increasing screen resolution in Gnome/Ubuntu5.10
 

Firstly, apologies if i've missed a really obvious button, walkthrough or thread regarding this topic.

Secondly, there is another cheeky question as an aside to my main query, but that'll be a bit later.

I'm brand new to Linux, and have been pondering loading it up on my home-built PC for some time. I'd tried out a couple of live CDs which worked really well and looked good. Then Fate conspired to give me a spare 40g partition, so I downloaded and burned the latest Ubuntu CD release, took a deep breath and stuck it in the CD drive (I guess I chose Ubuntu because it seems to be the weapon of choice at the moment). An hour. a couple of slightly perplexing questions and one reboot later I've got a dual booting Win2k/Ubuntu system.
Huzzah!

Unfortunately the screen will only run at 640x480, and this is the only option allowed according to the System - Preferences for Screen resolution.
Do I start looking for Monitor drivers? (19" CRT Dell 990) Or maybe graphics card Drivers? (Radeon 9200) Or do i need to find a way to edit a config file somewhere?

I'm grateful for any advice or help on this.

...

Oh, and the second query is - any idea why my mouse scroll wheel now works upside down?

edited: because i can't spell.

both answers are in /etc/X11/xorg.conf

look for a line similar to Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5" in the section "InputDevice"

you can reverse the direction of your mouse wheel, by reversing the 2 numbers as parameters... i my case i would change it to "5 4"

Hi jeffna,

I suggest you start looking here:
http://www.ati.com/products/catalyst/linux.html
and here:
https://support.ati.com/ics/support/...ge&folderID=27
to fix your resolution problems.
(ie. graphics card driver!)

As far as the mouse goes, I'm only guessing but I've got a couple of suggestions:
1. you have two scroll buttons with only one configured
2. your scroll 'buttons' are incorrectly orderded
you probably have a file like /etc/X11/XF86Config-4
that contains lines (among others) like:
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Configured Mouse"
Driver "mouse"
Option "CorePointer"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
Option "Protocol" "ImPS/2"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "true"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection
What happens if you change your ZAxisMapping to "5 4"?

Thank you for your replies.

qwijibow - Unfortunately your suggestion didn't work, I only seem to get the response "Permission denied".

uberNUT69 - i will have a look at ATI's support site and see if that does the trick.
My mouse has only two buttons and a scroll wheel, however it is running on a Wacom graphics mat. "No such file or directory" is displayed when I type in what you suggested.

Am I missing something? I'm simply opening a terminal window and copy-typing the strings as above
/etc/X11/xorg.conf
/etc/X11/XF86Config-4

Many thanks again.

edit: After looking at the ati site, I've found the driver installer and files concerning xfree86 and x.org. Thank you for your help with that.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by jeffna

qwijibow - Unfortunately your suggestion didn't work, I only seem to get the response "Permission denied".

Remember you were asked to enter a root password when you installed?
type 'su' in the terminal, and then enter your root password
... THEN try editing -->


My mouse has only two buttons and a scroll wheel, however it is running on a Wacom graphics mat. "No such file or directory" is displayed when I type in what you suggested.

Am I missing something? I'm simply opening a terminal window and copy-typing the strings as above
/etc/X11/xorg.conf
/etc/X11/XF86Config-4


Yes, you're missing the idea ... probably poorly explained by both of us.
To edit either of these files you need to be root (like the Administrator in M$),
AND you need to learn how to use either a command-line editor like vi or joem
or a gui editor (as root!) like gedit or leafpad.
(Yes more hurdles!)

for example:
$ su
<super-secret-root-password>
# vi /etc/X<tab>XF<tab>
(pressing <tab> will complete the line .... try it and see)
$ indicates that your are a (normal) user\
# indicates that you are root (all powerfull!)
the file you want to edit will _probably_ be called either
/etc/X11/xorg.conf
/etc/X11/XF86Config-4

If you get as far as editing the required file using vi, and get stuck,
open another terminal, enter 'vi' and type ':help'


To edit a file as root using a gui editor you need to be able to execute a
command like gksu or kdesu.
eg. press ALT+F2 and type 'gksu gedit' or 'kdesu kate'
and then enter your root password.

Almost sounds easy, huh? *cough*

Heh!

Thank you for taking the time to explain that more fully.
I have used command line editors before, but it was quite a few years ago (yipe!). It'll be like riding a bike...

I realise it is going to take a while to get my head round this system: as I mentioned earlier I'm brand new to Linux, so things that may be obvious to many I will have no clue about.

Thank you for responding so quickly and politely. I'm still searching alongside reading here, and I find that this issue has been asked many, many, many times before :)

pico is a very simple to use command line editor (i use it for simple edit jobs)

um guys...ubuntu doesn't use su out of the box, it prefers sudo
so the command is:

$sudo pico /etc/X11/xorg.conf

it will then ask for YOUR password, just type it as you did on logging in.

check to see what driver it's trying to use for your graphics card, I suspect one of the built in ATI drivers...they are hopeless. the line you are looking for will look a little like this:

Section "Device"
Identifier "NVIDIA Corporation Geforce 6200"
Driver "nvidia"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
EndSection

(thats mine for an nvidia card)

change the driver line to say "vesa" instead.
Restart X; You should get a better resolution.
You will then need to read up on installing the 3D ATI drivers, not a lot of fun on a linux system.
also look here:

http://www.ubuntuguide.org/