[NBLUG/talk] How to configure Xorg for a 1080p display?

matt matt at cfxnetworks.com
Sun Jun 17 14:47:25 PDT 2007


On Sunday 17 June 2007 13:35:01 Lincoln Peters wrote:
> And now for something completely different...
>
>
> I'm trying to use a somewhat older computer (a Compaq with a Pentium III
> processor and 128MB of RAM) to control a 1080p HDTV that has a VGA input.
> I've installed Ubuntu Linux on the computer, and it defaulted to a
> resolution of 1360x1024, with me having to move the mouse to the top and
> bottom edges to reveal them (i.e. the virtual screen is taller than the
> actual screen).  It's also far lower than the TV's native resolution of
> 1920x1080,
>
> I've tried to edit xorg.conf to make it run at 1920x1080 resolution (the
> TV's native resolution), but it still wants to run at 1360x1024.  It's hard
> to be sure exactly which of the lines from the Xorg log are relevant, but
> here are a few that look like they might be:
>
> (II) I810(0): Monitor name: SONY TV
> (II) I810(0): EDID (in hex):
> ...
> (II) I810(0): Using EDID range info for horizontal sync
> (II) I810(0): Using EDID range info for vertical refresh
> (II) I810(0): Printing DDC gathered Modelines:
> ...
> (II) I810(0): Modeline "1920x1080"  148.50  1920 2008 2052 2200  1080 1084
> 1089 1125 +hsync +vsync
> ...
> (--) I810(0): Chipset: "i810e"
> (--) I810(0): Linear framebuffer at 0x44000000
> (--) I810(0): IO registers at addr 0x40200000
> (II) I810(0): Kernel reported 24064 total, 1 used
> (II) I810(0): I810CheckAvailableMemory: 96252k available
> (==) I810(0): Will alloc AGP framebuffer: 8192 kByte
> (==) I810(0): Using gamma correction (1.0, 1.0, 1.0)
> (II) I810(0): SONY TV: Using hsync range of 30.00-80.00 kHz
> (II) I810(0): SONY TV: Using vrefresh range of 55.00-65.00 Hz
> (II) I810(0): Clock range:   9.50 to 136.00 MHz
> ...
> (II) I810(0): Not using driver mode "1920x1080" (bad mode
> clock/interlace/doublescan)
> (II) I810(0): Not using mode "1920x1080" (no mode of this name)
> ...
> (II) I810(0): Not using default mode "1400x1050" (width too large for
> virtual size)
> (II) I810(0): Not using default mode "1440x900" (width too large for
> virtual size)
> (--) I810(0): Virtual size is 1360x1024 (pitch 2048)
>
>
> I can't find anything in the logs to prove this, but I'm reasonably sure
> that the physical display is running at a resolution of 1360x768, since
> it's the only resolution with 1360 columns natively supported by the TV.
>
> Any thoughts as to what I might be missing?  The documentation for the TV
> clearly states that it can run at 1920x1080 over the VGA port, with a
> horizontal frequency of 67.5kHz and a vertical frequency of 60Hz
>
>
> By the way, I also tried it with Knoppix, and the best I could get was a
> screen resolution of 1440x1050, and I could not get anything other than a
> 4:3 aspect ratio (the HDTV is 16:9).  In every case under Knoppix, the left
> and right sides of the screen were unused, to yield a 4:3 aspect ratio.

It's more like can your graphics card (Integrated Intel...?) run at that 
resolution? If you're sure it can, in your xorg.conf, you would have:

Section "Screen"
	SubSection "Display"
		Depth	24
		Modes	"1920x1080"
	EndSubSection
EndSection

And if it still kicks you back, use `915resolution` to trick your card into 
displaying the modes you want. (You can do an `apt-get install 915resolution` 
and read the doc on how to get it to work.)

-- 
Salud,
Matt
matt at cfxnetworks.com

Your Fortune:
If I had a formula for bypassing trouble, I would not pass it around.
Trouble creates a capacity to handle it.  I don't say embrace trouble; that's
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you'll see a lot of it and you had better be on speaking terms with it.
		-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.



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