HTPC Screen Resolution Issues

[SpoonTech]

Hi,

I have the following setup:
- Ubuntu 12.04 (rolled back to Gnome)
- HP ProLiant Microserver (2GB Ram, 2 x 250GB HDD)
- Gigabyte Nvidia GT610

When installing the graphics card, the screen showed a strange purple image, and would boot no further. I took out all cables, plugged them in again, with no luck.

I then turned off the machine and removed the graphics card, and the machine started fine. I installed the Nvidia drivers from the package manager (Nvidia Current - thing an XOrg package.)

When rebooting the machine it worked fine and went straight to 1980 x 1080 on my Samsung 24" monitor via HDMI.
I did not check any other resolutions available.

I plugged into a 32" HD Ready Sinotec and the highest resolution available is 800x600 (TV has a native resolution of 1366x768, but accepts 720p and 1080p signals and upscales/downscales them). I looked for some help on the internet, finding this page:

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/ubuntu-63/display-limited-to-800x600-screen-resolution-on-ubuntu-9-04-on-lg-flatron-l1718s-835913/

and a few others. When I went to edit my xorg.conf file, it is not there!
I'm not sure why this is the case.

It is highly frustrating, as I'd like to get my media server up and running. Fairly close to doing a fresh install as having a few other issues. (Considering 12.10 or Linux Mint).

Does anyone have any suggestions on how I can solve this issue.

 

[Speedster]

It is highly frustrating, as I'd like to get my media server up and running. Fairly close to doing a fresh install as having a few other issues. (Considering 12.10 or Linux Mint).

Does anyone have any suggestions on how I can solve this issue.

Why not just go OpenELEC?

 

[DrJohnZoidberg]

Why not just go OpenELEC?

Sounds like a plan but OP hasn't told us what needs to be running on the machine.

 

[SpoonTech]

Hi,

I'm not going OpenElec as I'd like to run the following:
- FTP Server
- Apache Server
- Samba File Sharing
- Deluge Remote Torrent Interface
- Automatic Downloading (not using NZB's, so have custom software)

 

[SpoonTech]

For future reference, I managed to solve the problem by doing the following:

Remove existing nvidia proprietary drivers

sudo apt-get purge nvidia-current
sudo apt-get purge nvidia-*

Add the Ubuntu-X team repository (https://launchpad.net/~ubuntu-x-swat/+archive/x-updates)

sudo apt-add-repository ppa:ubuntu-x-swat/x-updates

Update new (using new repository too), install Nvidia drivers and Nvidia Settings

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install nvidia-current nvidia-settings

Some notes:

Samsung 2494HS 24" Monitor (via HDMI)
Boots into 1920 x 1080 @ 60Hz, works 100%, a whole array of resolutions available

Sinotec 32" HD Ready LCD TV (via HDMI)
Boots into 800 x 600, although through the Nvidia X Config, I can adjust this resolution to a whole bunch of resolutions, including 1920 x 1080. The TV is a piece of ****, at common HD resolutions (1280x720p & 1920x1080p), there is overscan problems (this also occurs with two other windows machines in the house (Ultrabook and HP laptop). XBMC can fix the overscan but it is a problem that I can't seem to fix in Ubuntu/Windows