Just installed Debian for the first time, it lookkks fine but when I hit the login screen I get:-

Input signal out of range
change to 1440 x 900 -60hz

This box does not go away and the monitor goes to sleep after a couple of minutes (I've had to switch it off and on a few times just to type this). When I go to screen resolution settings I am given NO options to select.

Please help!

Have you a way to edit xorg.conf?

Thanks for your quick reply, I'm going to Debian from Ubuntu as the new Ubuntu 9.10 just blitzed my display.

I can get to xorg.conf through the Terminal, is it something like:-

/etc/xorg.conf? I think there is another step in the middle but I can't remember what it is. What do I need to do?

Actually I've just tried the terminal and it won't let me run as sudo, just says the password is incorrect when I know it's right, after all I only set it this morning!

Probably /etc/X11/xorg.conf. Can you dump its content? Maybe something wrong here. And what's your video hardware?

you should not use 'sudo', instead use 'su'. You type 'su' and then your root password, then everything you type after that is treated as the root user. This is a debian thing. You're doing it the ubuntu way.

I'm using an Nvidia card, how do I find out which one?

the computer is only a couple of months old so it must be a new card.

Here's the xorg although I still can't get the command right to edit as root, if I type this, su root gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf I get 'cannot execute binary file'


#
# This file was generated by dexconf, the Debian X Configuration tool, using
# values from the debconf database.
#
# Edit this file with caution, and see the xorg.conf manual page.
# (Type "man xorg.conf" at the shell prompt.)
#
# This file is automatically updated on xserver-xorg package upgrades *only*
# if it has not been modified since the last upgrade of the xserver-xorg
# package.
#
# If you have edited this file but would like it to be automatically updated
# again, run the following command:
# sudo dpkg-reconfigure -phigh xserver-xorg

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Generic Keyboard"
Driver "kbd"
Option "XkbRules" "xorg"
Option "XkbModel" "pc105"
Option "XkbLayout" "gb"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Configured Mouse"
Driver "mouse"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Configured Video Device"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Configured Monitor"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Monitor "Configured Monitor"
EndSection:-

I don't know debian much but your x window config file seems quite empty (no settings at all if I'm right.) Maybe you should check out manpages for dexconf and dpkg-reconfigure for the xorg packages. As for the nvidia card, it's probably not the problem because I think it's fully supported by linux.

in that case you should type the following:
'su' works by converting your terminal to a root terminal. You don't type it on the same line as the command that you are trying to execute. First you type 'su' and then press return. Then you type your password, and press return. Then the prompt changes and you are acting as the root user. You could type something like 'gedit' then and it would have root permissions. Then when you're done typing commands as the root user, you type 'exit' and then return. Then you're back to your original user again.

Like I said though, you might just want to type 'gksu gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf'

BTW gedit won't work without x so you'd better use nano or another one in text mode that you know...

That's totally right. my apologies.

You can check which card you are using with:

It seems that with recent versions of x, xorg.conf is not necessary because x relies on hal to detect hardware.

Please let us know if you solved the problem (and how)...

Whenever I've had "out of range" problems with displays I have solved them by looking up the monitor specification for suitable values of "HorizSync" and "VertRefresh" to put in the Monitor section of xorg.conf. And by restricting "modes" in the "Display" subsection of "Screen" to only use resolutions of interest.

Sorry guys, I needed a working system so I went back to Ubuntu Jaunty, I'm just not going to upgrade to Karmic as that is where my problems started. I am going to put Debian back on a small partition so I can spend time trying to sort it out as the old-timer in me always wanted to run Debian but never did.

Thanks for your help, I learned stuff even if I didn't get to fix my problem.