# Screen Resolution wont stay put



## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

Yeah simply when i put my screen resolution to 1280x1024 (is that right?) after a reboot it reverts back to
800x600 its pretty annoying too. The login screen however is 1280x1024 but as soon as i login 1 second after the screen goes black and back to 800x600. Also my monitor doesn't seem to be in the "screen and graphics " section. My monitor is "BenQ FP71G" and the closes thing in there is "BenQ FP71E" do i need to download drivers for my monitor?

I've tried running the xorg.conf manually in the terminal didn't work. I tried taking out the resolutions and leaving but the one i wanted still didn't work. I'm thinking i need my monitor brand to appear in the screen and graphics then the rest will work fine.

Any ideas?


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

lol...ok i dont know why, but now my screen resolution stayed at 1280x1024 and i'm dead serious when i say i dont know how. But i would still like to know how to make my monitor brand appear in the screen and graphics section.


Edit: now it went back to 800x600, i have no clue why.


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## saikee (Jun 11, 2004)

If you are in root you can edit the /etc/X11/xorg.conf to make sure the following lines, marked red, are in

```
Section "Screen"
        Identifier      "Default Screen"
        Device          "ATI Technologies Inc RV280 [Radeon 9200 SE]"
        Monitor         "Philips 170B"
        DefaultDepth    [B][COLOR="Blue"]24[/COLOR][/B]
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           1
                Modes           "1280x1024" "1280x960" "1152x864" "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "720x400" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           4
                Modes           "1280x1024" "1280x960" "1152x864" "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "720x400" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           8
                Modes           "1280x1024" "1280x960" "1152x864" "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "720x400" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           15
                Modes           "1280x1024" "1280x960" "1152x864" "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "720x400" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           16
                Modes           "1280x1024" "1280x960" "1152x864" "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "720x400" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
        SubSection "Display"
                Depth           [B][COLOR="Blue"]24[/COLOR][/B]
                Modes           "[B][COLOR="Red"]1280x1024[/COLOR][/B]" "1280x960" "1152x864" "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "720x400" "640x480"
        EndSubSection
EndSection
```
You can just add the new resolution. Save the file. Press ctrl+alt+backspace, log in again and the new resolution should stay.

Some distros allow changes ib the desktop but may not keep the alteration. Could be down to a bug.


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

Ok first off, that didn't work, 2 off it screwed up my screen. I dont even know how. All i changed was 1 resolution. I took out the [email protected] and replaced it with [email protected] now i cant even regonize my screen because its so distorted. What now....i tried recovery mode but it wont let me access the xorg.conf file. 

I wish ubuntu would be just as easy as Microsoft sometimes. Simple gui just click click.


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## saikee (Jun 11, 2004)

How about showing us your xorg.conf?

You have said the higher resolution actually works but could not be not kept. The vertical and horizontal frequecies are kept elsewhere and you should stick with the notation as used in xorg.conf. I have not shown "[email protected]".


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

ok well 2 things. I cant even see my screen cause its so distorted like i see my screen x4 but in small trips and its cloneish and weird. The reason i put [email protected] is because all the other resolutions are @60 for refresh rate so yeah. I might have hit a typo and put like 6 or something lol. 

Any way to replace my xorg.conf file with a new one, or undo changes?


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## saikee (Jun 11, 2004)

Whenever you can see a video or it becomes funny just press ctrl+alt+backspace to drop yourself into the terminal mode. (also ctrl+F1 to ctrl+F4)

In terminal you can edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf as many times as you want.

Save the file and then you can reload the desktop by typing

```
startx
```
Just repeat as many times as you like until you beat Linux into submission.


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

well i managed to get my screen back to normal by replacing the xorg.conf with one of the livecd but now i'm back to square one. My screen still doesn't stay with 1280x1024.


edit : Oh and by the way, now my compiz fusion seems to be disabled >.>

edit edit : nevermind reinstalled the restricted drivers lol


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

I think the main reason why my screen resolution wont stay put is because i cant seem to save my nvidia x server settings. Heres a screenshot:


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## tomdkat (May 6, 2006)

Sometimes, X will use the "preferred" resolution of the monitor instead of the resolution you configure. I have the same issue as you from time to time on my Ubuntu 7.10 system at home. There's a directive you can put in X's config file that will tell it to ignore the "preferred" resolution reported by the monitor. It's "UsePreferredMode" and you can read about it here. On that page, search for "UsePreferredMode" and you will see how to set it to false.

Good luck!

EDIT: You'll also need to find out why the backup xorg.conf file can't be saved.

Peace...


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

Thnaks for that, i'll read it in just a sec. But heres an update on what i did 2 seconds ago. Seeing as nvidia settings couldn't or wouldn't create a new backup. i actually saved the xorg.conf and xorg.conf.backup to my desktop.

Opened the xorg.conf with terminal root user copy pasted the new xorg.conf. Then saved it, then saved the xorg.conf as xorg.conf.backup. (if you get what i mean just i made 2 copies from 1, and called the other one .backup.). Now if i try and save a setting in nvidia x server settings i get the following:



Edit : in my X11 folder why do i have like 10 xorg.conf files?


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

got it, just needed to do "sudo nvidia-settings" and it saved no problem 

But about the preferredmode i was reading a bit of it, but it is a lil' confusing. I'm just wondering if you could maybe give me a heads up on the right format. I've got an idea of how it should look. But i'm not quite sure.


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## tomdkat (May 6, 2006)

Well, if the problem doesn't happen again, don't bother with the UsePreferredMode setting. If it comes back, let us know and we can go over using it. 

Peace...


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

lol after saving it in nvidia settings, and after reboot, my resolution still didn't stay at 1280x1024.

>_<


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## saikee (Jun 11, 2004)

Can you show us the xorg.conf?

I never alter anything other than the xorg.conf and have not experienced such a bother.


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## tomdkat (May 6, 2006)

Yes, as saikee requests please post your xorg.conf file. According to the XFree86 doc, the UsePreferredMode option goes in the "Monitor" section, something like this:


```
Section "Monitor"
    Identifier "name"
    entries
    ...
   Option "UsePreferredMode" "False"
EndSection
```
I found out about the UsePreferredMode option from the XFree86 developers back when I ran XFree86 4.3.x (and later) on Slackware Linux.

However, the sooner you can post your xorg.conf file, the better we can help you out. 

Peace...


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

Alright sorry it took me so long to post back >.>

Here's the xorg.conf file:



> # xorg.conf (xorg X Window System server configuration file)
> #
> # This file was generated by dexconf, the Debian X Configuration tool, using
> # values from the debconf database.
> ...


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## tomdkat (May 6, 2006)

Ok, try adding:

Option "UsePreferredMode" "false"

to your Monitor section, like this:

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Generic Monitor"
Option "DPMS"
Horizsync 28-64
Vertrefresh 43-60
*Option "UsePreferredMode" "false"*
EndSection

Make sure "false" is all lower case. Restart X and see if your configured resolution sticks. Also, can you post what the file permissions are on your xorg.conf file?

Peace...


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## saikee (Jun 11, 2004)

Try also in the Section "Screen" (marked *red*)


```
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Device "nVidia Corporation NV43 [GeForce 6600 GT]"
Monitor "Generic Monitor"
Defaultdepth 24
SubSection "Display"
[B][COLOR="Red"]Depth   24[/COLOR][/B]
Modes "1280x1024" "1152x864" "1024x768" "832x624" "800x600" "720x400" "640x480" "128x0"
EndSubSection
EndSection
```


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

Alright here are the results:

First off, adding "preferredmode" "false" did not seem to work. ( i put all lower case too)

Second of all, i'm not sure i get what you mean by xorg.conf permissions, if you're asking if i'm root user? than yes i am. I can modify the xorg.conf only by terminal manually going to the file doens't work.

Third of all, Saikee i dont get what you mean by the screen section marked in red. Do you want me to add ("preferredmode" "false") in that section too? or make sure my depth is at 24, because i did post a copy of my xorg.conf.

Lastly whenever i open nvidia settings by command from the terminal i get this before it opens.


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## tomdkat (May 6, 2006)

blue4paper said:


> First off, adding "preferredmode" "false" did not seem to work. ( i put all lower case too)


Did you specify "preferredmode" or "*UsePreferredMode*"?

Peace...


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## blue4paper (Aug 11, 2007)

Ah Ha! I got my solution. Found it off some site. Here are the steps i followed.



> All, here is the solution:
> 
> 1. Remove nvidia binary driver if already installed.
> 2. Run in terminal 'sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg' choose autodetect where possible, choose nv driver, choose defaults except for screen resolution - set to 1440x900
> ...


I did most of the steps except, instead of super user i just went "sudo gedit xorg.conf" since "sudo-s" didn't work or wasn't recognized as a command for some reason. And in "device" my "nv" was already "nvidia" but yeah i rebooted the computer and the resolution didn't go back!

But i still get that message when i open up nvidia settings through terminal. (picture from post before)

PS: i did copy and paste "usepreferredmode" "false" but didn't work.


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## akolagtech (Jan 2, 2008)

Did your system detect your monitor name and model when installing your OS?


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