How to give a presentation at 1024x600.

Problem: I want to give a conference presentation from my A110L using an external projector attached to the VGA output. The Linpus default is that only 1024x600 external resolution (screen clone) is enabled. If the default page setup is used the sides of the screen are blacked out when viewing the presentation full screen and the available area for the slide itself is cropped to essentially 800x600.

In other words your presentation is going to look about 30% smaller on the projected screen than anyone able to output at a standard 4/3 ratio such as 1024x768.

You can fool around with the Linpus OS and get it to use different output resolutions, but this is not trivial.

A much simpler option is to change the page size of the presentation (under impress, it is format/page menu) from the default A4 or U S Letter to a custom size that matches the aspect ration of the screen. The convenient one I chose was 10.24" wide and 6" high. Ideally this is done before you start working on the slides, since the content will end up stretched otherwise. Though usually going over and resizing some of the graphics by hand is all that's needed even then.

Now when you press F5 for full screen, the slide will fill the A1's screen and fill to the edges of the projected screen too. You lose a little off the top and bottom, but not enough to be considered serious. Widescreen slide output is actually quite attractive.

 

or you could tweak one line in xorg one time,

Code:

sudo mousepad /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Under "Screen", set

Code:

		Virtual	2048 2048

(or bigger if you need to, but then compiz won't start)

and then run

Code:

xrandr --output VGA --mode 1024x768 --output LVDS --mode auto

or use any other resolution the external monitor/projector supports.

 

Let me update the situation rather than edit the original post.

What I wrote above does work, but typically the projector takes the 1024x600 output of the A1 and scales it up to 1024x768 anyway, unless you've gone into the projector settings and opted for widesceeen.

So you need to create the presentation at 4:3 ratio (normal), strecth it to 1024x600 by changing the page size after you"re finished, then the projector stretches is back to 1024x768 to maintain the original aspect ratio, but there are a lot of antialiasing artifacts from all the re-sizing. Its not pretty.

So, having not read annafils advice and hunting around the forum, I edited my xorg.conf file as follows:

to backup your conf file and make edits, use the following:

cd /etc/X11
sudo cp xorg.conf xorg.conf.old
sudo mousepad xorg.conf

edit the bottom section to look like this:

Code:

Section "Monitor"
	Identifier  "Monitor0"
	Modeline  "1024x600" 48.96 1024 1064 1168 1312 600 601 604 622 -HSync +VSync
#	Option	"Above"	"Monitor1"
EndSection

## This is the monitor section for an external VGA with DPMS (auto modeline selection)
Section "Monitor"
        Identifier  "Monitor1"
        Option  "DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Device"
	Identifier  "Videocard0"
	Driver      "intel"
	Option      "monitor-LVDS" "Monitor0"
	Option	    "monitor-VGA" "Monitor1"
	Option	    "Clone" "true"
	Option	"MonitorLayout"	"LVDS,VGA"
	BusID	"PCI:0:2:0"
#	Screen	0
EndSection

Section "Screen"
	Identifier "Screen0"
	Device     "Videocard0"
	Monitor	    "Monitor0"
	DefaultDepth     24
	SubSection "Display"
		Viewport   0 0
		Depth     24
		Modes    "1024x600" "800x600" "640x480"
# Virtual resolution set to resolution of external monitor in clone mode
		Virtual	1024 768
	EndSubSection
EndSection

Basically adding the Monitor1 setting, making active the two lines above "option clone true" and checking the virtual resolution was something the LCD projector would accept.

Now when I switch displays with alt-F5 the external output is 1024x768, and the presentation slides display on full screen without any artifacts and without having to mess around with the page setup any.

Life is pretty much perfect, but there are a couple of minor points:

If the LCD is turned off, all is great. If you cycle alt-F5 to have both VGA and LCD active, only the top 600 pixels of the 768 pixel desktop is shown in the LCD. Your slides are also cut off, naturally, so if you have to navigate from the LCD screen without being able to look at the projector output, this could well be a problem. If there is a way to scroll the virtual 768x1024 desktop in the LCD I don't know it.

Another thing is that in Impress when you hit fullscreen f5 the slides now show at 1024x768, i.e. missing the bottom 128 pixels. This happens even when you dont use the external VGA output. Its a bit of a pain previewing the slides on the screen in advance.

Finally, when you boot up with the VGA connection attached an active sometimes the automatic mode isnt detected, and the presentation tries to display at 1024x600 even though the desktop is 1024x768. Happened to me once and Im not sure why.

Next up, try Annafil's idea...

 

This isn't a bug, it's how the program that controls the outputs works. When screens are being mirrorer, the smaller screen always displays only a portion. Unless you specify "--left-of VGA" or "--right-of VGA" and add it to the line I wrote above - then you extent the vga screen by the size of your aspire one screen.

Now you can see why orignally the resolution behaves the way it does. Again wasn't a bug, acer intended it that way

 

Yes, I see that now. The default config is the only one that keeps everything fully under control. I think though that its worth sacrificing the integrity of the LCD output for getting an external display to run at its native resolution. It makes a big difference to the quality of the projected slide.

Actually I'd be willing to sacrifice dual-display completely, and just have Alt-F5 cycle bewteen LCD and VGA, rather than LCD, VGA and VGA+LCD.

Any idea what I have to edit to disable the VGA+LCD option?

 

Matter of fact, I do know what to edit

This is the file (you'll need to edit it as sudo): /usr/bin/lvdsvga.sh

It basically has a script that cycles through the options and gets you back to the original. If you want to specify your own resolution for the external monitor/projector, instead of

Code:

--output VGA --mode auto

Put

Code:

--output VGA --mode WIDTHxHEIGHT

Make sure you make a backup first before you mess around with it!

 

This last one was the only thing that worked out for me.

I have a 22" 1680x1050 LCD and couldn't make it work properly with any other config file edit.
Lines I changed are listed below:

Code:

##	${CMD_XRANDR} --output LVDS --off --output VGA --auto
	${CMD_XRANDR} --output LVDS --off --output VGA --mode 1680x1050

Code:

##	CURRENT_STATUS=2
	CURRENT_STATUS=0

This last one will do what RJM wanted "jump" the LCD+VGA option when you press Fn+F5.

Only problem I have now it that the "Display" control will automatically show BOTH displays on boot... And it does NOT show on the resolution I want.
Then, I have to press Fn+F5 to have it working properly on native resolution.

The question is, where is the config file for the Display Properties? How to I permanently disable the dual display option?

Thanks guys.

Me

 

That's the default behavior triggered by very low level non-OS stuff. If you notice the cloning of the display starts right from the bios screen, it's not something you can control, unless you plug the monitor in after the system is done loading up.