Dell Optiplex GX270 + 1703FP: 640x480 only?!...

[marcc]

Anyone ever tried Knoppix on a Dell Optiplex GX270 (Intel Extreme Graphics 2 on motherboard, *digital* interface, with 1703FP (1280x1024) TFT monitor)? Mine starts up in 640x480, I haven't yet been able to 'coerce' it into any higher resolution. I'm a complete newbie though

Any help appreciated,
Marc

[knoppixman]

That is because of the silly default of those machines' BIOS. Go into your bios and into its "Integrated Peripherals" section and change the onboard shared video memory from "1 MB" to "8 MB" and you will be able to get more than 640x480.

[marcc]

Thanks knoppixman! That indeed effectively did it! :P
One happy newbie... er... perhaps rather now-not-so-newbie-anymore?... sometime soon?...

Thanks again!
Marc

[A. Jorge Garcia]

I just tried this and find that I cannot get into the BIOS screen. After all my PCs were hdinstalled, all I get is lilo! How do I get to the BIOS login screen again???

TIA,
AJG

[marcc]

On my system, right after power-up, and *before* LILO or Grub or whatever (yep, I tried Fedora Core 1 & <grin>), there is this Dell "boot"-screen, mostly black, with a short progress bar below the middle. In the upper right corner it says something like "F2 = setup" and, right below that, "F12 = boot menu" (AFAIR). I just hit F2 *before* that specific screen disappears (In your case: before lilo shows up). On other computers "Del" (the Delete key) might do the trick, some use other function keys, or even key combinations, but usually there *is* a key (combin.) that pulls the trick!

Hope this helps?...
Marc

[A. Jorge Garcia]

I don't get that F2/F12 screen anymore. Is there a way to delay lilo a bit to see that, some setting in lilo.conf?

TIA,
AJG

[ped]

I wanted to give everyone who has had issues with Knoppix and Dell Optiplex GX270 machines a heads up on what causes it. Yes, the 1MB/8MB video setting is part of the problem, but the bigger culprit is the *BIOS version*. The A01 and A02 BIOSes work just fine with all manners of Linux (including Knoppix) but the latest one, A03, seems to cause a misread of the amount of video memory regardless of the setting in the BIOS. My GX270 came with A03 installed and was exhibiting all the issues described in the various threads here. I downgraded to A02 and just now booted Knoppix with no cheat codes whatsoever to find I'm in at a decent res and working just fine. The A02 BIOS can be gotten here:

ftp://ftp.dell.com/bios/gx270a02.exe

[A. Jorge Garcia]

Oh, that makes sense. I never had any of these problems and all my machines have A02!

Good call!

Regards,
AJG

[schopel]

I just the other day loaded a Linux OS to my Dell GX270. I was unable to get the same resolution size I had before and was quite frustated. By searching the web I came across this post and was easily able to resolve my issues.
I am amazed at the date of the original post and that it was still there. Any way, thanks to the person who posted it!