Radeon Linux IBM Thinkpad Infinite loop Blue Screen of Death BSOD

Normal people, feel free to ignore this post, I fixed a problem on my laptop and I'm trying to publish the solution. I'm sure Google will find this. I'll put up some real posts soon, I'm busy packing for home tonight.

Thanks.


My IBM Thinkpad R51 started crashing in Linux and BSODing in Windows XP (it's a dual-boot.) The BSOD screen would say something like

//
// The driver for the display device got stuck in an infinite loop. This
// usually indicates a problem with the device itself or with the device
// driver programming the hardware incorrectly. Please check with your
// display device vendor for any driver updates.
//

This is apparently a problem with these laptop Radeon cards.

There is a lovely fix for this in Windows XP. It is here:
here

Basically, you tell Windows to use this card as a PCI card, as opposed to an AGP one. (My hunch is that this kills graphic performance, but I don't play any graphically intense games on my laptop anyway, so I haven't really noticed it.) This solution works great for Windows, but I was really digging the Linux and wanted a similar fix.

Well, it turn out there IS an equivalent fix, and predictably, it involves editing a text file. Boot your Linux into safe mode. (This was really easy on my Ubuntu machine, it was just another GRUB option.) If you can't boot into safe mode, boot normally, and just try and do this quickly before it crashes (I believe it's a heating issue, so you should have a little time.) Open xorg.conf in your favorite text editor (I used emacs, but most things should work. vi, nano, etc.) You may have to/should do this as root, I'm not sure. I did it as root, and it worked for me. It's in the /etc/X11 directory. Find the device section. Mine looked like this:

Section "Device"
Identifier "ATI Technologies, Inc. Radeon Mobility 9000 (M7 LW)"
Driver "ati"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
EndSection

Just before the EndSection line, add this line:
Option "BusType" "PCI"

Make sure the spacing is the same as for other items. (Use TABs to line it up nicely. I don't know if this is critical or not, but there's no reason not to line it up.) Save the file, and restart the X server (or just reboot, but apparently Linux people are so proud that they don't have to reboot regularly like Windows people that they would encourage restarting the xserver. Whatever that means.)

It should work now. It's probably slower, but whatever. It's better than crashing constantly. This worked for me, I hope it works for you too. I think the worst case scenario is that it may stop the xserver from running at all, and then you can probably just take it back out. You may want to backup your xorg.conf before trying this. Good luck!

Oh, thanks a lot to this website, this is where I found the magic option command:
here


That's it.

You're probably an asshole if...

You probably shouldn't judge people, but I can. Why? Because I'm very good at it.

Specifically, I'm compiled a very short list (which I will add to later) of comments one can that are indicative of them being an asshole. Please note, this is strictly a correlative relationship; saying these phrases doesn't MAKE you an asshole, it merely reveals you as THE ASSHOLE YOU PROBABLY ARE. These statements may seem innocuous, but they're not. Here's a few:

"I don't care if someone is white, black, yellow, purple, or polka-dotted..." Whenever someone uses ridiculous colors to describe people (purple, polka-dotted, etc.), they're usually an asshole. These statements are often elaborated into something like, "I don't care if someone is white, black, yellow, purple, or green, as long as they put in a hard days work. But, the problem with these Mexicans is that they..." See, now it's clear that the guy (or girl) is an asshole. But, I predicted (judged) this already, just by the content of the first sentence.

"I don't care what someone does behind closed doors..." This is similar to number one, and is usually followed with "... but there's no reason to do/show X in public." Probably an asshole.

"I just think..." People who say this kind of thing are usually A) Not really thinking, and B) If they are thinking, they're thinking of something that shouldn't be prefaced with "just." It's often like, "Now, I don't know about all of you, but I just think that it's ridiculous to call Christmas trees 'holiday trees'." That's a reasonable side to argue, I guess, but it does require an argument. This kind of "Aww, shucks, I just think..." bullshit isn't going to fly.

"PC" or "politically correct." The only time these phrases are used is as strawman for some self-avowed straight-shooter. Stupid shit like, "Now it may not be 'politically correct' (cue double-quoting finger gesture) to say that we should let kids carry Bibles into schools, but gosh darn it, I..." Notice the thing being argued against here (rules against personal Bibles in school) doesn't even exist.

I encourage you to leave any of your own in the comments!

On an unrelated note, Emily and I listened to Christmas carols last night, hung lights, and decorated our holiday tree. I'm all for removing any and all public/governmental references to "Christmas", but I hope people keep decorating (which I'm sure they will.) Even secular humanists enjoy lights, snow, eggnog, and carols!


And finally, check out this Python code I wrote today:

if not goodFeature:
badFeatures.append(feature)

I love code like that; Python's the best.

The benefits of not living in a fraternity...

Are not at all clear to me. Are there any? More specifically, are there any benefits to not living with a group of close friends? I don't think there are any. Let's compare my current living situation with my previous one at DX:

Cost: My rent is $700 a month with utilities. If you include groceries, it's $750 - $800. I don't know what it was at DX, but I think it was cheaper.

Time spent doing menial activities: Much higher now. I have to cook, do dishes, occasional vacuuming, occasional pickup. Before, I spent 20 minutes a week cleaning and an hour in meetings that were usually only semi-menial.

Cleanliness: I live in a cleaner place now, but I don't really care.

Company: Living with Emily is great, it really is. But I would include mates in my dream fraternity, so Emily could live there anyway. On the negative side, I now live with one friend (the Monster), instead of (realistically) tenish. I think how big a shame this is can't be stressed enough. It sucks, it's terrible. For every bummer I no longer have to live with (Jay, etc.), I don't get to live with two friends and two warm acquaintances. Not a good trade at all.

Food: It's better now, but I have to cook or pay for it. It's not worth it, I'd prefer the soul-numbing convenience of LE.

Entertainment: I've been to a number of really fun hangouts/parties here. And it's certainly nice to not have to entertain freshmen etc, but I still give the nod to DX.

So, from these first six comparisons, it looks like DX has 5, apartment has .5 (because cleanliness isn't a priority.) Those aren't good odds.


So, I propose the abolishment of single-dwelling houses. Instead, let's look at the advantages of a household for five singles/couples/families.

Price: It'd be way cheaper.
Specialization of space: You wouldn't need a dining room/study room, or a living room/computer room/tv room/game room. A house/building big enough to support all of those people would have to have enough rooms for such specialization.
Hire a cook: Cooking's fine, but doing dishes is the fucking worst. We'd higher somebody to do this.
Friends: You'd be surrounded by friends! It'd be great!
Childcare: Presumably, many people would eventually have kids. The kids could all hangout, and you could have the other people babysit.

You'd have less privacy, sure. But how much privacy do you really need? You only read need privacy to fuck around, and DX proved how much fucking around could be had with minimal privacy.

Am I missing something here? I really think this would be a better solution than what we have now.