From: johnb@physun.physics.mcmaster.ca (John Benjamins)
Subject: Re: Help, vertical lines on screen
Organization: Dept. of Physics & Astronomy, McMaster University
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 14:06:45 GMT

In article <32146@adm.brl.mil> you write:
>Ok, I recall seeing someone else discuss the vertical lines across the
>screen problem.  Of course, I didn't follow the discussions carefully at
>the time.  If some one could point me at a current archive of this list
>or blast me their old versions of the mail I'd greatly appreciate it.
>
>  My problem,  I started seeing vertical "streaks" in gl windows.
>Usually at random with the problem clearing up after logging in and out.
>Now I see vertical lines across just about everything.  It appears to be
>associated to certain framebuffers.  Underlay planes are almost always
>hosed.  Is this a hardware problem?  Is it one that is reasonable to
>fix?

Well, I have a 4D/220GTX which has vertical streaks, but over
EVERYTHING and across logins, even over the pandora "window".  I
suspect a hardware problem, but I have no way to test it.  Is there
supposed to be a test suite in /usr/diags that I can use?  Where can I
get it?  It's not on the 4.0.1 CD that I can see...

The problem is that I'm getting vertical lines of dots alternating
light and dark in sort of this pattern:


 | | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :
 | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :  
 | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :   |
 | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :   | |
 | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :   | | |
 | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | |
 | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | |
 | | |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | |
 | |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | |
 |  :   | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | |
  :   | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | |
    | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | | |
  | | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | | | |
  | | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | | | | |
  | | | | | | |  :   | | | | | | | | | | | | 

The angle of the : line is really closer to half of what I have
sketched above (i.e. about 20 degrees, not 45).  Also the | are really
just a row of dots, and the : represent about 4 dots at about half the
density in the | regions.  These dots are sort of a dark purple
colour.  Then there are between the dark coloured "lines" a sort of
pale green (almost white) in an identical pattern.  Rebooting and
powering of and back on has no effect.  Of course this machine is no
longer under hardware maintenance:-( When you first power on the
machine you get a purple background with a black window in the middle
(this is where the console messages go during the power on tests, and
the boot messages, etc).  If I remember correctly, >>sometimes<< this
pattern appears on the window, but not always (may be related to power
on boot, or just a "warm boot"....I should check on that).  However,
when pandora starts up the pattern is always there.

Does this give anyone an idea as to what might be wrong with this
machine?  Thanks for any and all help.
-- 
 // E. John Benjamins,           Computing & Information Services,          \\
// johnb@edge.cis.mcmaster.ca    McMaster University, Hamilton, Ont., CANADA \\
\\                                                                           //
 \\ "Everybody loves to see justice done, on somebody else" - Bruce Cockburn//