I cannot decipher how this video modes thing goes. I see a bunch of numbers and ranges. I have my monitors specs which is a SyncMaster 914V, but I am lost after doing the resolution line. The man page stinks for this stuff too.

my graphics card is an ATI R700 PRO, and I have the most uptodate driver allowed by regular old YAST in 10.3 Suse..

my issue is just how to set all those correct numbers in the video mode section for X11 so I can get

1280 x 1024

The details are usually distro dependent.

However, X is pretty resilient and it is usually sufficient just to add "1280x1024" to the beginning of the "Modes" line in the "Screen" section. Google for "xorg.conf example ati r700".

Please edit your profile to include your distro and some idea to your location. This will help us reply properly.

If you run yast2 > hardware> monitor and graphic card what is the resolution suggested by Yast ?
Mostly yast2 recognized the right resolution and it also gives the change to change the resolution .

all the best

@ronlau9: how do you know hwy9nightkid talking about SUSE?

Admittedly, that talk of noxious mode-lines is a pretty strong hint...

The default xorg.conf is often a real mess. If you are hand-editing the file, you can first make a copy, then delete all the comments (lines beginning with #)** This may make it easier to read.

In the screen section, delete all the subsections for the different bit depths--keep only the ones you want to use. Also, the typical mode entry only needs to be the maximum resolution you intend to use.

Referring to Simon's example, I think it is better to put the horiz and vertical scan rate in the "monitor" section. I'm a little fuzzy on how this works, but I think specifying the rates helps keep X from sending too high a rate to the monitor.

You can also try running xorgconfig

"man xorg.conf" is actually not that bad....

** easy way to do this: sed -i 's/^#//' xorg.conf

Makes no difference for TFT/LCD (digital) monitors as they do not actually "scan". Only the bit of the display that changes gets updated.

The response rate (time it takes to change a pixel from black to white then back) is the important bit - it's measured in milliseconds. (Though some vendors list grey-to-grey time.) You can see this doesn't translate well into those CRT refresh rates.

If you try to change pixel values faster than the response time, you can get ghosting or slight blurring. Or the colors drift at the edges. This can be a problem in some games or movies with a lot of very fast action. Monitors with less than 8ms responce time can usually take video as fast as you will feed it.

Learn something new every day!!

However: I recall trying to get my Dell 24" widescreen to work. It was necessary to set the vert. refresh to 59.9-60.1 to force it to run at 60. I found this somewhere in the Google vastness.

I periodically have the feeling that there are things in X that NOONE understands.....

If the display is using the VGA interface, then it may need a refresh rate to satisfy it's analog emulation. Use the DVI interface, and only really slow screens will be a bother.

The refresh rate can be used in xorg as a clunky way of throttling the bitrate to digital monitors. Not normally needed. The rule of thumb is supposed to be something like 500/RT=VR ... but that doesn't seem to have any foundation in engineering.

I actually looked up the electronics for this once upon a time.

Modern TFTs have a built in clock to make sure data isn't fed faster than it can take. Cuts down on the artifacts.

Hmmmm....

I commented-out the horiz and vert rates on my laptop (nvidia driver), and it still works fine

Now I have to go to my office and try the same thing with the Dell 2407.

It never ends......

This TOTALLY worked, I added the lines, then went into SAX2 and it was in the list! THANK You Sir!

Cool - now go edit your profile