Hello,

Background:
I have a HP pavilion ze4317 with a screen that does 1024 X 768.
I have been able to get my X to run well at this resolution with maximum colors.
I searched the bios, but there is no screen resolution setting.

Problem:
When i go to command prompt, with ALT+CTRL+F2, or when the machine is booting up,
the system does not take up the entire screen and appears to work in 600X800,

How do i make it use the full screen?


Thanks for any help
Kevin

what does it mean?
maybe 640x480 or standard VGA...

If your video board support VESA protocol (see your board documentation) you can try something like this:

* If your distro use LILO as boot loader:
at boot time go to LILO command-line mode (hold the <Alt> or <Shift> key before the ``LILO'' message appears)
and type vga=318 then press enter
you should see the boot sequence in 1024x768 32M colors.
If it work you can add this option in the LILO configuration file
(/etc/lilo.conf) at the end of the line boot= <blah blah blah>.
Don`t forget to run LILO *every* time you modify lilo.conf file (simply type lilo).

I don`t use LILO as boot loader so i am not 100% sure that these are the right steps.
See LILO documentation and HOWTOs.

* If your distro use GRUB as boot loader:
The steps are similar,
at the GRUB boot menu select the Linux and kernel you want to boot
type 'e' to edit the command-line and ad vga=318
then press enter.
As above if it work you can add this option to the GRUB configuration file
(usually /boot/grub/grub.conf or /boot/grub/menu.lst).
You DON'T need to run GRUB to make the change permanent!!! (This is why
i use GRUB)
See GRUB documentation and HOWTOs.

You can find other VESA mode in the kernel documentation directory (i don't
remember where and the file name - i'm at work now ).

I hope this can help you.
Good luck.
P.S.: Sorry for my english!

Hi,
Thanks for the reply and by the way i think your english id pretty fine.

I have tried the "vga=317" and also vga = 305 and 316,
however they all give me a blank screen untill X starts up.

I am guessing it might be a problem with the display card, since i have the ATI card on this laptop and i know there are no correct drivers for this on linux yet. For example in X i am using the normal VESA driver.

Do you have any hints for me?

Thanks
Kevin

I can't read your reply until now cause
I was out of town for work last two days.

Sorry, but I gave you the wrong code,
the right code is vga=792,
(318 is the equivalent in hexadecimal and maybe
work if you prepend it with 0x).

Now, if your boar is VESA compliant (and every board
not too old is) everything shoul be ok.

You can find some help and other codes from the kernel docs
/usr/src/linux/Documentation/fb/vesafb.txt.

Let me know...

Hi,
I should have tried that 0x by myself!!
Anyway it works now, thank you very much. I'll go read on that link a bit now.

Kevin