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Works great - except for video resolution. Help?

Posted: Wed Nov 29, 2017 2:56 am
by JaybirdC
I fired up Kolibri OS 0.7.7 from a CD, on my Windows XP-equipped IBM Netvista P4 (2004?) Everything came up almost instantly and most of it works, except that all video is stuck in 640x480. My monitor is 1366X768 and Kolibri 640x480 screens stretch themselves to fit, so the aspect ratio etc is all wrong. Pictures are stretched in the viewer, etc.

When I booted, Kolibri gave me only 3 video options: one 320x200 and two 640x480 - and it auto-selected the better 640x480 with plenty of colours. I tried re-booting several times, with the same result. Then I went into the system screen and used the "Video options" icon. The panel displayed was blank - no options whatsoever. I found a debug screen that said my VESA was recognized - I hope that info might help.

The only other problem was the DEBUG panel. It shakes, is unstable and difficult to read. Odd, considering all other screens and programs work. I was just looking at it - no program loaded.

Can you please tell me how I might get the video to work correctly. If not 1366x768, then 1280x768 might do. Thanks!

JaybirdC

Re: Works great - except for video resolution. Help?

Posted: Fri Dec 01, 2017 2:54 am
by dunkaist
Hi JaybirdC,

I hoped someone else replies, I'm not an expert in VGA related stuff.
JaybirdC wrote:I fired up Kolibri OS 0.7.7 from a CD
Did you really try 0.7.7.0 release from 2009 or it was a fresh nightbuild aka 0.7.7.0+?
JaybirdC wrote:When I booted, Kolibri gave me only 3 video options: one 320x200 and two 640x480 - and it auto-selected the better 640x480 with plenty of colours. I tried re-booting several times, with the same result. Then I went into the system screen and used the "Video options" icon. The panel displayed was blank - no options whatsoever.
KolibriOS can't change VESA modes on the fly. AFAIK, this application works together with VGA card specific drivers which don't exist for your card.
JaybirdC wrote:I found a debug screen that said my VESA was recognized - I hope that info might help.
If you mean PCIDEV program, what are VendorID/DeviceID columns for you card. Also, you can find a VESA version supported by hardware on the blue boot screen, is it 2.0?
JaybirdC wrote:The only other problem was the DEBUG panel. It shakes, is unstable and difficult to read.
Could you describe in more detail, please? It may be hard to read because of a number of logs at system start. What do you mean by unstable, does it crash?

Re: Works great - except for video resolution. Help?

Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 10:51 pm
by JaybirdC
Thanks for your interest, dunkaist. Much appreciated.

(1) It was a fresh nightbuild - not a 2009 version.
(2) I'll get back to you on the PCIDEV program and VESA version - I'm not at home right now. I THINK the VESA is 3.0 - not sure.
(3) The DEBUG panel: It looked like a different video mode to the rest. Letters were small and very sharp. Screen was black, print was white. It did not crash, but flickered badly - as if the refresh rate was wrong. This was the only program that behaved that way. The rest displayed in 640x480. Images, in graphics programs (e.g. viewer) were "stretched".

I'm beginning to think there might be something proprietary about the IBM on-board graphics that Kolibri doesn't like. Perhaps a different brand of computer... (which I don't have, right now.) Although I have several live Linux CDs and they're all fine - no video problems.

J.

Re: Works great - except for video resolution. Help?

Posted: Thu Dec 07, 2017 1:36 am
by baggacfreak
You could try kolibri os within qemu, virtualbox or vmplayer. I guess your hardware is not supported correctly. Maybe you can get the bios to set it to vesa 2.0?!?