Hi all,


I seem to have weaved a wicked web.

For the last year I have run KDE4 with openSUSE 11.4 on my Dell inspiron laptop, using an external lcd monitor (and disabling the laptop screen to save power).


The KDE4 dialogue under: Kbutton -> Configure Desktop -> Display sets the dual monitor configuration. It determines which screen, if any, to disable and what screen size to use on a screen that is not disabled.

The external monitor had always offered a default screen size of 1440 x 900 and I'd been using that mode on the external monitor, and the laptop lcd disabled.

All was well until two days ago. I locked the screen and (foolishly) pulled the external monitor's VGA cable out of the laptop.

Twenty or so lines of text appeared on the laptop screen which then stopped responding altogether, so I switched it off and rebooted.

The 1400 x 900 display mode was no longer available, only 1024 x 768.

As I have been overdue to upgrade to SUSE12, I did the upgrade anticipating that would probably reset whatever needs resetting.

No such luck. As I had been intending anyway to get rid of KDE4 and go back to KDE3, I also did that too, so that I am now running KDE3 with openSUSE 12.1

Both monitors are on and working, and the screen size looks like 1000x700.

I say "looks like" because the present (GUI) system offers no controls at all. The dialogue under Kbutton -> Configure Desktop -> Hardware -> Display now states:


"Your X server is using the RandR extension at version 1.2 or greater which doesn't have any configuration yet."


Questions:

How to get the external monitor to display the 1440x900 pixels of which it is capable?

How to get dual monitor configuration control so that I can disable the laptop's lcd monitor when appropriate?

Many thanks.

Andrew.

I remember having the same problem. Upgraded to 12.1 and installed KDE3, and it downgraded the RandR. I think I upgraded RandR and it worked. I later found out how to customise KDE4 to my liking and that is what I now use. I tested it in Virtualbox first. My setup has dual 21" monitors, with KDE3 style panels on the right hand monitor, and I removed the Plasma desktop widget by renaming it and moving it to another folder.

Thanks Sadiqdm,

new randr installation enables configuration of dual monitors. So that much is fixed.

However, the max screen size on external monitor that is available is still only 1024*768.

There should be a mode like 1440*900 available, which I have not seen since pulling out the VGA cable after locking the screen. I can't understand how completely reinstalling the OS did not ensure a new and clean automatic detection of the monitor.

I can't find the functionality to detect and/or manually set the monitor type. I expected to find this in YAST, but apparently not. I recall this was there in suse10, but I am beginning to wonder if this even exists anymore?

Andrew.