Brand new PC with 1TB HDD (SATA) and a 1gbe. I installed ubuntu 64-bit, but the display has this weird split image that render using it downright difficult. If I drag the cursor to the far-right side of the screen, the mouse will 'wrap' back to the left-hand side before it stops at the 'limit' of the right-side of the display. Also, the tool/banner menus are 'split' as well with the user-control (i.e. logout, ethernet status, etc) wrapped to the left-side of the screen.

I was using Debian on a previous desktop until the motherboard fried. Do I have to use a 64-bit distro or can I continue with a 32-bit?

Thanks.

You can continue with 32 bit if you want. Keep in mind that you have to use a PAE enabled kernel if you have more than 4 GB of RAM.
Regarding your display issue, mabe we can sort that out if you tell us what graphics hardware you are using.

The display driver is possibly configured incorrectly, but more likely it is not really compatible and you need a different display driver.

You could try other distributions (best bet would be Fedora) to see if they select/install the correct display driver by default.

It isn't actually hard to get the right display driver installed in Ubuntu. But since you gave no info about your display interface, I can't begin to make suggestions on how to do that. Even with that info, you would probably need guidance from someone other than me. I don't currently use Ubuntu myself nor do I have any systems with very new display interfaces.

I think you would be better off sticking with Ubuntu and getting the display driver corrected. But that would take more expert guidance than trying a few other distributions and seeing if one happens to get the display right.

Linux distributions vary a lot in which display interfaces they will configure correctly without extra effort. Most distros will get most displays right, but you already know you missed that bet. I don't know a good way to predict which distro would get a display right after Ubuntu got it wrong.

You don't need to stick with 64-bit. 32-bit is OK, but switching to the 32-bit build of the same version of Ubuntu is VERY unlikely to help the display problem.

Your display problem has nothing to do with 64-bit. It results from whatever version of whatever display driver the installer for that version of Ubuntu selects based on what it thinks it auto detects in your hardware. The 32 bit installer would make the same selection and the 32 bit build of the same version of the same driver would behave the same.

Almost certainly a graphics problem. I recommend figuring out exactly which graphics chipset you have (you can use the following terminal command):

Then you can do a Search for your card on the Ubuntu Wiki and Forums:

http://wiki.ubuntu.com
http://ubuntuforums.org

If you can't get the problem fixed and decide to switch distros, distrowatch.com is a good source of information. Here's a comparison of the top 10:

http://distrowatch.com/dwres.php?resource=major

64-bit will give you better speed for certain calculatory tasks and the ability to use more than 4gb RAM.

I will check out the display settings. I have a KVM switch that I also use which may be interfering with things. It never has in the past but one never knows these days. I will try the Debian 32-bit after I poke around with ubuntu video settings.

With regards to another comment: Yes, it has 4GB of DDR.

As far as distro diffs: Yes, I have seen many hiccups on different platforms with different distros. I have ubuntu on my AMD-based laptop. Debian would not install at all and SuSE wouldn't recognize the video OR mouse. Fedora installed but performance was, well, a dead horse was faster.

DDR?? maybe DDR3!

regarding to distro question: actually I prefer a 32bit distro (best if Slackware, indeed!); you can easily boot up a live version of a distro of your choice to see if you run again into video problem..

Your best best it to stick with what you know and like if it works.

Just try a few live cd/dvd/usb's to test what you want.


The screen deal might be possible to fix but it you like the 32 bit then by all means go with it.


I tend to use the 64 bit so I can run multiple virtual machines in it. They tend to take a lot of ram. Otherwise on my flash drive installs I use 32 bit so it will run in older hardware.

don't settle for less. Your best bet is Fedora 15 x64 (looks incredible with Plasma KDE Desktop!!!). It would be stupid to use a 32-bit distro with a 64-bit processor. I used Fedora on i3 and it works great. Just make sure you choose AHCI controller in BIOS for your HDD before installing fedora.

Janek566

Ok, after the holidays and playing with things (4 distros... whew!) I am coming back to revisit this thread.
I played with ubuntu (cluster-f*** of massive proportions), Debian (video issue still), SuSE and Fedora.

Canonical has REALLY screwed the pooch with this latest release. Between the techincal vomit that is called 'unity', the new and discredited apt-get utility and the fact that I cant change my terminal shell, I finally said pluck it and will be scrubbing the distro from the HDD, NEVER to touch ubuntu again (I was able to disable the unity desktop, but the overall performance was worse than my old 32-bit Intel Pentium).

I worked with Fedora, but I HATED that plasma display mulch. Yes, I was able to remove it and work with a basic display environment, but remants of the blech that is plasma remained. The other thing about fedora (which has been an ongoing issue for some time now) has been the ongoing issues with yum updates/downloads. For whatever reason, it has been an issue and has more often than not failed. But that was not the reason I gave up on fedora.

I will be retrying SuSE again and see if that improves from a performance perspective. I will also dive back into the debian distro and see if I can ferret out the video errors. Slackware and/or OpenBSD may be options as well (any one have experience with either of those two?).

Before you lob rockets against my skred, I am a somewhat technical guy. I KNOW what linux/unix can do. I prefer command-line over a GUI (although I understand that a GUI is a requirement for a number of apps these days). I AM NOT one who is impressed by 'fancy-shmancy' colors and gee-whiz bang effects (yes, I turn animations OFF). I am not fan of glossy finishes or whistles and bells. To me, that is trying to hide something from the end user.

I liken the new ubuntu vomit interface as Mac OS-X/Winblows-7 wannabe. If I WANTED a Mac/Windows interface, I would have bought one of those products. I buy/use linux becuase I know it works!

Ok, my flame retardant suit is on now.

Why exactly would it be stupid? With 4GB with (or without) a PAE kernel an average user won't see much (any?) difference. At the same time they wouldn't have to install multilib stuff for compatibility with 32-bit only software.
By all means give them a try again. I haven't had any display problems with slackware for a long time. Please bear in mind that OpenBSD is not what you'd call a typical desktop operating system. If you want to go the *BSD way, for everyday use, FreeBSD might be a better option.

From what you say about what you want in a desktop, and your dislike of Unity/Kde stuff. Plus you don't care about flashy, I think you might like to give some of the Xfce distros a try.

Linux Mint Debian Edition(LMDE) Comes with an Xfce download for either 32 or 64-bit. It doesn't hurt to at least try the Live image out to see if your graphics work.

Vector Linux is also nice. (32-bit only) It's base on Slackware, but it has an easy to use gui package manager with their own Repos.

The nice thing about Xfce is, they move slow, and don't care to reinvent themselves entirely like Kde and Gnome(Ugh).