[Tfug] video tool

[Kramer Lee]

Well, even though they tried to take all the worry out of Xorg for us,
it doesn't work with all hardware, and now it is harder to get back
the resolutions we used to have now that we have installed the newer
kernels and Xorg stuff in Ubuntu.  So I tried Debian Lenny and with
that I still have the ability to effectively modify xorg.conf to have
the 16 bit defaultdepth and then I get the higher resolution from my
old Matrox card.  Also, Debian Lenny still uses grub.conf, and I know
how to work with that, and don't have to figure out a new grub2
configuration method.  I haven't found that much restriction in Lenny,
stuff works, the stuff I need anyway.

It seems like even Ubuntu is trying to get us to upgrade our hardware.
 On newer hardware there is no problem with Ubuntu newer versions that
I have run into for video.  So the "Linux supports older hardware" is
getting to be incorrect.

Maybe Xorg just doesn't have the funds or people to cover all
different hardware that is available, especially older hardware.  They
probably just want to stop having to support older hardware.

They say you can downgrade to grub 1 from grub 2, but just try it and
see if you have a working system after that.  If you do, please post
all the steps.  For now I am on Lenny on some, and trying to remember
how I changed the bootup list on 10.04.

Hopefully they will fix grub 2 so it is easier to modify or at least
have an easier to find and use documentation about how to do it.  How
do you change the timeout time?  How do you change the default OS?  I
did actually do those and other things once, but it just feels too
painful to find the steps again on the web and do it again, and Lenny
works fine for me on these outlier computers, like a Dell server with
a dual core and 4 GB but it has no good video so I put in the old
Matrox and it worked fine with 8.10,  but just dies out badly on
10.04, after working at first, about 30 minutes.  It was trying to
keep my old xorg.conf file, but I believe it overwrote it or
something.  So I put Lenny on it and no trouble, I know how to make
the Default Depth work and how to modify  the grub.conf file.  Ubuntu
wants us to help work out the kinks, and probably doesn't want to
waste time with Matrox Millenium cards, but maybe Lenny is supported
by more guys who have old Matrox Millenium cards.

I see that some distros try to support older hardware, so I hope there
is a good one of those with long term support also, or we have to give
up our older hardware and get new stuff every couple years.  More
profit for someone there, not me.