Server running X without a video card

Hello,
If I have a server that I want to run remote X apps on, and VNC and the
like for admin purposes, is it possible to do this if there is no video
card on board? Because most mobos don't have any onboard, but make you
purchase a (cheap shit) something extra, just so you can get a screen.
Also, this would, I expect, seriously damage the performance of the
whole computer, as it would have to wait on the bus for the slow card
to refresh its screen or write a character or whatever ( for terminal
mode), before it could continue.
So - can it be done?


Thanks.

On 2005-10-13, binary-(E-Mail Removed) <binary-(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> If I have a server that I want to run remote X apps on, and VNC and the
> like for admin purposes, is it possible to do this if there is no video
> card on board?

You need Virtual Frame Buffer. Just configure that in the X configuration.
Davide

--
I took the Pepsi challenge and chose Linux.
-- Carey McLelland

On 10/13/05 12:35, binary-(E-Mail Removed) wrote:
> Hello,
> If I have a server that I want to run remote X apps on, and VNC and the
> like for admin purposes, is it possible to do this if there is no video
> card on board? Because most mobos don't have any onboard, but make you
> purchase a (cheap shit) something extra, just so you can get a screen.
> Also, this would, I expect, seriously damage the performance of the
> whole computer, as it would have to wait on the bus for the slow card
> to refresh its screen or write a character or whatever ( for terminal
> mode), before it could continue.
> So - can it be done?
>
>
> Thanks.
>

Just run xdm daemon. You'll be able to run a X server on a remote
machine and X applications (including the window manager) on the machine
even if there is no graphic board.

I do this for an old machine I use ad firewall.

Ciao
Giovanni
--
A computer is like an air conditioner,
it stops working when you open Windows.
Registered Linux user #337974 <http://counter.li.org/>

On Thursday 13 October 2005 06:35 binary-(E-Mail Removed) wrote in
comp.os.linux.networking:

> If I have a server that I want to run remote X apps on, and VNC and the
> like for admin purposes, is it possible to do this if there is no video
> card on board? Because most mobos don't have any onboard, but make you
> purchase a (cheap shit) something extra, just so you can get a screen.
> Also, this would, I expect, seriously damage the performance of the
> whole computer, as it would have to wait on the bus for the slow card
> to refresh its screen or write a character or whatever ( for terminal
> mode), before it could continue.
> So - can it be done?

The problem is not the configuration, the bigger problem is probably to
start the server. A lot of computers don't start without a graphics card.
In this case the best thing to do is, get an old 1MB PCI graphics card.
Once you have the card built in, you can configure your X-Server to show
the VNC virtual and not on the screen and on the graphics card. This won't
slow down your server.
Good Luck
Tilman
--
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers"
Thomas Watson, IBM Vorsitzender, 1943

Tilman Klaeger wrote:

> In this case the best thing to do is, get an old 1MB PCI graphics card.
> Once you have the card built in, you can configure your X-Server to show
> the VNC virtual and not on the screen and on the graphics card. This won't
> slow down your server.
> Good Luck
> Tilman

Did you *read* what I said about the slow bus??

Many thanks to everyone else for their answers

binary-(E-Mail Removed) writes:

> Hello,
> If I have a server that I want to run remote X apps on, and VNC and the
> like for admin purposes, is it possible to do this if there is no video
> card on board? Because most mobos don't have any onboard, but make you
> purchase a (cheap shit) something extra, just so you can get a screen.
> Also, this would, I expect, seriously damage the performance of the
> whole computer, as it would have to wait on the bus for the slow card
> to refresh its screen or write a character or whatever ( for terminal
> mode), before it could continue.
> So - can it be done?

Sure. In the case of vnc you could just use the X-server Xvnc included
with VNC for Unix (it is launched automatically by the vncserver
command). Or you could just log in to the computer (from a computer
with an X-server) with ssh (having X tunneling) enabled and start your
application.

--
- Mårten

mail: (E-Mail Removed) *** ICQ: 4356928 *** mobile: +46 (0)707390385

In comp.os.linux.networking binary-(E-Mail Removed):

> Tilman Klaeger wrote:

>> In this case the best thing to do is, get an old 1MB PCI graphics card.
>> Once you have the card built in, you can configure your X-Server to show
>> the VNC virtual and not on the screen and on the graphics card. This won't
>> slow down your server.
>> Good Luck
>> Tilman

> Did you *read* what I said about the slow bus??

Complete nonsense, of course you can run a Xserver without using
the local display at all. This isn't doze.

--
Michael Heiming (X-PGP-Sig > GPG-Key ID: EDD27B94)
mail: echo (E-Mail Removed) | perl -pe 'y/a-z/n-za-m/'
#bofh excuse 360: Your parity check is overdrawn and you're
out of cache.