[rv370] 800x600 resolution chosen on X300

I tested this bug with a ATI MOBILITY radeon X300 and it didn't happen. It seems to just happen with the ATI radeon X300 at this time.

Does Ubuntu apply a different resolution after the installation or you have to set the parameters manually?

I'm trying to install on a VM (Virtualbox) and exactly the same, The resolution came as 800x600 making it impossible (very difficult) unless hiding both bars.

The actual livecd installer from what I could find.

Jose Castillo or Ramon Casha :

Did you look if an appropriate graphic driver was found for your graphic card?

Try to open a terminal and type "glxinfo | grep direct"

If you get something like "Mesa indirect", it's because no driver has been choosed for your graphic card.
If you get something like "Yes", it should mean that the driver for your graphic card is correctly installed.

Jose Castillo : Thanks for your last comments, it will help as I will be able to reproduce the bug on any computer.

I tested the bug inside VirtualBox on Linux Ubuntu and on Windows XP and I can't confirm the bug. I always get a 1024X728 screen with VESA driver.

Because VirtualBox always use the same virtual graphic card for his virtual OS, the result shouldn't be different between one computer and another, so the only logical reason is that we don't have the same Ubuntu or VirtualBox version.

I use the latest Ubuntu 7.10 stable release version and the latest VirtualBox, the two were downloaded today, october 10th, from the virtualbox and ubuntu websites.

october 19th* sorry

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ glxinfo | grep direct
direct rendering: No (If you want to find out why, try setting LIBGL_DEBUG=verbose)
OpenGL renderer string: Mesa GLX Indirect
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$

This is running Virtualbox 1.5.2 on the final Ubuntu live CD Gutsy 7.10 (non OSE) running over Windows XP SP2 with all security updates. Hopefully under other platforms similar activity should be available.

Please let me know if you need further assistance.

BTW this is running over a Vaio SZ-280p with a 1280x800 display.

My image file MD5 is: d2334dbba7313e9abc8c7c072d2af09c

We have the same md5sum for our ISO file, and I used VirtualBox 1.5.2 too, so that's pretty weird.. I think that I have no choice but admit that this problem is a resolution detection problem which happens on certain graphic cards / screen only. That would mean that Virtualbox gives to the virtual OS a partial direct communication with the Graphic Card or Screen of the Host computer ( that would explain how fast VirtualBox is ).

Jose Castillo : Can you test booting your computer with the Ubuntu 7.10 CD ? ( no need to install, but just to boot on the live CD to see if this happens outside Virtualbox on your computer ).

I looked on virtualbox forums and found this: http://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?t=2290

I'm right now burning the CD to reboot on the LiveCD and check. As comment I tried to boot kubuntu liveCD on Virtualbox and got the same 800x600 maximum resolution. (had both since I've been helping out the torrents)

I also have 2 video cards (The Vaio SZ is a hybrid video card system) all the testing has been done on the Integrated Intel video card, I will also try the nVidia to try to narrow down the possible scenario.

Jose Castillo : Can you also do a "lspci" in a terminal and look which graphic cards are detected on your computer?

Both Intel & nVidia card worked without problems and detected the correct resolution (1280x800 in my case).

I also tried running Virtualbox with the nVidia card under Windows XP and it also "stays" @ 800x600. (Both Ubuntu & Kubuntu)

Also (maybe worth mentioning) I'm using VT-x (my CPU supports it) under Virtualbox. (Although it happens also with VT-x turned off)

I'm attaching my Virtualbox machine settings so maybe this way you can replicate the problem.

I successfully reproduced the bug with a ATI card tested with two 15" screen. This didn't happen with my numerous tests with nvidia or intel drivers.

On Virtualbox it detects as 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: InnoTek Systemberatung GmbH VirtualBox Graphics Adapter.

If you need the one from the livecd let me know.

Oh yes sorry, I would need the one from livecd please :) Thanks

Ramon, thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. Please attach your X server configuration file (/etc/X11/xorg.conf) and X server log file (/var/log/Xorg.0.log) to the bug report as individual uncompressed file attachments using the "Attachment:" box below. Could you please also try to run without any /etc/X11/xorg.conf and let Xorg autodetect your display and video card? Please also attach the /var/log/Xorg.0.log from this attempt. Thanks in advance.

Running the computer on the "speed" (nVidia) side:

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation G72M [GeForce Go 7400] (rev a1)

Running the computer on "stamina" (Intel) side:

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GM/GMS, 943/940GML Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)
00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GM/GMS/GME, 943/940GML Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)

Hope this helps

This bug report is about Ramon's ATI card, therefore I think information about other people's hardware and issues is not so helpful.

Tormod, I want to make the point that it's not ATI's card only, as this issue happens on Virtualbox as well. Which I don't know if it uses the same driver. Originally it was not assigned to a particular package, hence I added my comments about Virtualbox, should I open another bug report, or do you think we can be talking about the same bug?

Before we know they have the same origin, we better treat these issues separately. It is easy enough to merge bugs later, but difficult to analyse a bug report with possibly many different issues. I suggest you open a new bug, and give us your bug number here.

Except if Tormod believe that I'm not right:

I think that as long that the computer finally have a 800x600 resolution when booting on the LiveCD, it MUST be considered as a part of that bug because we must list which drivers/graphic cards have this problem. In your case, it just happens in VirtualBox which is interesting for testing purposes but seems to be affected by a similar ( but different and perhaps a bit more complicate ) bug. If you want to continue working on the bug with VirtualBox, I suggest that you create another bug and create a link in the description of that bug to the bug #154142.

And if you can reproduce the bug on any computer when booting on the LiveCD, I think that specifying the graphic card (lspci) and the attaching "/etc/X11/xorg.conf" file ( or just the name of the driver used ) would be very appropriate.

Thanks a lot for the informations you provided this far.

Tormod Volden :

Please read my comments on this bug, I confirmed the bug too. I tested Ramon Casha bug in the same condition, with a ATI card and got the same problems. With the help of Jose Castillo, I also discovered that it only happens with ATI, not nvidia or Intel. This doesn't happens with all ATI cards but apparently only those which doesn't get a "Direct Rendering".

I attach the xorg.conf file of the card which doesn't work.

I would like to see Ramon's Xorg.0.log, but if you have the exact same description as his, please attach yours. And the output from xrandr --verbose

I just got home and tried the Live CD on my AIW Radeon X800 Pro and it does detect 1024x728. Yet it doesn't detect (like my laptop) the monitor's maximum resolution of 1280x1024. And shows 1280x800 as maximum possible value.

Tormod Volden : I have exactly the same bug with a ATI card ( probably not exactly the same card ).

Thanks, just tell me if I can give further info or help. It would be helpful to get Ramon files too.

Saïvann, you have only 2MB of video RAM. That limits the pixels to 800x600 in 24bit depth. Please try to set DefaultDepth to 16 instead (in xorg.conf) and restart X.

Ramon's X300 card most probably has loads of video RAM, and he has another problem.

Tormod Volden : It also works when configuring the card with the new screen manager in Gutsy, but the 1024x728 isn't automatic. I can't provide more help here, thanks for your great work on that. I can only say that the Mobility Radeon X300 doesn't have this problem, but I don't have the PCI X300 Card.

Ramon : Your help here would be very appreciated :)

This worked for me:

1. Start Restricted Driver Manager
2. Enable the Proprietary drivers for your graphics card. DO NOT RESTART when prompted to do so
3. Press <Ctrl><Alt><Bkspace>

X will restart and use graphics drivers

4. Select required resolution
5. Install Ubuntu and have fun.

Nice solution. I will try it on my X800 to see if it works. (I only get 1024x728 and not 1280x1024)

This won't work on Virtualbox since there's no restricted driver.

Hi everyone,

Sorry I took so long to answer, but I only set up evolution now - I opted for a new installation instead of an upgrade.

Ultimately I did not do the install from the live CD because my hard disk is LVM'd so I had to get the alternate CD. However I will boot off the live cd again just to save the xorg.conf, xorg.log etc.

From the alternate CD, it detected and configured my graphics card correctly.

Here are the files...

It appears that the monitor was not detected - it found my ATI card.

It seems to start up in 1024x768 according to the log, are you sure it was 800x600?

(II) RADEON(0): Output VGA-0 using initial mode 1024x768
after xf86InitialConfiguration

However, the vertical DPI is wrongly calculated, 113 would correspond to 1024 vertical pixels:

(**) RADEON(0): Display dimensions: (300, 230) mm
(**) RADEON(0): DPI set to (86, 113)

Ramon, can you please report the output from: xdpyinfo|grep -A1 dimension

Anyway, talking to upstream on IRC it appears that "DPI set to" message doesn't matter much.

The fact that the Ubiquity installer does not play nice with low resolutions such as 800x600, is bug #38442. This was probably the essence in the original report here, anyway we'll keep this bug open for the issue that the wrong resolution is chosen for your card.

We are closing this bug report because it lacks the information we need to investigate the problem, as described in the previous comments. Please reopen it if you can give us the missing information, and don't hesitate to submit bug reports in the future. To reopen the bug report you can click on the current status, under the Status column, and change the Status back to "New". Thanks again!