On 2012-11-27 20:46 (GMT-0500) Patrick Serru composed:
It's just that developers don't have *your* particular hardware combination to test on…
Is 1280x1024 pixels screen such an exceptionnel format?
It's probably the most common native resolution currently. But, was the Scaleoview T17-2 you're looking at perfect when it left the factory? Is it still perfect?
…, and when the required hardware data is missing or broken, as apparently must be the case for your display's EDID,…
My display (Fujisu-Siemens FUS T17-2) works well, and its Extended display identification data (EDID) too, but I did not espacialy check that last point. And some recent distributions did configure X correctly for its use.
But will they today? That something worked is not proof that it works.
Faced with the difficulties of installing the most recentdistributions, I got to thinking that the tests were done on virtual machines, and thus, the developers were not seeing the problems. The ATI driver? But I am using this machine, this graphic card and this screen with this ancient OSS 11.1!
IIRC, automatic X configuration was rather young at the time of, and likely not implemented in, openSUSE 11.1. The 11.1 I just booted even has a /etc/X11/XF86Config as a soft link from xorg.conf! The in place backup of its original xorg.conf is timestamped April 2007. What happens when you restart X in 11.1 after removing xorg.conf?
When I try X in 11.1 with xorg.conf removed, Xorg.0.log ends with fatal server error \ cannot run in framebuffer mode, even after having correctly identified the gfxchip as Radeon. After restoring xorg.conf, X starts in 1600x1200 according to specification in the xorg.conf file.
Most modern distros have automagic X configuration that works in most cases, but not all. Until one tries manual configuration or other hardware, there's no practical way to be sure a particular failure is not some previously unobserved hardware fault. I have found in *every* case tried personally, absent known driver or X bugs applicable to the hardware used, that basic automagic X configuration failure can be worked around through manual configuration. Trying a less than 1Kbyte http://fm.no-ip.com/Share/xorg.conf-minimal-EDID-workaround as a shortcut to manual configuration from scratch is a pretty simple thing to try. It doesn't take much in most cases to work around apparent EDID-related automagic failure.