xorg fails installing on Dell Mini 12

[Kyle Cronan]

Binary package hint: xorg

If you attempt to install Intrepid onto a Dell Mini 12 with the Poulsbo video chipset, X will not start, even in VESA mode. It reports that there are no available modes (see attached log).

The workaround is to specify 'Driver "vesa"' and a sensible range for HorizSync and VertRefresh in xorg.conf:

Section "Monitor"
        Identifier "Configured Monitor"
        HorizSync 30 - 80
        VertRefresh 50 - 70
EndSection
[lspci]
00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation System Controller Hub (SCH Poulsbo) [8086:8100] (rev 06)
     Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:02b1]
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation System Controller Hub (SCH Poulsbo) Graphics Controller [8086:8108] (rev 06)
     Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:02b1]

[John Pugh (jpugh)]

Have you tried the modeline suggested by the ddc probe?

"Printing DDC gathered Modelines:
(II) VESA(0): Modeline "1280x800"x0.0 70.10 1280 1328 1360 1419 800 803 809 823 -hsync -vsync (49.4 kHz)"

The problem, according to your log output, is that the appropriate screen cannot be found so adding this modeline to your "Screens" section might be the solution since X is too stupid to figure out a non-standard modeline.

Not a good solution, but possibly a workaround.

[Kyle Cronan (kyle-pbx)]

That's a good suggestion, although I wasn't really trying to get proper screen resolution to work in vesa mode. The bug is that you can't install Intrepid from a LiveCD on this hardware without switching to a VT and manually making corrections to xorg.conf (not only that, there seems to be another bug that makes the NetInstall fail on the Mini 12). The vesa driver should work out of the box, no matter what kind of GPU you have. Then, once you have the system installed, it is much easier at that point to take special steps to get the hardware working properly.

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

[This is an automated message]

Hi kyle-pbx,

Please attach the output of `lspci -vvnn` too.

[Mario Limonciello (superm1)]

This was just fixed today in the VESA driver in Jaunty, version 1:2.0.0-1ubuntu6. I'm going to mark this as a duplicate accordingly.