Dell Optiplex G27 with Fedora Core 1 Linux

Successfully installed Feodra Core 1 to Dell Optiplex G27. Also the integrated display adapter Intel 82865G works on all display modes with a Free driver.

Network interface card, Intel 82540EM Gigabit Ethernet Controller, worked out of the box. Fedora automatically selected e1000 driver for it. Probably because of network peculiarites in local network , I had to /etc/init.d/network restart a few times to get an IP-address from DHCP. I only tested the network card with a 100 Mbit/s network, as I did not have a gigabit switch at hand.

Sound card (Intel 82801EB AC'97 Audio Controller) worked out of the box, tested by playing an OGG with xmms.

Of course, optical USB mouse and ps/2 keyboard worked out of the box.

Display adapter, Integrated intel 82865G, was problematic at first. After installation, it displayed only 640x480 mode. Forcing higher resolution and colors crashed X Window System. Changing BIOS Settings (BIOS Setup (boot-f2): Integrated Devices: Onboard Video Buffer: 8 MB) helped slighly, but resolution and colors were still unacceptably low.

Integrated 82865G display adapter - HOWTO

So, this is how to make the Integrated display adapter work.

Boot Computer. Press F2 to enter BIOS Setup. Integrated Devices: Onboard Video Buffer: 8 MB. ESC, ESC, Save Changes.

Let Fedora Core start normally, log in, start command prompt and

su - rpm -Uvh http://iki.fi/karvinen/linux/doc/dell-optiplex-g27/865patch-0.3-2.i386.rpm init 3 && init 5

The patch is open source Free software, source rpm is available.

Choose main menu (bottom left corner): System Settings: Display. Select resolution "1024x768" (optimal resolution for Dell E152FP TFT display) and Color depth: "Millions of Colors" (24 bit ie "32 bit").

Log out, restart X Window System (alt-ctrl-backspace), Log in.

Your display should work now, very good.

Many pages found from the Net said that it is impossible to make 82865G work with linux, especially with BIOS revision A03. That is not true, system worked very nice with this (open source) patch.

865patch and RPM was made by Anglete (Dell 500m on redhat 9 and fedora), Christian Zietz, Marc Seil and Josh Vanderhoof.

Notes

Tested on 2004-04-21 with Fedora Core 1 Yarrow, installed from HelNux kickstart. Machine: a new Dell Optiplex G27, BIOS revision A03.