> Running mcc or any of its equivalents enters default values for themonitor HorizSync and VertRefresh in XF86Config The values used are so low that when XFree starts up it fails to find any working Modelines and just drops out to the CLI.
I have had some success by editing these values and replacing them with the correct values supplied by the manufacturer. However the best combination that I've been able to produce this way is 800x600 (which is as much as I was expecting) but only 8bit colour (256 colours).
However when I boot up the same machine under Windows NT I can set it to 64k colours (16bit colour) at the same resolution. My goal is to configure the monitor to run at the same resolution and bit-depth in Linux.
A further complication is that I've only been able to do this under the older version of XFree (v3.3.?) I've just tried again to configure it under XFree 4.0.? (can't remember the version numbers - but they're the ones that come with Mandrake)
This time mcc didn't enter ANY values for HorizSync or VertRefresh though it seemed to come up with similar very low default values as before. So I added lines with the correct values. Running *X -probeonly* seemed to indicate that some additional working Modelines had been found. But when I started the GUI the screen stayed blank, and after working away for a short time the computer rebooted itself.
I don't know what else to try - so any ideas would be most welcome!
Regards
David Bell
David, I'm in this thread a little late, but tell us what video card you have. It might well be only supported in the 'older' 3.3.6 Xfree version. No big deal.....but you do have to know!
You stated that Gnome did work opposed to KDE.....but at the right resolution or not?
The video card is an Ark1000PV with 1M of RAM which XFDrake/mcc correctly identifies in the setup. The card reports a dot clock rate of 80MHz
The standard driver for this card is 'arc' under XFree86 4 or the standard SVGA driver under 3.3.6.
The monitor is an Elonex MN069 15" The manufacturer has provided the following spec:
HorizSync: 30-54 kHz VertRefresh: 50-110 Hz Video Bandwidth: 100 Mhz
They suggest it should be capable of a max resolution of 1024x768 at 75Hz - though when using it under Windows I've never reliably got better than 800x600 at 60Hz and 16bit colour depth - which is what I want to be able to use under Linux.
But the best that I've been able to achieve so far is 800x600 at 8bit colour depth - which isn't too good - 256 colours leaves a lot to be desired. I've only been able to achieve this under XFree86 v3.3.6 - not the latest version - which as I reported above is currently resulting in a blank screen. I really don't mind what version of XFREe86 I use - just as long as what appears on the screen is useable.
All the results so far have been achieved using Gnome. KDE doesn't seem to start up at all. It only gets as far as displaying various versions of the background for the desktop, and sometimes one icons on the bottom rhs of the display. Another user had reported similar problems here with KDE and success with Gnome and other desktops. So I think that's a KDE problem and not directly connected with this resolution/bit depth problem and I'm happy to leave sorting KDE to another time.
In any case it seems to me though that as all the desktops use the same underlying XFree86 the problem must be to do with configuring XFree86 for this combination of graphics card and monitor to try to come up with a modeline in the config file that works to give access to 16 bit colour depth.
Although it might be tempting to just replace the graphics card and/or monitor - which admittedly are somewhat old - it's not an option at the moment. Anyway - if it works under Windows NT it seems to me that it ought to work under Linux too!
Regards
David Bell
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