Bug 3112

Summary: Neomagic 128XD(2160) horizontal, random lines appearing on a screen
Product: xorg Reporter: Artur Jablonski <apfel>
Component: Driver/NeomagicAssignee: Xorg Project Team <xorg-team>
Status: RESOLVED INVALID QA Contact: Xorg Project Team <xorg-team>
Severity: normal    
Priority: medium CC: eich, roland.mainz
Version: 6.8.2   
Hardware: x86 (IA32)   
OS: Linux (All)   
Whiteboard: 2011BRB_Reviewed
i915 platform: i915 features:
Attachments:
Description Flags
a dump of screen that shows the problem none

Description Artur Jablonski 2005-04-22 18:24:53 UTC
Overview Description:

Whenever I play video files in full-screen mode, there are horizontal lines
appearing on my screen at random places. When I switch to normal mode they
dissapear but once I am back in fullscreen everything starts again. I
experimented with many different configure options of xorg, but nothing really
helped. The thing does not happen on MSWindows98 so I guess that hardware is not
damaged. 

My HW is:
Acer TravelMate 507DX notebook with 2MB Neomagic 128XD(NM2160) grapic adapter
and 12.1" LCD panel with max. res. 800x600

My OS details:
Linux Slackware 10.0
kernel 2.6.11.7
xorg Xserver 6.8.2


Steps to Reproduce:
     1) Used mplayer and xine to play any video file
     2) switch to full-screen mode

Actual Results: 
     Horizontal lines appearing on the screen

Expected Results: 
     No lines appearing 

Build Date & Platform: 
     The problem is since "ever" but the first system it was on was Slackware
9.0 with all it's precompiled packages and kernel

Here's my xorg.conf:
http://student.agh.edu.pl/~apfel/X/xorg.conf
and xorg log:
http://student.agh.edu.pl/~apfel/X/Xorg.0.log
Comment 1 Artur Jablonski 2005-04-23 08:30:49 UTC
Created attachment 2521 [details]
a dump of screen that shows the problem

I found out, that these lines don't appear only in a full screen mode. They
appear whenever a window that a file is played in is resized from its original
dimensions or actually when it's larger than original. Shrinking doesn't make
lines to appear.

Also lines appear outside of a movie window (as seen in the picture)
Comment 2 Adam Jackson 2005-04-23 18:27:54 UTC
does disabling XAA help?
Comment 3 Artur Jablonski 2005-04-24 03:15:33 UTC
(In reply to comment #2)
> does disabling XAA help?

I added Option "NoAccel"
and I get

(**) NEOMAGIC(0): Option "NoAccel"

from log so that means that XAA is disabled, right?

No it doesn't help. Lines appear like before 
Comment 4 Artur Jablonski 2005-05-11 09:55:39 UTC
How much time does it take, on an average, for a bug to be accepted? 
:/
Comment 5 Mike A. Harris 2005-05-11 19:41:32 UTC
There is no average time.  All Xorg developers are volunteers.  Nobody is
paid to read bug reports, and nobody goes through every bug that gets reported
in any religious or methodical manner to ensure that every single bug reported
is addressed by a given window of time.

As volunteers, people choose to work on things that interest them in some
way, or to which they are familiar with.  Of course hardware specific bugs
also require having the hardware to which the bug occurs on generally, and
there is probably 10000 times the amount of hardware out there, than the
number of video cards, motherboards, etc. that all Xorg developers have
combined.

The only person guaranteed to be able to reproduce a bug, is the one who
files it in the first place.  They might be the only person who even has
the hardware, or at least who can reproduce the issue.  If a bug doesn't
have enough details in it for someone to be able to do something about it,
then it'll probably sit there forever until someone attaches more
details, or attaches a patch that fixes it.

While it may be frustrating to experience a bug, file a bug report, and
not have anyone respond right away, or even 2, 3, 6 months later, you
more or less get your money's worth.

Join xorg@freedesktop.org and politely discuss the problem there, and
perhaps someone can help.  Just remember, volunteers do not give
bug turnaround deadlines or guaranteed fix dates, and may never even
respond to a particular bug for a variety of reasons, including simply
just being too busy developing.

Hope this helps put things in perspective.
Comment 6 Egbert Eich 2005-05-17 10:23:02 UTC
Nobody has documentation for this chipset. Video support was done by reverse
egnieering register sets. Your problem looks like the memory clock is too low to
handle this situation. It's quite conceivable that there are ways to tune the
clock but unfortunately we don't know how. There are some things one could try,
but being that not many people have this chip any more it's unlikely somebody
will be able to help you here.
Comment 7 Artur Jablonski 2005-05-22 05:59:57 UTC
To Mike A. Hariss(In reply to comment #5)
> There is no average time.  All Xorg developers are volunteers.  Nobody is
> paid to read bug reports, and nobody goes through every bug that gets reported
> in any religious or methodical manner to ensure that every single bug reported
> is addressed by a given window of time.
Roger that. I like the part about religious manner :). 
I didn't want my comment #4 to sound rude or demanding....
I appreciate all the work that was put in Xorg and all the GNU-licensed software
in general. 

I am not irrtated with the bug beeing not assigned. I am irritated with some
hardware producents who simply ignore linux comunity....

Anyway, thanks 4 your post
Comment 8 Artur Jablonski 2005-05-22 06:09:51 UTC
(In reply to comment #6)

> There are some things one could try,
I am asking 4 a further reference

> but being that not many people have this chip any more it's unlikely somebody
> will be able to help you here.
This is not a brand new, top-shelf grapic card - that's for sure :) 

Thanks 4 your post




Comment 9 Artur Jablonski 2005-05-22 06:16:53 UTC
Actually ...
I've never had anything to do with writing drivers, but I am willing to get my
hands on neomagic's driver code.
I want to ask 4 some reference point. Like what to start with to understand
what's actually going on in a video driver code.
If you think it requires few years of studying electronics then please let me
know :)
Regards
Comment 10 Alex Deucher 2005-08-09 23:43:34 UTC
(In reply to comment #9)
> Actually ...
> I've never had anything to do with writing drivers, but I am willing to get my
> hands on neomagic's driver code.
> I want to ask 4 some reference point. Like what to start with to understand
> what's actually going on in a video driver code.
> If you think it requires few years of studying electronics then please let me
> know :)
> Regards

It's not that hard once you start playing with it:
http://cvs.freedesktop.org/xorg/xc/programs/Xserver/hw/xfree86/drivers/neomagic/
Comment 11 Kacper Wysocki 2006-08-13 14:31:57 UTC
I see the same horizontal lines while playing video on my ThinkPad 240 with the 
same graphics chip (NM2160). Xorg 7.0.0 here. 

What's strange is that my 2nd ThinkPad 240, on the same software, did *not* 
exhibit any strange horizontal lines during movie playback.
Sorry if this comment doesn't help much, maybe except showing that you aren't 
alone in the matter.
Comment 12 Daniel Stone 2007-02-27 01:26:28 UTC
Sorry about the phenomenal bug spam, guys.  Adding xorg-team@ to the QA contact so bugs don't get lost in future.
Comment 13 Simon 2007-08-02 07:55:18 UTC
The problem still exists in Ubuntu 7.04 on a nm2200 chipset. Interestingly, it only happens whle playing mpeg2 content (mpeg4 works perfectly) and while the sound is turned on, turning it of makes the lines disappear.
Comment 14 Jeremy Huddleston Sequoia 2011-10-11 10:48:18 UTC
Is this still an issue?
Comment 15 Adam Jackson 2018-06-12 19:10:52 UTC
Mass closure: This bug has been untouched for more than six years, and is not
obviously still valid. Please reopen this bug or file a new report if you continue to experience issues with current releases.

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