Setting the refresh rate in X

Forum: X and Fluxbox
Topic: Setting the refresh rate in X
started by: brycen

Posted by brycen on Mar. 28 2007,18:40

We're new to DSL, but installed it on several old PC's that would otherwise have been discarded.

It's great, but looking at the monitor is painful. How can we up the refresh rate in X? 70 or 80 hertz would be fine. Several posts on this forum say it's impossible in xvesa, others talk about modifying XF86Config's mode lines. It all gets muddy. No post is clear on how to make the fix persist in case of a HDD install (which we have) or a live CD install (which would be good for a complete reference on the topic).

Can we make a definitive guide to this (seemingly) FAQ here?

Posted by lucky13 on Mar. 28 2007,19:31

Why did bump another thread that's been dormant for nearly a year after already posting this about the same issue 10 minutes previously?

The information is already available elsewhere, putting it in menus is redundant. It's not anyone else's responsibility to read it since hardware configurations are unique. DSL is stripped. The S is for SMALL. Adding all the crap back to it would make it big again.

That's what the wiki is for:
< http://damnsmalllinux.org/wiki/index.php/Xvesa >
< http://damnsmalllinux.org/wiki/index.php/XF86Config-4 >
< http://damnsmalllinux.org/wiki/index.php/Xfbdev >

Posted by brycen on Mar. 28 2007,19:50

It's a lot of work to find good info on this topic -- that's why. And links above do not address the refresh topic at all.
< http://damnsmalllinux.org/wiki/index.php/Xfbdev > for example talks only about VESA BIOS modes. Only an expert on the topic would know that VESA 2.0 did not include refresh rate control.

It sure does seem to be a sensitive topic in the DSL world, though. Ouch!

Posted by lucky13 on Mar. 28 2007,20:10

Those pages have links to xfree86.org that have more information. If Xvesa doesn't work, give the Xfree86 extension in MyDSL a shot. Be sure you read through everything at henk's site before you try configuring.

Posted by brycen on Mar. 28 2007,23:05

I look forward to instructions an average user or corporate system administrator can easily follow. I think DSL could be very useful for turning old PC's into web terminals, but the refresh rate issue is a non-starter for that application.

Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Mar. 29 2007,13:50

In short, you'll probably want to use the XFree86 extension (searching around will show you that).

You can use custom modelines, changing modes on the fly, etc. but the easiest is probably editing Monitor > VertRefresh in the xconfig, or using one of those frontends (I think there's one in mydsl). See wiki for more info on editing the XF86Config-4 file.