Created attachment 746259 [details]
the fix for the problem

Description of problem:
All 3.7 and 3.8 kernels I have tried make the display of my old laptop unusable.  From the moment the graphics display start, the display is a slowly changing combination of various shades of grey.  There is nothing recognizable on the display.
My nVidia hardware is:
# lspci | grep VGA
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV17 [GeForce4 440 Go] (rev a3)

The problem looks a bit like the one described in http://forums.opensuse.org/english/get-technical-help-here/tumbleweed/482510-3-7-2-18-kernel-broken-nvidia-fx5200-latest-tumbleweed-kernel-5.html, and the fix that is referred to in that thread (comment 48) works.  The fix is the following changeset (also attached):

http://cgit.freedesktop.org/nouveau/linux-2.6/commit/?id=6d175e8f672836711497e9deb0f3cbf77e618aff

I compiled the kernel from the kernel-3.8.11-100.fc17.src.rpm sources but with this patch applied and the result is a display that just works.  The unpatched 3.8.11-100.fc17 kernel does not work.

Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable):
All kernels with version >= 3.7.

How reproducible:
100%

Steps to Reproduce:
1.boot into such a kernel
2.
3.
  
Actual results:
Unusable display.

Expected results:
Usable display.

Additional info:
Earlier I was running Fedora 18 on the laptop.  There the problem was exactly the same, so I was forced to use the latest 3.6 kernel available (from Fedora 17).  I have since reinstalled the laptop with Fedora 17 and have been running the latest 3.6 kernel that I could find (3.6.11-5.fc17).