Dell Latitude screen scramble!

**Phredd** · 12-22-2002, 04:56 PM

Greetings,

Im using a Dell Latitude laptop...If I leave my machine booted into Knoppix untouched for about 5 mins, the screen scrambles and becomes unreadable. On the screen I can still tell it is Knoppix, but none of the text is readable.

Is this a function of a screen saver kicking in and not releaseing? How about sometype of power management from the bios of my laptop?

When I move the mouse or type on the keyboard it does NOT 'come back' and my only recourse is to nuke it and reboot; the good news is the file system cannot corrupt!

**Phredd** · 12-22-2002, 05:47 PM

I went into my laptop's bios and the power mgt within the bios was set to turn off the screen after 5 min when on battery. Ill test and see if that was it...

**Phredd** · 12-22-2002, 06:34 PM

It did it again...best I can tell 20(ish) mins into being idle (only does it when idle). Screensaver is set to OFF. Power management is OFF in Knoppix and in the machines bios.

This time the screen slid down half way...putting the top on the screen in the bottom half and the bottom part of the screen on the top half... strange.

The mouse was still usable...sound still worked....I just powered down and rebooted.

Any ideas folks?

**Dave_Bechtel** · 12-23-2002, 05:11 AM

--Try booting with one of the framebuffer options (F2 at the boot prompt)

boot: ' fb800x600 ' == This is what I use on my laptops.

--When you get into kde, open up a Konsole or rxvt (whatever) and issue:

' xset s off '

--At a regular virtual terminal (Ctrl-Alt-F1 thru F4) issue:
' setterm -blank 0 '

--See if that helps, and post back here.

Originally Posted by Phredd

It did it again...best I can tell 20(ish) mins into being idle (only does it when idle). Screensaver is set to OFF. Power management is OFF in Knoppix and in the machines bios.

This time the screen slid down half way...putting the top on the screen in the bottom half and the bottom part of the screen on the top half... strange.

The mouse was still usable...sound still worked....I just powered down and rebooted.

Any ideas folks?

**Phredd** · 12-23-2002, 03:56 PM

It worked! Thx Dave!

One side note...I generally boot using with the switch:

knoppix screen=1400x1050

because that is what my laptop screen and video (GeForce Mobile somethign) can handle... I tried:

knoppix screen=fb1400x1050

It boots but runs 1024x768. I understand my fb1400 prob wont run...however...when my laptop runs in 1024x768 it has about a 2 inch black frame around it where my screen is not being used...can I force it to run in 1024x768 and use the ENTIRE screen without the frame?

Thx Dave!!!

**Dave_Bechtel** · 12-24-2002, 06:39 AM

--Probably not, if running on a laptop and booting from CD. But, you could try starting in runlevel 2 (doesn't auto-start GUI), edit the XFree86-4(?) config file for your resolution, and then try:

' su knoppix '
' startx '

--If you do this in the default VT (Ctrl-Alt-F1), you will still have F2-F4 as Root consoles; or just do the su in Alt-F4.

--You should be able to make this semi-permanent by doing a saveconfig (CD); or permanently, by using knx-hdinstall and changing the XFree config after reboot. If you decide to install to HD, issue ' man bash ' and look for ' /--noprofile ' (literal; type the slash at man's command prompt.) You can put those two screen-saver commands in one of bash's init scripts. (Just make sure the init script starts with ' #!/bin/bash ' and you chmod +x it.)

Originally Posted by Phredd

It worked! Thx Dave!
It boots but runs 1024x768. I understand my fb1400 prob wont run...however...when my laptop runs in 1024x768 it has about a 2 inch black frame around it where my screen is not being used...can I force it to run in 1024x768 and use the ENTIRE screen without the frame?

Thx Dave!!!

**Phredd** · 12-25-2002, 03:47 AM

If you screen scrambles as noted above press (CNTL/ALT F1) wait a second and then (ALT-F5). Presto! All fixed!

**corey_g_** · 10-08-2003, 07:18 PM

I am having the same problem with the screen border with my Dell Laptop (Inspiron 1100). Everything works fine, but there is like a 2 inch black border around the screen.

Dave.. can u be more specific on the fix u mentioned? Where is the XFree config file u mention?

any help is appreciated!

-Corey

**Dave_Bechtel** · 10-09-2003, 11:55 AM

--D00d, you realize you posted to a thread that was last replied to in 2002?

--Anyway, for your laptop you are probably best off with booting boot: ' fb800x600 ' or ' fb1024x768 ' to get around the border problem. My old P166 Latitude only handles 800x600 native res, so that's what I boot with.

Originally Posted by corey_g_

I am having the same problem with the screen border with my Dell Laptop (Inspiron 1100). Everything works fine, but there is like a 2 inch black border around the screen.

Dave.. can u be more specific on the fix u mentioned? Where is the XFree config file u mention?

any help is appreciated!

-Corey

**corey_g_** · 10-09-2003, 02:34 PM

didn't realize the thread was so old

anyways.. i tried with the cheatcode "fb1024x768" and "fb800x600" with no luck.

it starts to load, and when it gets to loading X11, my screen blinks a few times and I get the error "Error: no suitable X server found for your card" and then nothing.

any more ideas?