[ILUG] Help my x

[Lisa Muir]

Hi Guys,

I'm trying to devise a "process" for configuring SVGATextMode(8) on a
variety of old hardware for the purposes of being able to have a
commandline program dynamically resize the linux text console.

My chosen platform for this is debain-testing

I need to configure SVGATextMode to handle 80x24, 80x25, 80x42, 80x43,
132x24, 132x25, 132x42, 132x43

Using standard generic vesa VGA settings, SVGATextMode can handle
about 2 of those modes, and I have to hand configure it to handle the
rest. It's modes are defined pretty much the way XFree86 defines
modes. I'll need to give it more card related settings to get all
those modes in, in particular I need to get the cards clock speeds. My
current test system is using an ATI Rage 128 PF/PRO AGP. The next
systems will all have different cards, so I need a process to get this
info everytime. What I need to be able to do is at the very least
probe for the clock speeds, that has a huge bearing on being able to
calculate possible modes manually.

I'd like to be getting tools using apt-get.

XFree86 would have had tools to let me probe the video hardware, but
alas, its not available via apt, only x.org

so I installed xserver-xorg-core

and ran X -configure

It generated config file references a driver for my Ati, gives the
full specs of my screen, and no details of the graphics card :-(

xorgcfg might be the tool I need to probe the card and get its
details, but it didn't come down with that package, and an apt-cache
search didn't throw up any possibilities of getting it.

Can anybody recommend the simpliest way for me to probe the video card
for its details? Preferably using tools that I can pull using apt-get,
but at this stage I'll settle for the next best!

Thanks,

Lisa.