[buug] Refresh rates and LT win(not)modems

[Rick Moen]

Quoting HD (billoomal at yahoo.com):

> I am running RH 7.0 with 2.2.16, and I noticed today that there is a
> horizontal line continually moving upwards on my monitor. I am
> guessing it has something to do with my refresh rate settings. How do
> I check what this is set at, and how do I alter it? Or is this due to
> something else?

It's entirely possible that changing your refresh rate might get rid of
that line.  

One way to check on your X Window Systems settings in Red Hat 7.0, and
optionally fiddle with them, is using Xconfigurator.  Xconfigurator is a
graphical[1] utility written by Red Hat Software, and will let you
check, among other things, the "Horizontal Sync" and "Vertical Sync"
limits you've specified as allegedly the outside limits of what your
monitor will do.  This is on the "Monitor Configuration" screen.

The next screen is "X Configuration".  To more finely adjust X setup, 
select the "Customize X Configuration" button, which takes you to the 
"Customize X Configuration" screen, where you can pick when colour
depths and resolutions the X server will try.  There's a "Test the
configuration" button, which may be useful.  

Any changes at the end get written to the /etc/X11/XF86Config file,
which you may wish to study, although it's verbose and a bit of a mess.
Clue:  The bottom-most section is the one that pulls everything
together.  Items mentioned in it get defined in preceding sections.

RH 7.0 was rather early in the awkward transition from XFree86 3.3.x to
4.x.  Accordingly, one problem I'm having giving you advice I'm sure you
can use is that I have no way of knowing which series of X11 servers and 
associated software you're using.

One way you can get useful debugging information is to (1) kill X11
completely.  If you're having difficulty doing this any other way, try
"telinit 3" as the root user.  (2) Do "X > xerrors 2>&1", which will
start up a "bare" X11 server, with no window manager.  (You'll see just
a mottled screen with a mouse pointer.)  Kill the X server, by pressing
Ctrl-Alt-Bkspc.  Now, you have the full set of X-server error messages
and other output captured to file "xerrors", for your study.  Read it,
to see how the X server decides what video settings to use, and compare
it against the contents of /etc/X11/XF86Config .

[1] Actually, it also runs in console mode.  The screens are slightly
different from those I've described, but not much.

-- 
Cheers,   "This is mad, egotistical, sick, twisted, and stretches the bounds of
Rick Moen   good taste right off the tongue, past the uvula, and down around 
rick at linuxmafia.com      the duodenum.  It has other merits, but that should 
           indicate positive interest."  -- The Cube, http://www.forum3000.org/