Ubunto 8.10 hurts my eyes
 

Hi!

I'm new to Ubuntu having used XP for many years. I have an 5 old GVC laptop bought in Thailand. Everything is greeat, but the resolution realy hurts my eyes. I tried different resolution settings in System options, but it either went too small on 1024x768 (4:3) 60hz or distorted on 800:600 60hz. It doesnt seem to have recognised the screen on my laptop. I do not remember what resolution i had on XP.

I did a hardware scan and it says i have:

VGA compatable controller:
- Silicon Intergrated Systems (Sis) 65x/M650/740 PCI/AGP VGA Display Adapter
- Subsytem: Uniwill Computer Corp device 5100.


I read a few forums that said I need to change things when i run "sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf"' but all it says is "#

Section "Device"
Identifier "Configured Video Device"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Configured Monitor"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Monitor "Configured Monitor"
Device "Configured Video Device"
EndSection
"

Someone suggested updating drivers, but when i go into the drivers in System, it says there are no prioriety drivers on my computer.

I can zoom in and out and most text is ok, but i love playing Wordscraper, a scrabble type game on facebook that runs on Adobe Flash Player. It will not enlarge in Opera/Seamonkey and in firefox it does enlarge but disctorts really badly. I have the latest flash Player downloaded.

Any ideas? I'll need walking through like a kid, as i'm still learning all the different parts.

Thank you for reading my lonnnnng post. Apologies.

J

Hi. Your xorg.conf file is very minimal,

you can add things to change the way your graphics,

keyboard, mouse and touch pad as well as the screen and even fonts directories.

Have you tried to run xorgconfig or xorgcfg from a command line?

Answer the questions with care.

IF you do, you may need root access to change the file.

There is a readme for xorg.conf.

usually available from nvidia and ati, but may also be available from SiS.



But for now, type in a shell/term, cli konsole (kde)...

sudo xorgconfig

And answer the questions.

The defaults will be marked and generally all you need to do is ENTER for each one.

The old file will be saved as /etc/X11/xorg.conf~

If it does not work out you can rename that file and try again...

cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf~ /etc/X11/xorg.conf

see how you go.

Hi Glenspref,

Thanks for your tips. I opened a terminal and tried to run xorgconfig and xorgcfg but it says command not found.

I don't know what you mean on the last tip about shell/term. i've searched xorg.cfg and SiS on google, couldn't find anything i understood. The sudo xorgconfig also turns up as command not found.

I'm as rubbish as my my computer is old.

any other thoughts?

Try starting in recovery mode and running Xfix.

Try this to reconfigure your xorg.

dpkg-reconfigure -phigh -xserver-xorg

I tried this, it didnt seem to do anything. It said

"Unknown option: x
Unknown option: s
Unknown option: e
Unknown option: r
Unknown option: v
Unknown option: e
Unknown option: r
Unknown option: xorg
Usage: dpkg-reconfigure [options] packages
-a, --all Reconfigure all packages.
-u, --unseen-only Show only not yet seen questions.
--default-priority Use default priority instead of low.
--force Force reconfiguration of broken packages.
-f, --frontend Specify debconf frontend to use.
-p, --priority Specify minimum priority question to show.
--terse Enable terse mode.
"

That means it is xserver-xorg, not -xserver-xorg (mind the dash).

That said "/usr/sbin/dpkg-reconfigure must be run as root".

Also, really dumb question here, how do you reboot into recovery mode. Do i press f8 or something?

Sorry, i am trying to learn, but i am a 1 day old on this.

Well, if you reboot, there should be a second bootline that boots up in recovery mode.

As for the root thing, this means that the command can only be executed by someone who has administrative powers. If the system was installed by you, that would be - errr - you. So you would place
sudo
before the command
sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg
and it will prompt you for your password.

Thanks, just learnt something new. This command opened, but it asked me a lot of questions about my keyboard that i dont know the answers too. Its just a standard English laptop keyboard.

I answered the q's and it colsed and writes in terminal "xserver-xorg postinst warning: overwriting possibly-customised configuration
file; backup in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.20081126132343
.

It never mentioned monitors/resolution and there were no options to try anything else.

That is what I thought and why I suggested Xfix instead. dpkg-reconfigure is essentially a thing of the past that has lost most of its functionality (and the "xorgconfig" suggested earlier in this thread was dropped completely two years ago) .
As an alternative to Xfix, you could try editing your xorg.conf manually. I imagine that it is only missing refresh rate details or some such.

i just used Xfix in recovery mode, it did nothing and just said:
xserver-xorg postinst warning: overwriting possibly-customised configuration
file; backup in etc.....

I wouldnt know how to change code, i'm not a technical person.

OK, different approach: start a terminal (under Applications) and enter gksudo displayconfig-gtk.
If that still does not work, there is only one option and that would be to edit the xorg.conf file directly. Do not worry, that is nothing like editing code but you do need to know what to put in. If you do not, then there is something that appears to have worked very well for others and that is not difficult at all. Basically, you would have to burn a livecd that predates Hardy (8.04) and copy its xorg.conf to your installed system. You cannot use any 8.04 (or later) livecd because that is when they adopted the plug&play approach to xorg that is causing the confusion you are going through right now.

i trued the sudu display line, nothing happened, it just asked for password and then returned back to terminal with no message.

I can't burn a CD, i don't even have one of them! Plus, i don't know anyone called Hardy.

This isn't cool. I'm only 36 and i feel like i'm no longer "down with the youth society".

LOL, the difference a year can make (I'm 35 and half on my way to 36).

Hmm, let's try this. Open your terminal again and run:
cd /etc/X11
sudo cp xorg.conf xorg.conf.bak
sudo gedit xorg.conf

Insert this line
Driver "vesa"
under the "Device" section.
Then save, close gedit and press Ctrl + alt + backspace. This may - likely will - require a bit more work but let's wait and see.

Btw, should this place you in front of a black screen, just log in at the prompt and do
sudo mv /etc/X11/xorg.conf.bak /etc/X11/xorg.conf
(confirm overwrite if prompted)
to restore your current xorg.conf and reboot.