Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2014 22:50:05 -0700 From: Jin Guojun <jguojun@sbcglobal.net> To: Kevin Oberman <rkoberman@gmail.com> Cc: "freebsd-x11@freebsd.org" <freebsd-x11@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: How to configure a desired screen resolution Message-ID: <1413438605.141.YahooMailNeo@web180905.mail.ne1.yahoo.com> In-Reply-To: <CAN6yY1tSF=9cCgezOj1%2BQnRLtak7CDhTiNzPGE4SqgDW%2B1PbHQ@mail.gmail.com> References: <1413414700.93082.YahooMailNeo@web180904.mail.ne1.yahoo.com> <CAN6yY1tSF=9cCgezOj1%2BQnRLtak7CDhTiNzPGE4SqgDW%2B1PbHQ@mail.gmail.com>
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I am not sure why you think this is BIOS issue. If this is BIOS issue, only one monitor should work with ASUS motherboard according to your theory. Monitor A works on medium resolution, and Monitor B works on higher resolution but not works in the medium resolution individually. However, when both Monitors are attached to the ASUS motherboard, then both can work in the medium resolution. From this point, neither the BIOS nor the Monitor is the issue. On Wednesday, October 15, 2014 6:11 PM, Kevin Oberman <rkoberman@gmail.com> wrote: On Wed, Oct 15, 2014 at 4:11 PM, Jin Guojun <jguojun@sbcglobal.net> wrote: > The latest xorg 1.7.7 seems too smart to configure. It always uses what it thinks and ignores what xorg.conf file tells to do. > > > I am using Vesa driver on 8.4-R / 10.1-RC amd kernel on the same hardware (ASUS A88XM-A motherboard) and experienced this difficulty. > > Two monitors: one has 1600x900 resolution and the other has 1920x1080 res. > When attaching 1600x900 monitor to the system, xorg-1.7.7 X server configures the screen as 1600x900, which is nice and it is what I wanted. > When connecting 1920x1080 monitor to the system, X server configures screen as 1920x1080, which is correct, but is will not give 1600x900 resolution regardless if the Modes "1600x900" is in Screen section in xorg.conf file. > > If attaching both monitors to the system, then both monitors will be configured as 1600x900, thus both monitors are capable to work in 1600x900 resolution. > > Now, how to tell (force) X server to use 1600x900 resolution for the 1920x1080 monitor? > > -Jin This is not an X or Xorg issue, I'm afraid. The problem is that ASUS has not updated the video BIOS for wide screen displays and, when using VESA, only BIOS supported display sizes will work. Some vendors, e.i. HP, have updated the BIOS on some systems to support wide screen sizes. Lenovo had not when support for Sandy Bridge Intel graphics became available. I keep meaning to switch the X server to VESA and see if the latest BIOS upgrade fixes this, but I have not gotten to it. This is particularly annoying as in both the HP and Lenovo cases I am talking about laptops with wide-screen displays, so VESA did not work right on the built-in display. I suspect it is less likely to work on a system that does not come with a display. There is simply no work-around for this. It is seems really silly in this day of wide-screen display being the norm, but it cost money to re-work BIOS and since Windows and Linux support the built-in graphics on almost all boards. I suspect you only hope is to move to a reasonable new FreeBSD supporting KMS for Radeon devices. I believe you need to add WITH_GALLIUM=YES to /etc/make.conf (echo "WITH_GALLIUM=YES" >> /etc/make.conf) before building the kernel. You will also need to update old xorg ports as NEW_XORG was only made default very recently. -- R. Kevin Oberman, Network Engineer, Retired E-mail: rkoberman@gmail.com From owner-freebsd-x11@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Oct 16 06:16:33 2014 Return-Path: <owner-freebsd-x11@FreeBSD.ORG> Delivered-To: freebsd-x11@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher AECDH-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 9F0D6F5A for <freebsd-x11@freebsd.org>; Thu, 16 Oct 2014 06:16:33 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail-ie0-x230.google.com (mail-ie0-x230.google.com [IPv6:2607:f8b0:4001:c03::230]) (using TLSv1 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-RC4-SHA (128/128 bits)) (Client CN "smtp.gmail.com", Issuer "Google Internet Authority G2" (verified OK)) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 6CA3FD7D for <freebsd-x11@freebsd.org>; Thu, 16 Oct 2014 06:16:33 +0000 (UTC) Received: by mail-ie0-f176.google.com with SMTP id rp18so2808497iec.35 for <freebsd-x11@freebsd.org>; Wed, 15 Oct 2014 23:16:32 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=20120113; h=mime-version:sender:in-reply-to:references:date:message-id:subject :from:to:cc:content-type; bh=174U2jwkXOa4xoZWdxsIahPafChP5zIYB4g9LDxRcXU=; b=jNiNQ+lcMFF3lcVlXB7EMm5/4Qk3N1vyrXTEvt2qocofgnnB/uzU2rtFVKaiG5LRO9 eEsRDyZ+GKmGCkneo1lKxvAEk4p7bUn+eizEwbYU8JzV5CawPdCv3bPG0U2rspVZHmoK bjlZWsugXQLIVLWZQcv3infJN43qJcldOc1mAFm3ra7XXe8/45pJMAxOCeps5zcAfMx8 /fV5XSUoQOCwc5d5KjURx4R5diYLj/IQAwIZlB4erzIz5Cz0km555mjmRH+rG70MT0K6 VqxpGoJtT+Df8brj/cigxL3kOYGvcodZ61wWAikjFC0p4iq+VwDAyaN7Qn0rwfC32/88 kldw== MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Received: by 10.42.87.6 with SMTP id w6mr2351767icl.10.1413440192814; Wed, 15 Oct 2014 23:16:32 -0700 (PDT) Sender: kob6558@gmail.com Received: by 10.107.11.141 with HTTP; Wed, 15 Oct 2014 23:16:32 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: <1413438605.141.YahooMailNeo@web180905.mail.ne1.yahoo.com> References: <1413414700.93082.YahooMailNeo@web180904.mail.ne1.yahoo.com> <CAN6yY1tSF=9cCgezOj1+QnRLtak7CDhTiNzPGE4SqgDW+1PbHQ@mail.gmail.com> <1413438605.141.YahooMailNeo@web180905.mail.ne1.yahoo.com> Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2014 23:16:32 -0700 X-Google-Sender-Auth: MBNoMW-vKOXFbpaQvKyiADyXl04 Message-ID: <CAN6yY1v2KWyx1K_uYsxWCCSwEibp8ELv5ODSJMiK3CkJ9Vh09w@mail.gmail.com> Subject: Re: How to configure a desired screen resolution From: Kevin Oberman <rkoberman@gmail.com> To: Jin Guojun <jguojun@sbcglobal.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Cc: "freebsd-x11@freebsd.org" <freebsd-x11@freebsd.org> X-BeenThere: freebsd-x11@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.18-1 Precedence: list List-Id: X11 on FreeBSD -- maintaining and support <freebsd-x11.freebsd.org> List-Unsubscribe: <http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/options/freebsd-x11>, <mailto:freebsd-x11-request@freebsd.org?subject=unsubscribe> List-Archive: <http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-x11/>; List-Post: <mailto:freebsd-x11@freebsd.org> List-Help: <mailto:freebsd-x11-request@freebsd.org?subject=help> List-Subscribe: <http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-x11>, <mailto:freebsd-x11-request@freebsd.org?subject=subscribe> X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2014 06:16:33 -0000 On Wed, Oct 15, 2014 at 10:50 PM, Jin Guojun <jguojun@sbcglobal.net> wrote: > I am not sure why you think this is BIOS issue. If this is BIOS issue, only > one monitor should work with ASUS motherboard according to your theory. > > Monitor A works on medium resolution, and Monitor B works on higher > resolution but not works in the medium resolution individually. > However, when both Monitors are attached to the ASUS motherboard, then both > can work in the medium resolution. From this point, neither the BIOS nor the > Monitor is the issue. > > > > On Wednesday, October 15, 2014 6:11 PM, Kevin Oberman <rkoberman@gmail.com> > wrote: > > > On Wed, Oct 15, 2014 at 4:11 PM, Jin Guojun <jguojun@sbcglobal.net> wrote: > >> The latest xorg 1.7.7 seems too smart to configure. It always uses what it >> thinks and ignores what xorg.conf file tells to do. >> >> >> I am using Vesa driver on 8.4-R / 10.1-RC amd kernel on the same hardware >> (ASUS A88XM-A motherboard) and experienced this difficulty. >> >> Two monitors: one has 1600x900 resolution and the other has 1920x1080 res. >> When attaching 1600x900 monitor to the system, xorg-1.7.7 X server >> configures the screen as 1600x900, which is nice and it is what I wanted. >> When connecting 1920x1080 monitor to the system, X server configures >> screen as 1920x1080, which is correct, but is will not give 1600x900 >> resolution regardless if the Modes "1600x900" is in Screen section in >> xorg.conf file. >> >> If attaching both monitors to the system, then both monitors will be >> configured as 1600x900, thus both monitors are capable to work in 1600x900 >> resolution. >> >> Now, how to tell (force) X server to use 1600x900 resolution for the >> 1920x1080 monitor? >> >> -Jin > > > This is not an X or Xorg issue, I'm afraid. The problem is that ASUS > has not updated the video BIOS for wide screen displays and, when > using VESA, only BIOS supported display sizes will work. Some vendors, > e.i. HP, have updated the BIOS on some systems to support wide screen > sizes. Lenovo had not when support for Sandy Bridge Intel graphics > became available. I keep meaning to switch the X server to VESA and > see if the latest BIOS upgrade fixes this, but I have not gotten to > it. This is particularly annoying as in both the HP and Lenovo cases I > am talking about laptops with wide-screen displays, so VESA did not > work right on the built-in display. I suspect it is less likely to > work on a system that does not come with a display. > > There is simply no work-around for this. It is seems really silly in > this day of wide-screen display being the norm, but it cost money to > re-work BIOS and since Windows and Linux support the built-in graphics > on almost all boards. > > I suspect you only hope is to move to a reasonable new FreeBSD > supporting KMS for Radeon devices. I believe you need to add > WITH_GALLIUM=YES to /etc/make.conf (echo "WITH_GALLIUM=YES" >> > /etc/make.conf) before building the kernel. You will also need to > update old xorg ports as NEW_XORG was only made default very recently. Sorry for the misinformation. I should have resized that 1600x900 is also wide screen. It does not take much arithmetic to see that it is a 16:9 aspect ratio. I also mis-read the problem description and see that it is almost certainly not a BIOS issue. Try using xrandr(1) to check it out. It will tel you what resolutions are supported and will let you set it to any supported values. The man page is pretty complete. You can use --addmode to add modes and --newmode to define additional mode lines. (Be careful with the latter as it can cause damage if it is set values out of the specs of the display.) The xrandr command with no arguments or options provides the list of modes and output names. You need the output name for to set the mode. xrandr --output OUTPUT_NAME --mode 1600x900 xrandr --addmode OUTPUT_NAME 1600x900 Again, sorry for not reading your message more carefully. Note that the monitor may not tell X that 1600x900 is available. Oh, and VESA will not provide much in the way of performance, though for almost anything that is not graphics intensive, it should be OK. -- R. Kevin Oberman, Network Engineer, Retired E-mail: rkoberman@gmail.com
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