Maximum screen size 1024 * 768

Discussions related to using VirtualBox on Windows hosts.
webknecht
Posts: 3
Joined: 10. Nov 2007, 22:10

Maximum screen size 1024 * 768

Post by webknecht »

Hello,

I'm new to Virtual Box but pretty impressed. Today i installed it and my first virtual machine is Ubuntu 7.10. All installation things went ok. The only thing i could not do is choose a screen resolution to use my laptops screen.

I would like to chose 1140 * 900 in Ubuntu but simply was not able to do so. 1024 * 768 is the highest resulution. Where do i have to look for this?

Hope to hear, Aad Slingerland
Jock_McTartan
Posts: 16
Joined: 8. Nov 2007, 21:13
Location: Glasgow

Post by Jock_McTartan »

Install the guest additions
Neil
murgleys
Posts: 5
Joined: 14. Nov 2007, 01:05

Post by murgleys »

Hello - I didn't see this post at first and have asked the same thing.

I'm interested to know if installing the Guest Additions worked, because when I installed them it definitely didn't work! If it did, can you tell me exactly what happened?

Mike.
Zebulon
Posts: 27
Joined: 5. Oct 2007, 00:30
Location: Netherlands
Contact:

Post by Zebulon »

From the manual:
4.3.1. Installing the Linux Guest Additions
The VirtualBox Guest Additions for Linux are provided on the same ISO CD-ROM as the Additions for Windows described above. They also come with an installation program guiding you through the setup process, although, due to the significant differences between Linux distributions, installation may be slightly more complex.

Installation involves the following steps:

Before installing the Guest Additions, you will have to prepare your guest system for building external kernel modules. This is exactly the same process as described in Section 2.2.2, “Support for external kernel modules”, except that this step must now be performed in your Linux guest instead of on a Linux host system, as described there.

Mount the VBoxGuestAdditions.iso file as your Linux guest's virtual CD-ROM drive, exactly the same way as described for a Windows guest in Section 4.2.1.1, “Mounting the Additions ISO file”.

Change to the directory where your CD-ROM drive is mounted and execute as root:

sh ./VBoxLinuxAdditions.run
The VirtualBox Guest Additions contain several different drivers. If for any reason you do not wish to install them all, you can specify the ones which you wish on the command line - for example

sh ./VBoxAdditions.run x11
to install the X Window graphic drivers. Type in the command

sh ./VBoxAdditions.run help
for more information.

4.3.2. Video acceleration and high resolution graphics modes
In Linux guests, VirtualBox video acceleration is available through the X Window System. Typically, in today's Linux distributions, this will be the X.Org server. During the installation process, X will be set up to use the VirtualBox video driver, using whatever graphics modes were set up before the installation. If these modes do not suit your requirements, you can change your setup by editing the configuration file of the X server, usually found in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.

VirtualBox can use any default X graphics mode which fits into the virtual video memory allocated to the virtual machine, as described in Section 3.7.1, “General settings”. You can also add your own modes to the X server configuration file. You simply need to add them to the "Modes" list in the "Display" subsection of the "Screen" section. For example, the section shown here has a custom 2048x800 resolution mode added:

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Device "VirtualBox graphics card"
Monitor "Generic Monitor"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "2048x800" "800x600" "640x480"
EndSubSection
EndSection

4.3.3. Updating the Linux Guest Additions
The Guest Additions can simply be updated by going through the installation procedure again with an updated CD-ROM image. This will replace the drivers with updated versions. You should reboot after updating the Guest Additions.
webknecht
Posts: 3
Joined: 10. Nov 2007, 22:10

Post by webknecht »

Zebulon wrote:From the manual:
Hello,

I did have a good look at this and it works (almost) for Ubuntu 7.10. However, since logging in as root is not possible I had to use sudo. Below is a small transcript of my terminal session. Some comments are inserted here and there.

/*
this is where VBoxGuestAdditions.iso is mounted
*/
aad@gibbon:~$ cd /cdrom

aad@gibbon:/cdrom$ ls
AMD_PCnet driver os2 VBoxLinuxAdditions.run
AUTORUN.INF gina VBoxGuestAdditions.exe

/*
this is how I exectued the script
*/
aad@gibbon:/cdrom$ sudo sh ./VBoxLinuxAdditions.run
[sudo] password for aad:
Verifying archive integrity... All good.
Uncompressing VirtualBox 1.5.2 Guest Additions for Linux installation................................................................................................................................................
VirtualBox 1.5.2 Guest Additions installation
Building the VirtualBox Guest Additions kernel module...
Building the shared folder support kernel module...
Installing the VirtualBox Guest Additions...

Successfully installed the VirtualBox Guest Additions.
You must restart your guest system in order to complete the installation.
/*
here i restarded...
*/

After the restart i did modify /etc/X11/xorg.conf. Again sudo was needed to be able to save the result. So type "sudo gedit" in a terminal session, open /etc/X11/xorg.conf and below is what i changed:

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Device "Generic Video Card"
Monitor "Generic Monitor"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Modes "1024x768" "1440x900"
EndSubSection
EndSection

As you might notice I added 1440x900, which is the resolution of my laptop's screen.

After a restart I clicked in the main menu "System, Preferences, Screen Resolution". The Screen Resolution Preference" dialog is shown and the resolution 1440x900 CAN be chosen. However, after having confirmed the change to 1440 * 900 nothing happened. Not after a restart as well.

So what are we missing. A small step?

TIA Aad Slingerland
murgleys
Posts: 5
Joined: 14. Nov 2007, 01:05

Post by murgleys »

I did almost exactly the same.

I can get a screen resolution of 1280x1024 but nothing higher than that despite the fact that my monitor's resolution is 1900x1200?

I've no idea what this is about!

Bizarrely I have another computer set up with Ubuntu as the main OS and I had to disable the restricted drivers in order to get maximum resolution from the system! That doesn't seem right either!

Mike
Bedlore
Posts: 14
Joined: 11. Sep 2007, 04:02

Post by Bedlore »

Can you please tell me how you installed Ubuntu 7.10, was it from an ISO? I can't get past select time zone / city because of obscured view.
webknecht
Posts: 3
Joined: 10. Nov 2007, 22:10

Post by webknecht »

Bedlore wrote:Can you please tell me how you installed Ubuntu 7.10, was it from an ISO? I can't get past select time zone / city because of obscured view.
I indeed used an ISO which I downlaoded from ubuntu.com. The name is ubuntu-7.10-desktop-i386.iso and the size 729.608.192 bytes.

I mounted this ISO in the virtual machine settings (Mount CD/DVD Drive, ISO Image File). After starting the VM it booted from the ISO.

Post a screen shot to show what you actually get....

Aad
saberworks
Posts: 5
Joined: 14. Sep 2007, 08:48

Post by saberworks »

I recently installed CentOS 4 which uses gnome by default. This is older than Ubuntu but I found that CentOS detected a "generic" monitor with a maximum resolution of 800x600. I used the System Preferences gnome dialog to choose another "generic" monitor which has a maximum resolution that I want. After restarting X, everything went fine. Of course I installed the guest additions and made sure my xorg.conf file was using the vbox graphics card driver (which the guest additions install, apparently).
bellinsky
Posts: 3
Joined: 7. Dec 2007, 17:36

Post by bellinsky »

Bedlore wrote:Can you please tell me how you installed Ubuntu 7.10, was it from an ISO? I can't get past select time zone / city because of obscured view.
You can select the city and then just click the enter button. By default, it leads you to the next step. Similarly you can do the following other steps.

Hope it helps.
OsoRojo
Posts: 2
Joined: 16. Nov 2007, 06:52

Post by OsoRojo »

Bedlore wrote:Can you please tell me how you installed Ubuntu 7.10, was it from an ISO? I can't get past select time zone / city because of obscured view.
In the installation screen, alt+f7 will grab the window and allow you to drag it up above the top of the screen (alt+f7 in the middle of the window). Then you can see what you need to complete the installation.
alcedo
Posts: 1
Joined: 14. Dec 2007, 06:51
Location: The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
Contact:

Post by alcedo »

webknecht wrote:
Zebulon wrote:From the manual:
Hello,

I did have a good look at this and it works (almost) for Ubuntu 7.10. However, since logging in as root is not possible I had to use sudo. Below is a small transcript of my terminal session. Some comments are inserted here and there.

/*
this is where VBoxGuestAdditions.iso is mounted
*/
aad@gibbon:~$ cd /cdrom

aad@gibbon:/cdrom$ ls
AMD_PCnet driver os2 VBoxLinuxAdditions.run
AUTORUN.INF gina VBoxGuestAdditions.exe

/*
this is how I exectued the script
*/
aad@gibbon:/cdrom$ sudo sh ./VBoxLinuxAdditions.run
[sudo] password for aad:
Verifying archive integrity... All good.
Uncompressing VirtualBox 1.5.2 Guest Additions for Linux installation................................................................................................................................................
VirtualBox 1.5.2 Guest Additions installation
Building the VirtualBox Guest Additions kernel module...
Building the shared folder support kernel module...
Installing the VirtualBox Guest Additions...

Successfully installed the VirtualBox Guest Additions.
You must restart your guest system in order to complete the installation.
/*
here i restarded...
*/

After the restart i did modify /etc/X11/xorg.conf. Again sudo was needed to be able to save the result. So type "sudo gedit" in a terminal session, open /etc/X11/xorg.conf and below is what i changed:

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Device "Generic Video Card"
Monitor "Generic Monitor"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Modes "1024x768" "1440x900"
EndSubSection
EndSection

As you might notice I added 1440x900, which is the resolution of my laptop's screen.

After a restart I clicked in the main menu "System, Preferences, Screen Resolution". The Screen Resolution Preference" dialog is shown and the resolution 1440x900 CAN be chosen. However, after having confirmed the change to 1440 * 900 nothing happened. Not after a restart as well.

So what are we missing. A small step?

TIA Aad Slingerland
Hi there i did what you did and it work! though i must say that im using the latest version of everything ie virtualbox, and guestaddition(which is a must)
snakyjake
Posts: 7
Joined: 9. Jan 2008, 23:22

Post by snakyjake »

I have the same problem as "webknecht", and I haven't gotten this to work. I made all the changes in xorg.conf, and the display setting show the resolution I wish for. But after restarting, nothing changes.

Jake
d4nte
Posts: 1
Joined: 28. Aug 2008, 07:28

Post by d4nte »

For anybody who comes across this via a search, I solved this issue by adding more video memory (i.e. poweroff, virtualbox GUI -> settings -> general -> video memory). This, after installing Guest Additions of course.

P.S. It was on Debian etch (2.6.18), although I don't believe that makes a difference

Hopefully someone else will find it useful
dave_c
Posts: 6
Joined: 31. Oct 2008, 11:13

Post by dave_c »

i meet this problem too.i open the .xml file of the VM,and see 800x600x32 in a line . I modified it to 1280x800x32,when i poweron the VM ,it's ok.but when i repeat those steps on another host,it does not work.
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