update: i found an old xorg.conf from a backup that was known to be working in xorg 7 on this hardware, and plugged that into the X11 directory. it doesn't work as is, but if i change the driver parameter from mga to vesa, it works perfectly, 1280x1024 at 24 depth. so i have to conclude that either there is a bug in the fedora mga xorg driver, or mga requires a configuration option in fedora that's unknown to me. does anyone else have a matrox working in fedora? thanks for the responses. i'll just use the vesa driver w/out acceleration for now. -sc
