Using a projector with Ubuntu or *NIX

[kellnerp]

I had to do a presentation last night. I use randr to run my projector and it has worked fine for static screens. However, I had to show a video clip and fortunately I did a dry run. The video showed up as a black rectangle on the projector.

Fortunately there was a solution that was pretty simple.

xrandr -q

This command gave me:

Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1024 x 768, maximum 2048 x 768
VGA-0 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
DVI-0 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
LVDS connected 1024x768+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 286mm x 214mm
   1024x768       60.0*+   60.0  
   800x600        59.9  
   640x480        59.4  
S-video disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)

This determines the device my machine thinks is the projector screen.
Then I just had to do this:

xrandr --addmode LVDS 1024x768
xrandr --output LVDS --mode 1024x768

Which assumes the previous command told me my projector screen was LVDS with a dimension of 1024x768.

I could have used the S-Video cable if I was using my TV as an output device too.

xrandr is a package I loaded previously to enable the external monitor on my laptop.

sudo apt-get install xrandr

BTW, this was done on jaunty jackalope. Your mileage may vary on other versions.

TOP
CSWP, BSSE

http://www.engtran.com

http://www.niswug.org

http://www.linkedin.com/in/engineeringtransport

Phenom IIx6 1100T = 8GB = FX1400 = XP64SP2 = SW2009SP3
"Node news is good news."

 

[drawoh]

kellnerp,

Are you talking about a VGA projector, or something else?

I plug my Fedora laptops into projectors and monitors, and everything works, although not always the way I expected it to.

To get high resolution, you need an XVGA cable. The stores have them, but they cannot intelligently answer questions about them.

Fedora Core[ ]10 on my Acer laptop always used the external monitor as the console, then it put the same image on both monitors under X-Windows.

Fedora Core[ ]14 on my Fujitsu laptop assumes the screens are side by side. It took me a while to figure out what was going on. The Gnome display configuration allows you to decide what each of the two monitors should do.

I have idea what KDE would do.

JHG

 

[kellnerp]

It was plugNplay for normal Presentation stuff. It was when I tried to show a video clip that I had to seek a solution.

Jaunty is out of date too.

Have you tried to show a video using something like VLC with your laptop?

TOP
CSWP, BSSE

http://www.engtran.com

http://www.niswug.org

http://www.linkedin.com/in/engineeringtransport

Phenom IIx6 1100T = 8GB = FX1400 = XP64SP2 = SW2009SP3
"Node news is good news."

 

[drawoh]

kellnerp,

I have not had problems like that.

I would think that if you can make the monitor or projector work at all, then any video format the computer can play will play on the monitor.

Linux is not the world's best operating system for supporting multi-media. Even when something is available that will play it, the distributions so not include it because it is proprietary. This is more of an ideological problem than a software one.

JHG

 

[kellnerp]

How does Fedora differ from the debian family of builds in the way it handles it's displays? They all use X IIRC.

TOP
CSWP, BSSE

http://www.engtran.com

http://www.niswug.org

http://www.linkedin.com/in/engineeringtransport

Phenom IIx6 1100T = 8GB = FX1400 = XP64SP2 = SW2009SP3
"Node news is good news."

 

[drawoh]

kellnerp,

I don't know. I have never tried Ubuntu.

I have just upgraded my desktop to Fedora[ ]15 and Gnome[ ]3.0. So far, I hate Gnome[ ]3.0. The video configuration works perfectly though. The user interface paradigm has changed completely and so far, I hate every bit of it. Maybe I will feel better when I sit down and figure it out. I have already installed FVWM2.

I would assume that the video configuration and the ability to play video formats are entirely separate issues.

JHG