[ale] thinking about switching away from ubuntu

[Michael Trausch]

On Wed, 2010-04-14 at 11:21 -0400, Jim Kinney wrote:
> OK. It's actually Kernel Mode Settings. Google "kernel kms" for links
> to specific docs and articles. Basically, the X mode moves from
> (semi)user/X space to kernel space. For most proprietary binary
> drivers, this is either already handled (nvidia current) or breaks
> royally (nvidia legacy).

I've not been able to get NVIDIA current to do KMS at all.

That said, it is an _awesome_ thing.  Finally, if you have a system that
has a wide screen monitor, the kernel will set the monitor's native
resolution at boot time.  For me, that means I get a 200x56 console when
I go to a VT.  That's *much* better than 80x25 standard VGA.

The other major thing re: KMS is that when you switch between a VT and
X, or any framebuffer and X, when using the same video mode, no longer
are you required to wait for the monitor to catch-up when the mode
changes.  The transition between moving between X and a VT is instant,
and much more pleasurable.  On servers, KMS is also wonderful, even if
you never run X, because you get a much bigger field of view.

The only systems that I have gotten KMS working on reliably use Intel or
ATI chipsets (using the free radeon driver in very late-version kernels
such as the one that comes with Ubuntu 10.04).

	--- Mike