Problems with resolution on widescreen laptop

noware · 08-30-2007, 02:55 AM

Hi All,

I have an Acer Extensa widescreen laptop, with FC6 on it. Everything is fine, X works well, except for one thing: I cannot set a 16:10 resolution for the screen. I tried to set the resolution using Gnome's and KDE's 'Display Settings' stuff; I can "set" 1280x800 and when I press OK, it says You must restart X to make the changes, but when I do this (either by pressing ctrl-alt-bacspc, or by going back to runlevel 3 and then runlevel 5 again), well, I don't see any changes. My screen resolution is still 1024x768. I tried to edit the xorg.conf file and added 1280x800 to the 'Modes', but still nothing.

Do I have to live with this resolution?
Or do I have other ways to change it?

Thanks in advance!
G.

teek · 08-30-2007, 04:27 AM

What kind of videocard do you have and are you using the right driver? For a hint, type lspci in a terminal. (Or upgrade to Fc7

)

noware · 08-31-2007, 04:59 AM

I have the Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 950. So far I could not find a driver for it. I'm searching.

noware · 08-31-2007, 05:06 AM

Another question: Why would it help me if I would upgrade to FC7?
Thanks.

teek · 08-31-2007, 06:01 AM

Upgrading always brings more hardware support and bugfixes. Perhaps there is better out of the box support for your intel card... the driver should be in the kernel, let me look, newer intel graphics chips are very well supported in linux... hmm I see only support up to 945G chips.

Perhaps this page helps your further:
http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Intel_...ccelerator_950

These are my last options. But still, do you have anything against upgrading? I always like upgrading, new features, fresh desktop

But off course you should decide for your self. Good luck with it.

witz · 08-31-2007, 06:23 PM

noware,
Your video card is supported by linux. Link = http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Intel_...ccelerator_950

This how to get the full resolution.First make sure you have the i810 intel driver installed.
It should be as almost all distros do.If not get it from your package manager.

Then modify your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file as followed,

Code:

First, goto Section "Device" 
under xorg.conf and modify as shown.

Section "Device"
    Identifier  "intel 945gm"  (Insert your card's model as intel 945gm is my card)
    Driver      "i810"
EndSection

Then modify Section "Screen" as followed

Section "Screen"
    Identifier  "Screen 1"
    Device      "intel 945gm"
    Monitor     "screen"
    DefaultDepth 24

    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       8
        Modes       "1280x800
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       16
        Modes       "1280x800
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       24
        Modes       "1280x800
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
EndSection

After that, exit X server fully and restart the X server.
If it starts and the resolution looks like 1280x800, check by running command

Code:

xrandr

and seeing that it's 1280x800.

If you want to enable dri to get
3d, go back to xorg.conf and modify as followed,

Code:

 Go to Section "Module" 
and uncomment the line :   Load       "dri"

Example : Section "Module"

 Load        "dbe"   # Double buffer extension
    SubSection  "extmod"
      Option    "omit xfree86-dga"   # don't initialise the DGA extension
    EndSubSection
    Load        "freetype"
    Load        "xtt"
    Load       "glx"
    Load       "dri"

EndSection

Then add on the bottom of the xorg.conf file,

Section "DRI"
    Mode 0666
EndSection

Section "Extensions"
  Option        "Composite"     "Enable"
EndSection

From here you should be good to go.