11.4 - Higher display resolution?

georgeinacton · May 25, 2011, 8:48pm

I have newly installed 11.4 on a COMPAQ EVO D510 SFF with a NVIDIA GeForce 6200 and a Viewsonic G90fb CRT monitor. The monitor and the graphics card should be capable of 1600x1200 @77Hz but the maximum I can achieve is 1024x768 @ 50Hz. I have the NVIDIA 270.41.06 driver installed.

The NVIDIA X Server interface does not seem to have any place to set or change the resolution capabilities of the attached monitor nor does it seem to recognize it specifically so I suspect that I am constrained by some sort of default.

I had been discussing this in the thread 11.4 new install, only get cursor on black screen and it was suggested to me that I post here since I may have a better chance of catching the attention of a graphics card guru or two.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions you might offer!

deano_ferrari · May 25, 2011, 9:23pm

This will almost be certainly due to your old CRT monitor not (or incorrectly) reporting its EDID info. (The driver then falls back to one of the safe vesa display modes).

A good place to start is to upload the output of

cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log

to SUSE Paste

Post the link to it here. That will give us the additional info we need to confirm what the exact problem is.

BTW, there are numerous threads on this topic reported in these forums if you search using the keywords ‘nvidia’, ‘resolution’, ‘edid’ and similar.

deano_ferrari · May 25, 2011, 9:51pm

Maybe you could try creating a minimal /etc/X11/xorg.conf like this

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
HorizSync 45.0 - 100.0
VertRefresh 50.0 - 80.0
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Device0"
Driver "nvidia"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "Device0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1600x1200"
EndSubSection
EndSection

If using KDE, you can edit/create xorg.conf with

kdesu kwrite /etc/X11/xorg.conf

For Gnome

gnomesu gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf

See how that goes…

martin_helm · May 25, 2011, 10:31pm

This is nothing new I just want to copy the information over from the other
thread (link to log file)

georgeinacton wrote:

>
> for oldcpu: ‘SUSE Paste’ (http://www.susepaste.org/56290195)
>
I would guess this is your problem (from your posted file)


    32.114] (WW) NVIDIA(GPU-0): The EDID read for display device CRT-1 is
invalid:
    32.114] (WW) NVIDIA(GPU-0):     unrecognized EDID Header.

Let’s see what comes out in your other thread (post this susepaste link also
in the other thread).
I have to quit at this point and wish you success

georgeinacton · May 25, 2011, 11:02pm

Hello deano and thank you.

When I try kdesu kwrite /etc/X11/xorg.conf in a terminal window after giving the root pw, I get the message:

"/root/.kde4/share/config/kdedre" not writeable.
Please contact your system administrator.

What can I try?

deano_ferrari · May 25, 2011, 11:03pm

Thanks Martin. I was expecting Xorg.0.log output containing those lines (based on symptoms reported).

oldcpu · May 25, 2011, 11:41pm

If it is /etc/X11/xorg.conf you are supposed to edit or create (and I’m not saying it is) then as a regular KDE user open (or create) the file with:

kdesu kwrite /etc/X11/xorg.conf

and enter root password when prompted.

gogalthorp · May 26, 2011, 12:52am

Looks like you may have logged to your GUI as root. Don’t do that, it can cause problems. Alway become root in a GUI with su kdesu gnomesu etc commands.

georgeinacton · May 26, 2011, 1:28am

oldcpu:

If it is /etc/X11/xorg.conf you are supposed to edit or create (and I’m not saying it is) then as a regular KDE user open (or create) the file with:
kdesu kwrite /etc/X11/xorg.conf 
and enter root password when prompted.

oldcpu - I did as you suggested and it worked in that I now have a file at /etc/X11/xorg.conf with the contents that deano suggested.

A reboot but no change in resolution. In the Configure Desktop tool, Display and Monitor selection, no resolution higher than 1024x768 is available.

Any other suggestions?

Thank you.

deano_ferrari · May 26, 2011, 2:05am

Just a guess. Maybe it can be persuaded with the addition of a custom mode-line:

 cvt 1600 1200 77
# 1600x1200 76.87 Hz (CVT) hsync: 96.62 kHz; pclk: 210.25 MHz
Modeline "1600x1200_77.00"  210.25  1600 1720 1888 2176  1200 1203 1207 1257 -hsync +vsync

This approach was used successfully here.

So your xorg.conf would now look like

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
HorizSync 45.0 - 100.0
VertRefresh 50.0 - 80.0
Modeline "1600x1200"  210.25  1600 1720 1888 2176  1200 1203 1207 1257 -hsyns +vsync
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Device0"
Driver "nvidia"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "Device0"
DefaultDepth 24
Monitor "Monitor0"
Option  "metamodes" "1600x1200"
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
Viewport    0 0
EndSubSection
EndSection

georgeinacton · May 26, 2011, 11:58am

Thank you deano!! It worked. I am now looking at 1600x1200.

Also in the cold light of morning I see that yesterday I saved the file as “xorg.config” instead of “xorg.conf” so my machine was probably ignoring it.

PROBLEM SOLVED.

martin_helm · May 26, 2011, 12:43pm

georgeinacton wrote:

>
> Thank you deano!! It worked. I am now looking at 1600x1200.
>
> Also in the cold light of morning I see that yesterday I saved the file
> as “xorg.config” instead of “xorg.conf” so my machine was probably
> ignoring it.
>
> PROBLEM SOLVED.
>
If you like experiments, you could check if the simple xorg.conf without the
modeline also does the job (if named correctly) or not, just to see what it
really needs for your monitor to run with higher resolution.

georgeinacton · May 26, 2011, 1:19pm

Hello Martin - yes I should try that.
The 1600x1200 is just a bit too small for my old eyes.
I am am able to set other lower resolutions in Configure desktop. The 1440 does not seem to work with this monitor so I have to go all the way down to 1280x1024 but after reboot, it comes back as 1600x1200.

georgeinacton · May 26, 2011, 1:45pm

I can report that the xorg.conf works without the modeline. Incidentally, I think that there was a typo in what deano posted:
Modeline “1600x1200” 210.25 1600 1720 1888 2176 1200 1203 1207 1257 -hsyns +vsync
The underline should be “c”?

Also, I found that to get the system to come up at 1280 x1024 permanently, I changed “Modes” in the “Screen” section to 1280x1024

martin_helm · May 26, 2011, 1:52pm

georgeinacton wrote:

>
> Hello Martin - yes I should try that.
> The 1600x1200 is just a bit too small for my old eyes.
> I am am able to set other lower resolutions in Configure desktop. The
> 1440 does not seem to work with this monitor so I have to go all the way
> down to 1280x1024 but after reboot, it comes back as 1600x1200.
>
Sounds like kde forgets your resolution settings, but anyway, instead of
adjusting the size by changing to a lower resolution I would suggest you
adjust the correct DPI for the fonts. With 17 inch and 1600x1200 this will
be around 120dpi, you may have to log out and log in again to make it
effective for all applications.
(DPI calculator: http://members.ping.de/~sven/dpi.html)

georgeinacton · May 26, 2011, 3:29pm

Thank you Martin. I am back at 1600x1200 but I do not see where to adjust the correct DPI for the fonts?

martin_helm · May 26, 2011, 7:57pm

georgeinacton wrote:

>
> Thank you Martin. I am back at 1600x1200 but I do not see where to
> adjust the correct DPI for the fonts?
>
Configure Desktop (Personal Settings) -> Application Appearance -> Fonts ->
Force Fonts DPI

georgeinacton · May 27, 2011, 5:24pm

That worked. Thank you Martin. You have been a great help!

deano_ferrari · May 27, 2011, 11:37pm

Glad to see your display is working as desired!

georgeinacton · May 28, 2011, 2:54am

It’s great. Thank you deano for your help! I will meet you again with other questions I am sure