can't play to LCD projector

[Rick Stevens]

On Wed, 2006-02-01 at 16:36 -0500, Jason Pinkney wrote:
> Dear List,
> I'm having trouble using my laptop with an LCD projector
> (for presentations) ever since I installed FC2.  The current
> WinXP OS works in this regard.  My old RH7.3 OS also used to
> work smoothly.  However, that was a custom built
> kernel from the manufacturer of my laptop, and the FC2 kernel is
> standard (not customized).
> 
> I know how to obtain many different resolutions
> and HFL/VFL's on the laptop screen using xrandr and the F7
> key.  I know that F8 should toggle the signal to the external monitor.
> I expected 640x480, 70 Hz Vsync, and 16 bit resolution to work, but the best
> I can get is the top left corner of my display appearing on the projector
> (with bad colors).
> 
> I have tried many different options and settings in my Xorg.conf
> file, so I hesitate in sending one. 
> So let me first ask: 
> is there any reason to expect the FC2/Xorg system to fail where the RH7.3
> system succeeded?

Uh, no.  Directing the output between the LCD and external port is
typically controlled by the BIOS.  However, if you set the display to
640x480 and press F8 (usually it's a combo of the function key and an
"F" key--on my Fujitsu it's "[Fn]+F10"), you should see the same stuff
on both the LCD and the projector.  If the projector is mucked up, the
odds are that you either aren't really running in 640x480 or have a
vertical refresh that's not compatible.

If you have your old XFree86 config file lying about, you can get Xorg
to use it instead of its own.  You have to specify the "-c (file)"
option to the server when you start it and I can't guarantee it'll
work, but you can try it.  See "man Xorg" for details.
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- Rick Stevens, Senior Systems Engineer     rstevens at vitalstream.com -
- VitalStream, Inc.                       http://www.vitalstream.com -
-                                                                    -
-          Consciousness: that annoying time between naps.           -
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