vga=? hello mac mini

Continuing from my earlier posting, I tried booting with vga=0x31b but this mode was hated. What I got instead was this is unrecognized... it offered me a much narrower range of stuff, I mean I got ... whoa,
(EE) open /dev/fb0: No such file or directory
so that didn't work very well. How about 0x318 for vga? Nah, same thing:

Probing EDD (edd=off to disable)... ok
Undefined video mode number: 318
Press <ENTER> to see video modes available...

Oh, I didn't hit any key so it just continued with fb off. So there won't be a /dev/fb0 to use. Oddly enough, 0x305 doesn't appear in the list of modes, if you say "scan". but it works.

I wonder... would 307 work? Nope. They offer me this list:

0 F00   80x25
1 F01   80x50
2 F02   80x43
3 F03   80x28
4 F05   80x30
5 F06   80x34
6 F07   80x60
7 301  640x480x8
8 303  800x800x8
9 311  640x480x16
Enter a video mode or "scan" to scan for additional modes:

If I type "scan" (no quotes) then I get the same list. Oh, the quote mark just gets dumped anyway. OK, if I type "305" (no quotes) I get what the old one looked like. H'm...

OK, so at that prompt, it won't take any of the 1280x1024 modes, and the only 1024x768 mode it *will* take is 305. This is with opensuse 11.0 loaded.

Suppose I make defaultfbbpp 8 and same for defaultdepth? That will result in a supremely ugly screen, but if fbdev doesn't crash the box, well, then worse things have happened, right? So let me change DefaultDepth=8 and startx.

OK, it does seem to start. Sort of. OK, I started the teen's screen, 1024x768, 8 bits per pixel, very ugly. But will it freeze? I guess I'll find out.... YES. Still freezes. Pingable, but my pre-existing ssh session doesn't respond. Hitting NumLock does not change state of the LED. ctl-alt-backspace, ctl-alt-delete, no response.

Maybe it *is* the RAM and I have to run memtestX86 really for 24 hours?? I'll start it. What is it now, 6pm? Okay....

Meanwhile, it looks like a mac mini is about $700 :(