install and screen resolution troubles with fresh hw and opensuse 12.1/11.4 releases

English Install/Boot/Login
#1

Hi folks,

I am dealing with a problem I can’t seem to figure out regarding the
screen resolution I get with my gtx 550 ti purchased through evga and
a fresh 11.4 install. (12.1 install attempts fail)

Summary:
I am unable to convince my opensuse 11.4 install of linux to provide
me anything but 640x480 resolution in its “normal” boot kernel
options. The failsafe kernel option gives me 800x600, which isn’t much
better.

Details:

I have recently done a hardware refresh on my home machine except for
the screen itself. In the box now are asus m5n98td motherboard, a dual
core phenom II, and an evga purchased gtx 550 ti graphics card. There
is 12GB (3x4GB Gskill RAM). The screen is a several year old
viewsonic vp2030b.

I attempted to install opensuse 12.1 on this machine (onto a fresh
disk) and it failed to boot the install kernel. No errors I could find
logged to the screen. Just a “Starting udev” or something like that
message, and then nothing else for hours. Sigh.

So I go on and try ubuntu 11.10 and fedora core 16. They both also
failed to boot their install kernel too. But they reported a repeated
1x/sec or so modprobe error of some sort.

Went back to suse 11.4 and got it to install, but the normal kernel
failed to boot from the hdd. The failsafe option did boot, and I got
800x600 resolution out of it. No options to increase/decrease it were available that I could find. Went from there to the nvidia site to
download the driver for the graphics card
(NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-280.10.01.04.run) and then ran its installer. It
finished and I let it do its thing with the /etc/xorg.config file as
it wanted.

Rebooted, and still no higher resolution graphics. Only 800x600 and no
other options presented to me by any screen resolution setting
programs, including the one that installs from the nvidia thingy
above. Now though I can get the normal kernel to boot, but it only gives me
640x480 and no options to increase the resolution either.

I’ve examined some of the kernel logs (/var/log/messages and its
friends), and in one of them, it complained at one point about “No
screens detected”. Not very encouraging. I don’t see that message in
current logs hwoever.

I am certain the screen itself is capable of higher
resolution…certainly on a previous set of hardware and opensuse 11.2
it had such. It also presents a annoyance message that suggests I set
the resolution in the OS to 1600x1200, so that I suppose is the best
it expects.

Does anyone have any thoughts on how to get this going properly?

Thanks,

andy271828

#2

Did you try adding nomodeset to the boot argument

#3

The screen is a several year old
viewsonic vp2030b.

Rebooted, and still no higher resolution graphics. Only 800x600 and no
other options presented to me by any screen resolution setting
programs, including the one that installs from the nvidia thingy
above. Now though I can get the normal kernel to boot, but it only gives me
640x480 and no options to increase the resolution either.

This is quite likely an EDID issue with your monitor. (Viewsonic are notorious for this behaviour). Are you using a VGA or DVI connection? Examining the contents of /var/log/Xorg.0.log will confirm this. Cut and paste the output, and upload to SUSE Paste (and adjust ‘Delete After’ period to something sensible), then post the link to it here. It is often possible to edit xorg.conf manually to force a particular display resolution. It has been the topic of many previous threads in various Linux forums.

This thread may be helpful to you:

http://forums.opensuse.org/forums/english/get-technical-help-here/hardware/460441-11-4-higher-display-resolution.html

#4

Thanks for the response. I have done the cut and paste thing. Not sure which part of the fileis most interesting so I included the whole thing. Here it is:SUSE Paste

hmmm. Looks like I wasn’t using quite the right search terms. I’ll look at it in more detaillater this evening when I’m not chasing kids :-)andy271828

#5 
    19.682] (**) FBDEV(0): claimed PCI slot 4@0:0:0
    19.682] (II) FBDEV(0): using default device
    19.682] (WW) Falling back to old probe method for vesa
    19.682] (II) FBDEV(0): Creating default Display subsection in Screen section
        "fbdev" for depth/fbbpp 16/16
    19.682] (==) FBDEV(0): Depth 16, (==) framebuffer bpp 16
    19.682] (==) FBDEV(0): RGB weight 565
    19.682] (==) FBDEV(0): Default visual is TrueColor
    19.682] (==) FBDEV(0): Using gamma correction (1.0, 1.0, 1.0)
    19.682] (II) FBDEV(0): hardware: VESA VGA (video memory: 1875kB)
    19.682] (II) FBDEV(0): checking modes against framebuffer device...
    19.682] (II) FBDEV(0): checking modes against monitor...
    19.682] (--) FBDEV(0): Virtual size is 800x600 (pitch 800)
    19.682] (**) FBDEV(0):  Built-in mode "current": 48.0 MHz, 46.9 kHz, 75.1 Hz
    19.682] (II) FBDEV(0): Modeline "current"x0.0   48.00  800 832 928 1024  600 604 608 624 -hsync -vsync -csync (46.9 kHz)
    19.682] (==) FBDEV(0): DPI set to (96, 96)

The Xorg.0.log confirms that the nvidia driver is no loaded, but instead the frame-buffer driver is used, and nowhere do I see evidence of any NVIDIA chipset detected. (This explains why only a basic low resolution is used).

Can you post the output of

/sbin/lspci -nnk |grep VGA -A2
#6

thanks for the quick response. This is the output of the lspci command:

04:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: nVidia Corporation Device [10de:1244] (rev a1)
Subsystem: eVga.com. Corp. Device [3842:1556]
Kernel driver in use: nvidia

Does this give useful information to you?

andy271828

#7

Did you try adding nomodeset to the normal boot
It is suggesting the nvidia driver is installed
But you did it manually so you will need to add nomodeset too
Like this: http://en.opensuse.org/images/thumb/8/8f/Nomodeset-example.jpg/704px-Nomodeset-example.jpg

#8

Yes, as I recall, nomodeset got me the 800x600 resolution rather than 640x480, but didn’t get me
higher resolution than that.

#9

Just to be sure since you installed by hand. Did you first install the kernel source and the gcc compiler?

If you look at the mycomputer screen does it say what driver is being used?

#10

Yes, as I recall, nomodeset got me the 800x600 resolution rather than 640x480, but didn’t get me
higher resolution than that.

Something else I note from the kernel boot parameters reported in your Xorg.0.log

    19.638] Kernel command line: root=/dev/disk/by-id/ata-SAMSUNG_HD204UI_S2H7J9FB904996-part2 apm=off noresume edd=off powersaved=off nohz=off highres=off processor.max_cstate=1 nomodeset x11failsafe vga=0x314

This is the ‘failsafe’ boot option, so that explains why the fbdev driver was loaded. Make sure you boot with the normal (‘Desktop’ or ‘Default’)boot parameters (without x11failsafe, hires=off etc). If that is not clear to you, then post your menu.lst entries here

sudo cat /boot/grub/menu.lst
#11

Yes, I did install the kernelsource and gcc. The nvidia driver installer errored out the first times because I didn’t have them.

Booting into the standard kernel now (rather than the failsafe), I find that
the mycomputer information says under “Display Info” that I have this information active

Vendor: nvidia
Model:
2d driver: nvidia
3d driver: NVIDIA 280.10.01.04

Booting this kernel variant is only possible with the nomodeset option on the boot line. Otherwise it hangs as it boots on this event:

Loading drivers, configuring devices: some time] fb: conflicting fb hw usage nouveaufb vs VESA VGA - removing generic driver

I’d guess that is relevant to the issue at hand too. Sigh

Once booted, I’m in 640x480 mode (and I’m typing away in that mode
right now). For reference in another subthead, this is what my Xorg.0.log
gives me in this kernel:

SUSE Paste

This says a lot more in the context of that subthread too. All sorts of EDID stuff and invalidating higher resolutions lines.

Sorry for the previous red herring info from the failsafe boot.

andy271828

#12

Some basic checks wrt the nVidia proprietary driver and the nouveau driver. When installing the nVidia driver, did you disable KMS before installing the proprietary driver ? ie. run “yast” (you can run yast in text mode with root permissions if X window not available) and navigate to yast > System > /etc/sysconfig Editor > System > Kernel > NO_KMS_IN_INITRD and change it to “yes”. This takes a minute or two to save once changed is submitted. A reboot after it has been applied is needed.

Also, has the nouveau driver been blacklisted ?

#13

This says a lot more in the context of that subthread too. All sorts of EDID stuff and invalidating higher resolutions lines.

Sorry for the previous red herring info from the failsafe boot.

Ok, now that we have the log from normal boot and ‘nomodeset’, we’re back to the EDID issue as confirmed by the output

    23.052] (II) NVIDIA(0): Assigned Display Device: CRT-0
    23.053] (WW) NVIDIA(0): No valid modes for "1600x1200"; removing.
    23.053] (WW) NVIDIA(0): No valid modes for "1280x1024"; removing.
    23.053] (WW) NVIDIA(0): No valid modes for "1024x768"; removing.
    23.053] (WW) NVIDIA(0): No valid modes for "800x600"; removing.
    23.053] (II) NVIDIA(0): Validated modes:
    23.053] (II) NVIDIA(0):     "640x480"
    23.053] (II) NVIDIA(0): Virtual screen size determined to be 640 x 480
    23.084] (WW) NVIDIA(0): Unable to get display device CRT-0's EDID; cannot compute DPI
    23.084] (WW) NVIDIA(0):     from CRT-0's EDID.
    23.084] (==) NVIDIA(0): DPI set to (75, 75); computed from built-in default
    23.084] (--) Depth 24 pixmap format is 32 bpp
    23.084] (II) NVIDIA: Using 3072.00 MB of virtual memory for indirect memory
    23.084] (II) NVIDIA:     access.
    23.090] (II) NVIDIA(0): Setting mode "640x480"

Go back and have a read of the thread I linked to back in post #3 of this thread. It is usually possible to force the desired display resolution manually if required.

#14

Hmmmm…just went to look and that is what it was already set to, so I didn’t need to change it. I don’t know what you mean about the nouveau driver though.

How blacklisted?

#15

Will do, and thanks. The other solution may be just to go back and do the same
hw refresh process on the monitor that I did on the rest of the system, to get one
that reports what it is capable of properly.

Any recommendations along those lines?

#16

Typically there is a file in the /etc/modprobe.d/ directory that will have the line ‘blacklist nouveau’. It ‘may’ be the file ‘50-blacklist.conf’, but it may also be another file.

I recommend you follow deano_ferrari’s suggestion that you take another look at post#3 of this thread, trying to implement the suggestions there to obtain the resolution you want.

… ps. … apologies for the mistaken edit above. I pressed the ‘moderator edit’ button instead of the ‘reply’ button. I hope I have restored the content (I went to an NNTP download to find your post content so I could restore it).

#17

Try this minimal xorg.conf

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
HorizSync 45.0 - 100.0
VertRefresh 50.0 - 85.0
EndSection

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

You’ll need to used an editor with root privileges to create/edit it. If using KDE desktop, then open a terminal window and type

kdesu kwrite /etc/X11/xorg.conf

For Gnome

gnomesu gedit  /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Be careful with your editing, as it can cause problems with the X-server. When finished, restart the X-server with CTRL-ALT-Backspace (twice).

If this doesn’t do it, then it may be necessary to add a modeline to the monitor section as well. Again, examine /var/log/Xorg.0.log to check for any processing errors or resolution-related messages.

#18

Woohoo!

Indeed it does work. I’m typing on a much more comfortable 1280x1024 resolution now. Seems that my monitor
lies to me even yet, when it says it wants 1600x1200. When I set it to that in the xorg.conf file and restart X,
it goes black on me, except for a bubble in the middle of the screen saying “Out of Range”. Well, it sure does make me interested in getting a new/different brand monitor, so as to avoid all this stuff, particularly if you have any recommendations.

But for now, I can easily live with the 1280x1024 resolution I have, so I’ll sign off of this thread, with a very
grateful “Thank You”.

andy271828

#19

Woohoo!

Indeed it does work. I’m typing on a much more comfortable 1280x1024 resolution now.

Just declaring a sensible horizontal sync and vertical refresh range probably did the trick here. For future reference, it is possible to edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/50-monitor.conf to do the same (ie no xorg.conf is required)

Seems that my monitor
lies to me even yet, when it says it wants 1600x1200. When I set it to that in the xorg.conf file and restart X,
it goes black on me, except for a bubble in the middle of the screen saying “Out of Range”.

It would probably be possible to refine this a little more with use of a compatible modeline to provide timings suitable for your monitor, but I think new display hardware will save a lot of time and effort. Choose one with DVI-D input.

But for now, I can easily live with the 1280x1024 resolution I have, so I'll sign off of this thread, with a very
grateful "Thank You".

I’m glad you’re happy with that. :slight_smile:

#20

Very nice and well done deano_ferrai for coming up with an approach to fix this.

andy271828, am I correct that you now have an /etc/X11/xorg.conf with the following content ?


Section "Monitor"
  Identifier "Monitor0"
  HorizSync 45.0 - 100.0
  VertRefresh 50.0 - 85.0
EndSection

Section "Screen"
  Identifier "Screen0"
  Monitor "Monitor0"
  SubSection "Display"
    Depth 24
    Modes  "1280x1024"
  EndSubSection
EndSection

??