UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

My laptop is goes black when I perform startx in Red Hat 9. I used a generic monitor type, just like Red Hat documentation instructs, during the installation. Now after the installation I am unable to run RedHat-Config-xfree86, the screen just goes blank. I am trying to just edit the XFree86config file using VI. I am noticing that the Display values are 0.0. Is this the source of my problem or is there another way to configure my display? Please help

The Display value has nothing to do with your monitor's resolution, 0.0 is normal, designating the first display on your system.

You'll need to know more about your monitor to write a good config file, most importantly, it's maximum horizontal and vertical refresh rates. I was fortunate enough to have my monitor autodetected by Mandrake way back when, it looks like this:

Code:

Section "Monitor"
# HorizSync is in kHz unless units are specified.
# HorizSync may be a comma separated list of discrete values, or a
# comma separated list of ranges of values.
    Identifier "Dell"
    VendorName "Plug'n Play"
    ModelName "Dell D1025TM"
    HorizSync 30-85
    VertRefresh 50-120
    DisplaySize 434 406
EndSection

Note that this is an example. Use values from YOUR MONITOR. The wrong values could possibly DAMAGE YOUR MONITOR, though fortunately monitors are better about that than they used to be. DisplaySize is something I filled in later to tell Xfree the literal physical dimensions of my monitor to stop font sizes from jumping around, it describes the width and height of the display in millimeters.

The display is only part of it. These sections come in any order, but next, my graphics card is described:

Code:

Section "Device"
    Identifier "r7500"
    Driver     "radeon"
    VideoRam   65536
    Option     "AGPMode"        "4"
    Option     "AGPFastWrite"   "on"
#    Option     "backingstore"   "true"
#           Option     "EnablePageFlip" "on"
EndSection

These are decent settings for an ATI Radeon 7500, using the open-source radeon driver. Your video card may and probably does differ, google up the appropriate settings for it.

Here's the part that actually defines resolutions:

Code:

Section "Screen"
    Identifier  "Screen 1"
    Device      "r7500"
    Monitor     "Dell"
    DefaultDepth 16

    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       8
        Modes       "1280x1024" "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       16
        Modes       "1280x1024" "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       24
        Modes       "1280x1024" "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
EndSection

Notice how it joins the Monitor section with a Device section. DefaultDepth is the bits-per-pixel of the default video mode you want.

There's tons more in XF86Config, but those are the parts dealing with displays, video cards, and display resolutions.

You'll need to find out more about what hardware you have in your laptop before you can edit your XF86Config for it by hand.