Debian Sarge: screen resolution

daenney · 06-07-2005, 05:22 AM

Hey everyone,

As the title says, I'm using Debian Sarge.
After fiddeling around for an hour to get gnome to work (i forgot to apt-get x-window-system

) I fianlly managed to start gnome.

All set and well, I have one major problem: the screen resolution won't go higher than 800x600 which is really to small for me.
I have a VIA KM400 chipset.
Funny thing is, it always worked out-of-the-box with ubuntu and others, it's the first time this happens to me.

Can anyone help me to fix this? Cause i'd really like to get at least a 1024x resolution.

collen · 06-08-2005, 05:28 AM

Hmm make sure you set the monitor in X11 right...

alot of distro's have this problem (same here with Fedora)
just tell the setup that you have a 1024x786 monitor
then you can go to a high resolution.
(or define it in the conf manualy..)

btw, be sure your monitor CAN do 1024x786.. (just a saifty notice here!)

Goodluck.

MikeZila · 06-12-2005, 01:13 AM

How do you go about this?

Are there special scripts that must be run to "setup" your monitor before you edit your X config file? I'm new to Debian (from Slackware) and I want to make sure I don't break my shiny new Debian install by jumping the gun. In Slack, all you have to do is setup your possible resolutions (and their refresh rates, I think) in your X config. Is that all that must be done under Debian?

MikeZila · 06-12-2005, 01:34 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by MikeZila
How do you go about this?

Are there special scripts that must be run to "setup" your monitor before you edit your X config file? I'm new to Debian (from Slackware) and I want to make sure I don't break my shiny new Debian install by jumping the gun. In Slack, all you have to do is setup your possible resolutions (and their refresh rates, I think) in your X config. Is that all that must be done under Debian?

I decided that this question was really, really lazy, and did some research. No special config is needed, just add the resolutions you want (that you know your monitor/card support) into your X config file. Log out from your KDE/Gnome/whatever and wait at the login screen for a bit. Your resolution may well change to the highest supported. Mine changed itself a few seconds after KDE was closed, and now I'm happily using my desired res. Hope this helps somebody...or at least helps redeem me for that really, really lazy question.

rickh · 06-12-2005, 01:39 AM

Most common solution, assuming you're using the right driver, etc., is this one, which I copied from one of many threads here that lay it out.

vim /etc/X11/XF86Config-4

Find the section that looks like this:

Code:

Section "Screen"
        Identifier      "Default Screen"
        Device          "NVIDIA Corporation NV18 [GeForce4 MX - nForce GPU]"
        Monitor         "Generic Monitor"
        DefaultDepth    24
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           1
                Modes           "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           4
                Modes           "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           8
                Modes           "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           15
                Modes           "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           16
                Modes           "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           24
                Modes           "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
EndSection

and make it look like this:

Code:

Section "Screen"
        Identifier      "Default Screen"
        Device          "NVIDIA Corporation NV18 [GeForce4 MX - nForce GPU]"
        Monitor         "Generic Monitor"
        DefaultDepth    24
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           1
                Modes           "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           4
                Modes           "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           8
                Modes           "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           15
                Modes           "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           16
                Modes           "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           24
                Modes           "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
EndSection