Changing a display resolution if you have a higher resolution in Ubuntu 9.1

[titianmom]

Hi all,

I searched the archives and didn't find anything on this, and was just wondering if there is a problem if you load Ubuntu 9.1 and have a display that's higher than 1024x768. I'd prefer a machine with a higher res, but I've heard that Ubuntu will only go as high as 1024x768.

I'm guessing, however, that by 9.1, it should recog the higher res while loading and it won't be a problem, but thought I'd check before shelling out on a machine with a nicer display.

Thanks!
Kim

[waterhead]

To get a higher resolution you usually need to install a video card driver. Proprietary drivers usually aren't installed by default. This means nVidia and ATI drivers. And of those two, only the nVidia Linux driver is any good.

The ATI driver has recently excluded older ATI video chips from it's latest driver. And that driver won't install on older kernels. I have a ATI X850 card that I paid $400 for, and it is useless in a new Linux installation! I am keeping one version of WMCE 2005 just for that reason.

[oz]

Hi all,

I searched the archives and didn't find anything on this, and was just wondering if there is a problem if you load Ubuntu 9.1 and have a display that's higher than 1024x768. I'd prefer a machine with a higher res, but I've heard that Ubuntu will only go as high as 1024x768.

I'm guessing, however, that by 9.1, it should recog the higher res while loading and it won't be a problem, but thought I'd check before shelling out on a machine with a nicer display.

Thanks!
Kim

When I last installed Ubuntu, Kubuntu, and Xubuntu, (a month or two ago) they all worked fine at 1920x1200 resolution with the generic video drivers, so that resolution should work on your system as well if the video card and monitor are cable of displaying it. All the above-mentioned distros worked even better once I enabled the nvidia proprietary drivers.

That said, I had problems with each distro when I tried to install from the liveCD version. Working with the alternate (text) installer, the installation worked perfectly each time, so you might give it a try to see what happens.

What video card and monitor do you have?


Edit: if you have an xorg.conf file, you might post the contents here so that we can have a look at it. If you don't have one, creating one might help you to get the resolutions that you seek.

[nimlonim]

Hey
Sorry to interfere, i'm having the same problem. (ubuntu 10.04)
my card is matrox p750
driver installed

for some reason i cant get my native 1900 1200 res.

will be greatfull if anything will help this

Thanks


my xorg.conf file (after several experiments) is now :


Section "Device"
Identifier "Configured Video Device"
Driver "vesa"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Configured Monitor"
EndSection

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

[devils casper]

Hi nimlonim !

Try this xorg.conf file :

Section "Device"
       Identifier "Configured Video Device"
       Driver    "vesa"  
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
         Identifier "Configured Monitor"
         HorizSync 31.5 - 70.0
         VertRefresh 50 - 160
 EndSection

Section "Screen"
        Identifier "Default Screen"
        Monitor "Configured Monitor"
        Device "Configured Video Device"
        DefaultDepth 24
        Subsection "Display"
             Depth 24
             Modes "1900x1200" "1280x1024" "1024x768" 
        EndSubsection
EndSection

[nimlonim]

Dear Casper
Thank you so much for yr reply.
I tried the file, unfortunately I'm getting black screen with a monitor error - mode not support. strange because I've worked with this resolution before on win with no problems at all. monitor model - Samsung T260HD.

When booting with failsafe graphic mode, it says something about gls missing.. i dont even know what is that mean..

N

[devils casper]

Execute this

lspci | grep -i vga

Post output here.

Check contents of xorg.conf file again. There should not be any typo.

[waterhead]

I doubt if you can even get 1900x1200 using the vga driver. You need to use the Matrox mtx driver, but I don't know if you can install it on the latest kernel.

Here is an old How-To concerning that driver:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Bi...MatroxParhelia

The beta driver it links to hasn't been updated since 2007! I did find a "newer" version on the Matrox web sit, it is only one year old. I doubt if that one will compile on a newer kernel either.

Matrox Graphics - Support - Driver Download

Now that you know what you are looking for, Google is your friend.

[waterhead]

I see that Matrox won't give you the driver without registering first. I found another place that has the driver, but I don't know if it is good.

wget http://www.shrimps-design.de/blog/wp-content/uploads/matroxdriver-installer-x86_32-1.4.7.run

[waterhead]

Well, the driver from shrimps-design web site seems to have compiled OK on my netbook. But I am using Ubuntu 9.04 "Jaunty", with kernel 2.6.28-18.