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noctlos

Member

Registered: 2013-08-26

Posts: 36

NVIDIA-340xx driver not correctly assigning resolution on console

I have an NVIDIA Quadro FX 1700 and I must use the legacy driver for CUDA. X can assign the resolution properly, but the virtual console has a lower resolution. When I tried it out with the nouveau driver, the resolution was fine.

Does anyone know how to resolve this?

graysky

Wiki Maintainer

From: :wq

Registered: 2008-12-01

Posts: 10,597

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Re: NVIDIA-340xx driver not correctly assigning resolution on console

What resolution do you want?  I recall that nouveau supports more higher ones...

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headkase

Member

Registered: 2011-12-06

Posts: 1,976

Re: NVIDIA-340xx driver not correctly assigning resolution on console

The proprietary driver does not support kernel mode setting which is required for native resolution virtual consoles.  That is why you get a lower resolution one.  The open-source Nouveau driver does support KMS and that's why it is at native resolution.  I believe you can look into a framebuffer like fbdev to work around the issue a bit.  Google.

Gusar

Member

Registered: 2009-08-25

Posts: 3,605

Re: NVIDIA-340xx driver not correctly assigning resolution on console

The proprietary driver does not support kernel mode setting which is required for native resolution virtual consoles.  The open-source Nouveau driver does support KMS and that's why it is at native resolution.  I believe you can look into a framebuffer like fbdev to work around the issue a bit.  Google.

That's not entirely correct. Kernel modesetting does not automatically give you a high resolution console. It's only because the open source KMS drivers have an internal fbcon driver that you get a high res console. The Nvidia driver uses kernel modesetting too (and they've had it for years before the open driver got it), but it's their own proprietary implementation that has a different interface than the open KMS drivers, and this proprietary implementation does not have an internal fbcon driver, it's only used by their X driver.

To get a high res console with the Nvidia driver requires using vesafb/uvesafb (when booting in BIOS mode) or efifb (when booting in UEFI mode). But this limits you to resolutions in the VBIOS of the GPU, and very often widescreen resolutions aren't there.

headkase

Member

Registered: 2011-12-06

Posts: 1,976

Re: NVIDIA-340xx driver not correctly assigning resolution on console

Ok, thank you for the clarification Gusar.