Display Problems In 10.1

Bare with me, there's a few things I don't know about my machine and I can't find a card reader to give you a picture of the problem just yet (my laptop is normally what I put my pictures onto).

My computer's an Ibuypower Battalion Slim line bought about 2 years ago, screen's a widescreen 15" with 4mb shared video ram. I don't remember the motherboard or video card type etc, and hopefully I'll find a live CD to tell you. When I install Suse and keep the resolution at 800x600 it's fine, but if I change it to anything else, including lower resolutions, I get a weird display problem where the background is black and everything stays ghosted onto the screen, like when something's not responding. The mouse never shows up, except for the bouncing things when it's thinking.

I never had this problem in 10.0 and could go up to 1280x960 no problem. Also, if I test the screen mode (which is always the same story) and cancel or do ctrl alt backspace the machine appears to lock up.

Any ideas?

I don't remember the motherboard or video card type etc, [/b]

Its possible you need a custom graphic driver from the card manufacturer. Lets find out what card sax2 thinks you have. Open up a konsole, type "su" to get root permissions, and then type "sax2 -p". You shoud get one or two lines of text in response. That should tell you what card you have. Go look for a custom driver for that card.

I grabbed a knoppix disk that displays everything just fine. It's telling me my display controller is Intel 82852/855GM integrated Graphics Device (rev 02), which sounds about right. Of course it's right, it works in knoppix.

I'll still do what you said, oldcpu, just to see if they agree

In the meantime, here's a picture of what I'm getting. The little fire-like patterns are left over from the screensaver

EDIT:
that command gives me Uniwill Compuer Corp 855 GM. So.... Do I need to install a driver seperately for that?

Boot to SuSE at the working resolution (that's 800x600, right?).
Kmenu > system >config > Sax2

Then to Monitor settings. See what's set up there.

Change the monitor. Instead use a VESA one for your maximum resolution (1280x960@60Hz) or an LCD one for the same reso.
Go Ok > Ok and press the test button when prompted by Sax2. If the screen goes black and nothing happens just wait a while. It should go back to 800x600.
If it works click on "Save" and restart X (Log out of session a Log back in)

And good luck!

Feeling like an idiot here, but how should I get it back to 800x600. Obviously, it's a little tough to do from the desktop. I tried running SaX2 -l from the failsafe prompt, but I got the same problem. I'm kind of reluctant to reinstall if it would just land me on the same problem.

Do:

> sax2 --vesa 0:800x600@60

Then:

> startx

To go to WM

[edit]
Yes, a reinstall would probably lead to the same problem, if the problem is a wrong detected monitor.
And don't feel like an idiot.
I just thought that you had some way to do it.
[/edit]

Do:

> sax2 --vesa 0:800x600@60

Then:

> startx

To go to WM

[edit]
Yes, a reinstall would probably lead to the same problem, if the problem is a wrong detected monitor.
And don't feel like an idiot.
I just thought that you had some way to do it.
[/edit]
[/b]

sax2 --vesa 0:800x600@60 leads to the same problem. Now that I have a lot more time on my hands (finals are done!) I might reinstall one more time so that it's at the right working resolution and do what you say. If not, it might be time to fish around for other distros. I'm sure I'll come back to Suse eventually

Other thing you can try is to edit your xorg.conf file:

# joe /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Find monitor section there and check the vertical and horz. refresh/sync rates are the same you have in your monitor manual. Also check resolution.

I have a display problem with 10.1 as well. The laptop is an IBMA21m with an ATI Rage Mobility P/M AGP 2X video card. The top of the desktop display starts 1" from the bottom of the screen and wraps over the top i.e. the top and bottom meet !" from the bottom of the dispaly. I have tried re-loading, changing to VESA, LCD, 640x480, 800x600 all with the same result. What is wrong? What can I do about it? I have Windows XP on the same laptop ( dual boot) and there is not a problem.

I have been a Windows user for many years but I am seriously thinking of changing and SUSE 10.1 is the best Linux that I have tried except for this problem.

Problem is probably a result of a bad scanrate.

Boot to runlevel 3 (type the number '3' without the quotes in the options field at boot)

Log in as root.

do ...

sax2 -r

to start sax and re-initialise the settings.

If the screen appears okay, just save the settings and quit.
If it doesn't then.

Change your monitor to LCD - 800x600@60Hz
Change the display size to 14.1"

Test the settings again.

If it still fails, try 800x600@70, then 800x600@75

Until you find one which displays correctly.

One of those three settings ought to work.

If while you're testing you lose the display altogether, use CTRL-ALT and Backspace to quit the test and send you back to sax.

Eds