Dell Inspiron 1100 - Installation Ubuntu 6.06 Desktop

ac "aec$news" at candt.waitrose.com
Fri Sep 15 06:57:20 UTC 2006


Hardware detail - 512 MB RAM, bios A32.

After initial searches and trying many guessed boot options without
success, I found the information necessary on the Ubuntu forums (note 1).

After the file edit process, which was not difficult even for me as
someone who has avoided use of command line, things did display
correctly, and I am most grateful for the information referenced above.

I am not new to linux but I still find I am unsure of many non gui
actions, and other people  even less confident than myself might find
this summary useful.

I was also happy to see that the immediate subsequent install from the
edited running live cd ubuntu system was also correct in its screen
display and needed no further editing of files.

A Ubuntu forum posting on June 5th, 2006 by ssnitily included the
following:

===================
Default Installing on a Dell Inspiron 1100
It's well known that the installation resolution for this laptop is
incorrect and is locked at 640x480. Since the default installer for
6.06 involves booting and running a GUI and these installation screens
are much larger than this it's very difficult to install as you can't
see what you are tabbing to and can't click on any buttons as they are
well bellow the viewable area on the screen.
===================
My Comment: as it happens, this described the problem I had.
====================
The response on June 6th, 2006 from durableapostle was on the button:
====================
Default Re: Installing on a Dell Inspiron 1100
I had the EXACT same problem. Here's what I did:

1) In a terminal window type: sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf

2) Change your data to what I have below (actually, add this info,
<i>in addition to</i> what you already have):

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
VendorName "Monitor Vendor"
ModelName "Dell 1024x768 Laptop Display Panel"
HorizSync 31.5 - 48.5
VertRefresh 59.0 - 75.0
Option "dpms"
EndSection

and in Section Screen, change the monitor line to read

Monitor "Monitor0"

3) Save, close gedit, and then restart the x drive (crtl, alt,
backspace). It should work.

4) Now, this is the part where you'll need help elsewhere... After a
hard restart, this will probably go back to the small screen. You'll
need to configure things so that this loads earlier in the startup
sequence. I had a friend help w/ this... sorry, I don't know how he
did it. Ask around the forums. At least you'll be able to easily fix
it every time until you can get help with the part I can't help you with.
=======================
My comment: I had a little uncertainty about the above point 2)
because I could see that some lines were obvious additions and one or
two seemed to be replacements.
I  found that point 4) was not relevant to my need to run the live CD
and then do an install to hard drive.
=======================
With this hindsight I would now slightly re-word the posting from
durableapostle to read as follows:
1) In a terminal window type: sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf

2) Change your data to what I have below
Section "Monitor"
        Identifier      "Monitor0"
VendorName "Monitor Vendor"
ModelName "Dell 1024x768 Laptop Display Panel"
HorizSync 31.5 - 48.5
VertRefresh 59.0 - 75.0
        Option          "DPMS"
EndSection

and in Section "Screen", change the monitor line to read

Monitor "Monitor0"

3) Save, close gedit, and then restart the X server (crtl, alt,
backspace). It should work.

4)If you want to continue to install, double click the Install icon on
the desktop, and proceed. My experience was that the installation
adopted the current xorg.conf values.

====================
Note 1:
http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=190022&highlight=inspiron+1100

-- 
alan c





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