color depth

Forum: X and Fluxbox
Topic: color depth
started by: konrad

Posted by konrad on April 24 2005,00:22

for some reason in dsl, I cannot get it to do any color depth greater than 8 bits. I've run xsetup.sh as root and selecting a depth changed nothing.

Posted by SaidinUnleashed on April 24 2005,00:46

Try one of the framebuffer modes.

At the Boot: prompt, type fb800x600, fb1024x768, or fb1280x1024.

-J.P.

Posted by konrad on April 24 2005,00:54

I have it installed to HD... do I have to do that every boot?

Posted by konrad on April 24 2005,01:16

I just tried the fb1280x1024 (my moniter definatly goes that high) setting, and X won't even start.

this machine also has limited ram - 64 MB.
the cpu is an old celeron medecino @ 500Mhz
some generic 10 GB hard drive @ 5400 rpm

Posted by SaidinUnleashed on April 24 2005,02:11

try fb800x600

perhaps the problem is your card.

Posted by konrad on April 24 2005,02:36

from a HDinstall, how does one boot fb*x* (fb800x600, fb1024x768, fb1280x1024) at all?

Posted by cbagger01 on April 24 2005,13:16

Edit your /etc/lilo.conf (as user root: sudo beaver /etc/lilo.conf)

Above the append line, choose vga=xxx where xxx is the framebuffer code from your F3 livecd boot menu.

Edit your append statement and add fb???x???

Activate your changes with:

sudo lilo -v

Posted by konrad on April 24 2005,19:28

Now I can't even get it to start X. It complains about not being able to connect to X server. Does this have to do with not having enough ram, and if so is there any way to make the startup process consume less of it?

Posted by cbagger01 on April 24 2005,19:47

No, it probably has to do with you choosing an unsupported frame buffer.

Try a different code until you find one that works.

If your framebuffer is working you can try some vesa options instead if needed. Type xsetup.sh and make new choices and then type startx to try them out.

Posted by konrad on April 24 2005,20:01

No, I mean I try it without any options, or with options, and X won't start... but sometimes it starts without any constant options. It seems random when it does.

Posted by mike'o on May 24 2005,08:25

Hi konrad.

Check the amount of memory on your video card.
I have an old Compaq notebook which only has 890 kB (or so)of video memory. While the screen supports 800x600 16 bit colors it can't still be used as it requires at least 940 kB (or 960 000 Bytes, which can be calculated like this: 800 x 600 x 16 bit/pixel / 8 bits/Byte) of memory in the video card.

I'm truly unhappy of the designers' decision to put this little memory on the chip, when the screen could do much better

I hope they feel remorse :;):

Anyway, I hope this helps.

Mike

Btw. If you don't know how much video ram your card has, try booting with the CD, as I saw it somewhere during boot process. Or try 'dmesg | less' in console if your box is already running. It shows the kernel messages during boot.