Home / ubuntu / Questions / 176306
In Process
isomorphismes
Asked: 2012-08-16 14:07:35 +0800 CST

How to change the screen resolution of the virtual console on an external VGA?

  • 772

I've found helpful solutions to randr problems on the regular GUI (Ctrl+Alt+F7) but this question is about resizing the virtual console, which doesn't have good google results.

I've been using arandr to change VGA outputs between my 1680×1050 monitor and digital projector with I think a different ratio (definitely smaller numbers). Noticed a few quirky things like I need to resize VGA, then resize LVDS, then resize VGA again (possibly multiple repeats) to reduce the maximum screen size

Between going back and forth these two devices the most recent time I somehow reduced the resolution of the virtual console (Ctrl+Alt+F6) which I use most of the day.

The virtual console still shows up correctly on the LVDS but I'd like to change the VGA resolution so I can watch the virtual console on my monitor. It was projecting at a nice large resolution before my most recent switch to projector and back. (I even looked at the virtual console on the projector and it was large resolution.)

Any suggestions what I might need to do here? I tried xrandr --output VGA --mode 1680x1050 and got can't open display error.

Let me know if there's any other info I should give.

12.04

1 Answers

  1. In Grub2, as a Linux kernel boot parameter, this is what I add to the boot line on my servers...

    # It follows the format of video=conn:res[M][R][-bpp][@refresh][i][m][eDd] 
# Example:
nomodeset video=VGA:1024x768@60m

    What this says is to turn kms modesetting off... Manually set the framebuffer for port VGA to 1024x768 @60Hz with a margin. Search on the "format" above and it will explain all the options for that, as well as all the valid conn names.

    • 1