViRGE/GX2, ViRGE/MX and ViRGE/V4 Users



Acceleration and graphic engine:

   o "noaccel" turns off all acceleration

   o "fifo_aggressive", "fifo_moderate" and "fifo_conservative" alter the set-
     tings for the threshold at which the pixel FIFO takes over the internal
     memory bus to refill itself. The smaller this threshold, the better the
     acceleration performance of the card. You may try the fastest setting
     ("aggressive") and move down if you encounter pixel corruption.  The opti-
     mal setting will probably depend on dot-clock and on color depth. Note
     that specifying any of these options will also alter other memory settings
     which should increase performance, so you should at least use "fifo_con-
     servative" (this uses the chip defaults).

PCI options:

   o "pci_burst_on" will enable PCI burst mode. This should work on all but a
     few "broken" PCI chipsets, and will increase performance.

   o "pci_retry" will allow the driver to rely on PCI Retry to program the
     ViRGE registers. "pci_burst_on" must be enabled for this to work.  This
     will increase performance, especially for small fills/blits, because the
     driver does not have to poll the ViRGE before sending it commands to make
     sure it is ready. It should work on most recent PCI chipsets. A possible
     side-effect is that it may interfere with DMA operations on the PCI bus
     (e.g. sound cards, floppy drive).

Cursor:

   o "hw_cursor" turns on the hardware cursor.

Color depth options and limitations:

   o Pixel multiplexing is used above 80MHz for 8bpp on the ViRGE.

   o 15bpp is supported, use "-bpp 15" as an option to the server.

   o 24bpp is supported using the STREAMS engine.

   o 32bpp uses STREAMS as well; however, because the ViRGE does not really
     support 32 bpp "natively", acceleration is quite limited.

   o Both 24bpp and 32bpp do not support interlace modes.

   o 32bpp is limited to a width of < 1024 pixels.  (1024x768 is not possible,
     even if you have the memory.)  This is a hardware limit of ViRGE chips.

3.4  Hints for LCD configuration (S3 ViRGE/MX)

If LCD is active the CRT will always output 1024x768 (or whatever is the _phys-
ical_ LCD size) and smaller modes are zoomed to fit on the LCD unless you spec-
ify Option "lcd_center" in the device section.

The pixel clock for this physical size (e.g. 1024x768) mode...








 Information for S3 ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX, ViRGE/GX2, ViRGE/MX and ViRGE/V5 Users



   o ...can explicitly set in the config file (device section) with  e.g.
     `Set_LCDClk 70' (resulting 70 MHz pixel clock being used for all modes
     when LCD is on)

   o ...is taken from the _first_ mode in the modes line iff this mode's dis-
     play size is the same as the physical LCD size

   o ...the default LCD pixel clock of BIOS initialisation setup is used.  This
     value is output at server startup in the line `LCD size ...' unless you're
     specifying a value using `Set_LCDClk ...'

If LCD is _not_ active, the normal mode lines and pixel clocks are used for the
VGA output.

Whenever you switch output sources with Fn-F5 or similar, the Xserver won't get
informed and pixel clock and other settings are wrong.  Because of this you
have to switch modes _after_ switch output sources!  Then the server will check
which outputs are active and select the correct clocks etc.  So the recommended
key sequence to switch output is

Fn-F5  Ctrl-Alt-Plus  Ctrl-Alt-Minus

and everything should be ok..

on the Toshiba keypad you can first hold down Ctrl-Alt, then press `Fn' addi-
tionally before pressing Plus/Minus too to avoid to explicitly enable/disable
the numeric keypad for mode switching.


4.  Authors

4.1  XF86_S3V server

Harald Koenig <koenig@tat.physik.uni-tuebingen.de>

and:

   o Kevin Brosius Cobra@compuserve.com

   o Berry Dijk berry_dijk@tasking.nl

   o Dirk Hohndel hohndel@XFree86.Org

   o Huver Hu huver@amgraf.com

   o Dirk Vangestel gesteld@sh.bel.alcatel.be

4.2  XF86_SVGA ViRGE driver

Sebastien Marineau <marineau@genie.uottawa.ca>

and:










 Information for S3 ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX, ViRGE/GX2, ViRGE/MX and ViRGE/V6 Users



   o Harald Koenig <koenig@tat.physik.uni-tuebingen.de>

   o Kevin Brosius Cobra@compuserve.com

     Generated from XFree86: xc/programs/Xserver/hw/xfree86/doc/sgml/S3V.sgml,v 3.3.2.9 1998/12/04 01:36:48 dawes Exp $

























































 Information for S3 ViRGE, ViRGE/DX, ViRGE/GX, ViRGE/GX2, ViRGE/MX and ViRGE/V7 Users





































































                                   CONTENTS



1. Supported hardware ....................................................... 1

2. XF86_S3V server .......................................................... 1
   2.1 Features: ............................................................ 1
   2.2 Known limitations .................................................... 2
   2.3 Future Features (in order from highest to lowest priority) ........... 2
   2.4 Configuration: ....................................................... 2

3. XF86_SVGA server ......................................................... 2
   3.1 Features ............................................................. 2
   3.2 Known limitations .................................................... 3
   3.3 Configuration ........................................................ 3
   3.4 Hints for LCD configuration (S3 ViRGE/MX) ............................ 4

4. Authors .................................................................. 5
   4.1 XF86_S3V server ...................................................... 5
   4.2 XF86_SVGA ViRGE driver ............................................... 5



































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$XFree86: xc/programs/Xserver/hw/xfree86/doc/README.S3V,v 3.5.2.11 1998/12/29 07:54:24 hohndel Exp $
