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To: hackers@freebsd.org
Cc: brian@utell.co.uk
Subject: Screen flickering
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Date: Thu, 20 Feb 1997 01:50:00 +0000
From: Brian Somers <brian@awfulhak.demon.co.uk>
Sender: owner-hackers@freebsd.org
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I've just set up FreeBSD (~-current) on a laptop, and to my surprise,
*everything* works - apm, pcmcia (3c589c doesn't hang), audio, cd, X
- well done guys....

There was only one small problem - it's now fixed (avoided), and I'm
starting to wonder if I've been seing this problem for a *long* time
on my main machine (and just assuming I have a dodgy monitor).

Essentially, the syscons screen "flickers" probably every couple of
seconds on average, and only with "vidcontrol -c destructive".  From
what I can figure, the "while (!(inb(crtc_addr+6)&8)) ;" bit in
syscons.c doesn't work as expected (although removing it makes
things a *lot* worse)....

Is anyone actively responsible for this code ?  Or is it worth my
while to delve deeper ?

FWIW, the laptop has a Chips & Tech 65545 chipset.  My main machine,
which hasn't flickered yet, has had both a Hercules Graphite
Terminator and a #9...... oops - just got a flicker in single-user
mode :(  Guess it is a lousy monitor after all :(

-- 
Brian <brian@awfulhak.demon.co.uk>, <brian@freebsd.org>
      <http://www.awfulhak.demon.co.uk/>
Don't _EVER_ lose your sense of humour....