Widescreen Monitor Support

[CatDude]

Hello all

Not sure if this is the best section of the forum for this, but here goes.

Over the past several months i have been considering buying a new monitor
as my old DELL D1626HT 21" CRT was becoming a little hard on the eyes.
Both the brightness & contrast were set at 100%, yet it was like looking through fog,
especially after looking at Mrs CatDudes 17" TFT then looking back at my DELL.

The beasty had to go, but what do i get to replace it ?
Large (4:3 ratio) screens appeared like the proverbial rocking horse pooh,
and i would much rather have a nice slim/lightweight TFT anyway.

But my main concern was whether or not my graphics card would support widescreen monitors.

So recently i sent out several PM's to various forum members (those who run FX5200 graphics cards)
asking if they had any experience of using these cards with widescreen monitors.
Unfortunately it appears that nobody did. (Thank you for your replies anyway guys)

Well i was now left in what felt like a rather uncomfortable position, do i or don't i,
sod it i thought just "bite the bullet" and see what the crack is.

To cut what could be an even longer story short, here is what i found.

• Puppy version is a remastered 4.00 (k2.6.21.7)
  LG FLATRON W2242S (22" widescreen TFT, native resolution 1680x1050)
  MSI GeForce FX5200-TD128 (AGP 8x)
  NVIDIA-100.14.19-k2.6.21.7.pet (nvidia driver)

All i can say about the monitor is that it is, "Shit Hot" and not 1 dead pixel in sight.
I did nothing more than use the NVIDIA X Server Settings to set the screen resolution and refresh rate,
well i did have to reduce the brightness from 100% to 50% (even down to 20% under low light conditions)
and after the monitor had been on for 30 minutes, i hit the Auto/Set button and everything was nicely squared up on screen.

Attached is a screenshot showing the NVIDIA X Server Settings.

So there you have it, my graphics card does indeed support widescreen monitors.

If i may, i would like to use this thread to ask those of you using widescreen monitors,
to please provide details of what monitor/graphics card/driver/puppy version is working for you.
You can also add any Pro's & Con's that you feel may be helpful.

Hopefully anybody then finding this thread may at least find something that will help them,
if they find themselves in a similar predicament as i found myself in.


All the best, from one very happy (and relieved) pussycat
CatDude
.

****************************** Caution ******************************
Clicking on the thumbnail image will take you to the original FULL SIZE image (1680x1050)

[MU]

a general rule:

your card should run with a "native" driver.

You can look in /etc/X11/xorg.conf with an editor.

There is a "Section Device".
It has a line like:

Code: Select all

	Driver      "fglrx" #card0driver

Instead of "fglrx" you may see words like radeon, via, nv, nvidia, or intel.
But if you see "vesa", then Widescreen will not work.

If you find such a "native" driver there, also look at /var/log/Xorg.0.log.
It lists the supported modes.
For my Ati card, such lines are visible:

Code: Select all

(**) fglrx(0): *Mode "1680x1050": 146.2 MHz (scaled from 0.0 MHz), 65.3 kHz, 60.0 Hz
(II) fglrx(0): Modeline "1680x1050"x60.0  146.25  1680 1784 1960 2240  1050 1053 1059 1089 +hsync +vsync (65.3 kHz)
(**) fglrx(0): *Mode "1600x1200": 162.0 MHz (scaled from 0.0 MHz), 75.0 kHz, 60.0 Hz
(II) fglrx(0): Modeline "1600x1200"x60.0  162.00  1600 1664 1856 2160  1200 1201 1204 1250 (75.0 kHz)
(**) fglrx(0): *Mode "1440x900": 106.5 MHz (scaled from 0.0 MHz), 55.9 kHz, 60.0 Hz
(II) fglrx(0): Modeline "1440x900"x60.0  106.50  1440 1520 1672 1904  900 903 909 934 +hsync (55.9 kHz)
(**) fglrx(0): *Mode "1400x1050": 121.8 MHz (scaled from 0.0 MHz), 65.3 kHz, 60.0 Hz

There are many more, this is just a short example.
I see there:

Code: Select all

(II) fglrx(0): Modeline "1680x1050"x60.0

So the driver supports this mode.

Mark

[Burn_IT]

I have Puppy on my Dell C840 Laptop.
With the NVIDIA drivers installed I have my desktop spread across the 1600x1200 laptop screen and a Samsung Synmaster 1920x1200 external monitor.
That is one hell of a wide screen

[MU]

removed, I should learn to read

[MU]

removed, I should learn to read

[Burn_IT]

Mark, I said I have it working !!!!!

[MU]

ahh sorry, I thoght you have 1600, but want 1920... should read more carefully
Fine that it works
Marrk

[CatDude]

Hello MU

your card should run with a "native" driver.

I didn't realise that mate, i thought to get those resolutions i needed the "nvidia" driver.

Just to check (not that i didn't believe you or anything), i booted up a frugal install of Puppy 4.20 using the "nv" driver
as opposed to the "nvidia" driver and it did indeed work.

Thanks for the tip off.

@ Burn_IT

That is one hell of a wide screen

I think you could safely call it that , must be like watching a tennis match


CatDude
.

[MU]

CatDude,

I think, this is a misunderstanding.
Both are "native", the nv, and the nvidia.
"Non-native" is a "general" driver, like Vesa.
Vesa works with almost every card, but does not support special features, like video accelleration, or widescreen.

As the nvidia driver works for you, please use it. It has many advantages over the "nv" driver, that has no 3D support.

Mark

[CatDude]

Hello MU

I think, this is a misunderstanding.
Both are "native", the nv, and the nvidia.
"Non-native" is a "general" driver, like Vesa.
Vesa works with almost every card, but does not support special features, like video accelleration, or widescreen.

OK, now i get you.

As the nvidia driver works for you, please use it. It has many advantages over the "nv" driver, that has no 3D support.

For sure, i do normally use the "nvidia" driver in my main Puppy, and the "nv" driver in any Puppy that i am just testing out,
but it is nice to know that the "nv" driver will actually run the widescreen resolution that i need.
Like i said, i thought i would need to install an "nvidia" driver just to be able to test any Puppy versions that i fancy.

Thank you for the clarification.
CatDude
.

[sikpuppy]

I think I will have to use the Nvidia driver with my main desktop setup, which is a shame because my setup thinks it's...setup properly when it isn't.

I have a Samsung 21" 1680x1050 monitor. Go for a probe on install and it tells me the video card (a 5 series Nvidia) is fine, but maybe the monitor isn't for such a high resolution.

It does however let me go to the maximum 1680x1050 even though it is pessimistic about success. It looked like crud on testing, so I checked and it said the resolution was 1680x1050 in the relevant section in Puppy.

When I checked my monitor, using the buttons on the front, it was actually running at 1400x1050. Hence it looked blurry and horrible. I cannot get any higher than that using the stock Xorg with Puppy 4.2.

To be fair, that is higher than Ubuntu could manage using Xorg drivers, but they rely on Restricted drivers on demand for setups like mine.