[ImNeat]

My laptop currently has a screen resolution of 800x600, giving it a 1-inch thick black frame surrounding the screen, because the screen is intended for a 1024x768 resolution. Even my BIOS opens in 800x600 resolution. I have tried adding "vga=773" and "vga=0x305" to my menu.lst to at least get the startup text and initial shell to 1024x768, but this only gives me an error at boot (an error in which the fix is to remove the vga line from my menu.lst.)
My only idea is that I need to update the drivers of my video card. In the past I have used distributions that must have auto-updated my drivers, so I have never manually done this in linux. How do I go about updating my drivers in Arch Linux? Support would be much much appreciated.
edit: the problem may also have something to do with my HorizSync and VertRefresh values. How do I go about finding the correct amounts?

[ozar]

Don't add the quotes to the vga setting. It should look like this:

kernel /boot/vmlinuz26 root=/dev/hda3 ro vga=773

Of course the root partition should match your own.

Edit: I missed the bottom part of your post. You'll need to check your monitor manual to get the correct Horiz and Vert refresh rates to satisfy your xorg.conf file.

[ImNeat]

Originally Posted by ozar

Don't add the quotes to the vga setting. It should look like this:

Yea I realize. I entered it without quotes. But I get the error every time, I'm not sure what's up. You sure I don't need to update or install video drivers? Is there a way to do that thru arch?
If the problem persists with X after I get it fixed with shell I'll look into the vert/horiz numbers.

[ImNeat]

Alright this issue is reaaaaaally getting to me

I've given up on the entering vga=773 to my menu.lst. I guess I just don't load the vga module or something. So I'm trying to focus on getting X to the correct resolution. I've been trying to follow http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Xorg to the T, but I'm apparently going wrong somewhere.
(I would post my /etc/X11/xorg.conf but I can't figure out how to copy/paste it - I have no GUI editors.)

[antidrugue]

Originally Posted by ImNeat

Even my BIOS opens in 800x600 resolution.

Hum... Do you have the latest BIOS version installed? Or you could just reset your BIOS values to the default ones.

[ImNeat]

Yea my BIOS is configured perfectly and is up to date. I know this because this laptop doesn't have an internal CD or floppy drive - so I spent a week in the BIOS trying to get it to boot USB heh. I'm not too worried about getting the bios and shell > 800x600. I do wanna get my GUI 1024x768 though.

I found that X is starting at a 16 depth. If I set it to 24 depth default the screen gets smaller. If I set it to 8 depth the GUI fills up my entire screen but the reolution is real funky, Don't know what all this means - but it's interesting.

[ImNeat]

Kinda strange... looking at my /var/log/Xorg.0.log and it shows:
(II) VESA(0): Not using mode "1024x760" (no mode of this name)

This problem keep getting more confusing... why won't X just start in 1024x768?! lol

Now that I can paste I'll stick my xorg.conf here:

Section "ServerLayout"
        Identifier     "X.org Configured"
        Screen      0  "Screen0" 0 0
        InputDevice    "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
        InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
EndSection

Section "Files"
        RgbPath      "/usr/share/X11/rgb"
        ModulePath   "/usr/lib/xorg/modules"
        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/misc"
        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/75dpi"
        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/100dpi"
        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/TTF"
        FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/Type1"
EndSection

Section "Module"
#       Load  "evdev"
        Load  "extmod"
        Load  "dbe"
        Load  "record"
        Load  "xtrap"
        Load  "dri"
        Load  "glx"
        Load  "freetype"
        Load  "type1"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
        Identifier  "Keyboard0"
        Driver      "kbd"
#       Option      "XkbLayout" "us"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
        Identifier  "Mouse0"
        Driver      "mouse"
        Option      "Protocol" "auto"
        Option      "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
        Option      "ZAxisMapping" "4 5 6 7"
        Option      "Emulate3Buttons" "yes"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
        Identifier   "Monitor0"
#       DisplaySize  269 201 # 96 DPI @ 1024x768
        VendorName   "Monitor Vendor"
        ModelName    "Monitor Model"
EndSection

Section "Device"
        ### Available Driver options are:-
        ### Values: <i>: integer, <f>: float, <bool>: "True"/"False",
        ### <string>: "String", <freq>: "<f> Hz/kHz/MHz"
        ### [arg]: arg optional
        #Option     "ShadowFB"                  # [<bool>]
        #Option     "DefaultRefresh"            # [<bool>]
        #Option     "ModeSetClearScreen"        # [<bool>]
        Identifier  "Card0"
        Driver      "vesa"
        VendorName  "Intel Corporation"
        BoardName   "82815 CGC [Chipset Graphics Controller]"
        BusID       "PCI:0:2:0"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
        Identifier "Screen0"
        Device     "Card0"
        Monitor    "Monitor0"
#        DefaultDepth   16
        SubSection "Display"
                Viewport   0 0
                Depth     1
                Modes     "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Viewport   0 0
               Depth     4
                Modes     "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Viewport   0 0
                Depth     8
                Modes     "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Viewport   0 0
                Depth     15
                Modes     "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Viewport   0 0
                Depth     16
                Modes     "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Viewport   0 0
                Depth     24
                Modes     "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
EndSection

[ImNeat]

*SOLVED*

Had to add HorizSync 30.0-54.0 to the monitor section of my xorg.conf