[Solved]Unable to change resolution

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DragonSky
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[Solved]Unable to change resolution

Post#1 by DragonSky » 20 Jul 2016, 18:35

After discovering Porteus last week and tinkering with it on my laptop(I love this distro so far!), I decided to take every PC in my house, completely get rid of Windows and install Porteus on each one of them. All of them worked flawlessly, except my main computer(because duh... things go wrong on the important stuff only :wall:).

So, what happened? Well it isn't anything critical, but it is quite annoying. After installing Porteus, I noticed that the screen was a little blurry - sign that the display isn't at the right resolution. I checked the settings and I was right. Porteus is set at 1024x768, but my monitor's optimal resolution is 1366x768.

I thought it was because I hadn't installed the drivers for my video card(NVidia GeForce GT 630) yet, so I went and did that. (By the way, what do you recommend? Official drivers(from their site, or from a USM package) or the Nouveau drivers?)

I installed the "nvidia-driver-352.63-x86_64-3_slack.xzm" and the "nvidia-kernel-352.63_3.10.17-x86_64-3_slack.xzm" packages, moved them to /porteus/modules, and rebooted.

After rebooting, Xorg spits out two error messages, one about "X.conf being invalid; deleting configs" and one about "falling back to modeset" or something similar. They flash for a second before loading XFCE, so I can't see them clearly(also, the screen is a bit blurry, remember :D ).

XFCE loads normally, and the system is okay, but I still can't make the resolution higher(I can make it lower now, though).

Any tips or ideas how to fix this? I spent a while to fancify XFCE, and a blurry screen doesn't fit my definition of "fancy"...
Last edited by DragonSky on 21 Jul 2016, 18:15, edited 3 times in total.

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DragonSky
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Somehow solved it, but...

Post#2 by DragonSky » 20 Jul 2016, 19:06

I did a "Start Fresh" boot to delete the /porteus/changes folder so I can get rid of some settings I didn't want, and after a quick reboot the screen became perfectly clear and nice... except this happened: http://imgur.com/a/trHW9

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Re: Unable to change resolution

Post#3 by donald » 20 Jul 2016, 19:15

which version of porteus do you use?
If 3.1 64 bit (stable) you will find nvidia drivers at
http://dl.porteus.org/x86_64/current/drivers/

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Re: Unable to change resolution

Post#4 by DragonSky » 20 Jul 2016, 19:23

donald wrote:which version of porteus do you use?
If 3.1 64 bit (stable) you will find nvidia drivers at
http://dl.porteus.org/x86_64/current/drivers/

Thanks! Going to install them once I manage to make text readable again --> http://imgur.com/a/trHW9

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Re: Unable to change resolution

Post#5 by francois » 21 Jul 2016, 02:57

If donald solution does not work please provide the output of:

Code: Select all

xrandr
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Re: Unable to change resolution

Post#6 by DragonSky » 21 Jul 2016, 06:57

francois wrote:If donald solution does not work please provide the output of:

Code: Select all

xrandr
Here's the output:

Code: Select all

Screen 0: minimum 8 x 8, current 1024 x 768, maximum 16384 x 16384
DVI-I-0 disconnected primary (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
VGA-0 connected 1024x768+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 0mm x 0mm
   1024x768       60.0*+
   800x600        72.2     60.3     56.2  
   640x480        59.9  
   512x384        60.0  
   400x300        72.2  
   320x240        60.1  
DVI-I-1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
HDMI-0 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
Also, I noticed that when using Start Fresh, the screen looks normally, but in normal booting it doesn't.

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Re: Unable to change resolution

Post#7 by donald » 21 Jul 2016, 08:41

again, which porteus version?

Troubleshoot:
Boot porteus into normal mode without your -- most likely messed up -- changes
and without any additional Modules -- does this work?.

Get the nvidia driver from
http://dl.porteus.org/x86_64/current/drivers/

According to nvidia both should work with your card
(click on "supported products")

304.123
http://www.nvidia.com/Download/driverRe ... 7034/en-us

340.58
http://www.nvidia.com/download/driverRe ... 9413/en-us

Put one of them into the Modules folder > reboot

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Re: Unable to change resolution

Post#8 by DragonSky » 21 Jul 2016, 09:54

I use Porteus Desktop 3.1 64-bit with XFCE.


I tried booting using the "Start Fresh" option, installed the module, and the problem is still here.

X.org or the NVidia driver tries to force to set the PC resolution to 1280x720, but the correct(native) resolution is 1366x768, and as a result the screen is blurry.

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Re: Unable to change resolution

Post#9 by francois » 21 Jul 2016, 11:51

Let's verify the video card first and then come back to xrandr viewtopic.php?f=61&t=4781
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Re: Unable to change resolution

Post#10 by DragonSky » 21 Jul 2016, 18:14

I solved it by myself. The problem was with Xorg.conf, which had incorrect settings. More specifically the Horizsync and Vertrefresh parameters, which had weird values.

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Re: [Solved]Unable to change resolution

Post#11 by francois » 22 Jul 2016, 03:51

Good for you. :D

This means it could have been fixed with xrandr too viewtopic.php?f=61&t=3203

Fixing a single screen resolution xrandr.
See the experience of @Petr.kx, who was caught with a resolution under the one that could be attained with his display:
http://www.slax.org/forum.php?action=vi ... ostid37773

Here Petr.kx wanted to add a resolution 1400x900 with a frequency of 60 that was not provided stock by the xorg.conf setting:

Code: Select all

root@slax:~# gtf 1400 900 60
 # 1400x900 @ 60.00 Hz (GTF) hsync: 55.92 kHz; pclk: 104.23 MHz
 Modeline "1400x900_60.00" 104.23 1400 1480 1632 1864 900 901 904 932 -HSync +Vsync
 root@slax:~# xrandr --newmode "1400x900_60.00" 104.23 1400 1480 1632 1864 900 901 904 932 -HSync +Vsync
 root@slax:~# xrandr --addmode VGA "1400x900_60.00"
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