xorg;conf lost at hardy upgrade, screen resolution cannot be set

Some progress since then.

I created a new xorg.conf file and put some of the settings from previous file in there.
I tired to use gcon-editor and saw that:
/gnome/screen/default/0
rate: "This key has no schema"
resolution "This key has no schema"

although the values are ok (75 and 1024x768)

The gnome screen resolution tool still doesn't allow me to set the res to 1024x768 ... screen flickers...

I will now try to use the Virtual parameter in the xorg.conf and report with included files and logs.

I have now corrected quite a few things, even some bugs from the past (#16472 login screen resolution)

My platform
AMD64
ATI Radeon 9200 graphics card
Real-Time kernel
ATI free driver.

I did the following:
read and tried to follow these how-to's to create a new xorg.conf file.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RadeonDriver
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/FixVideoResolutionHowto

Used gconf-editor to set screen resolution

At the end, I got:
- proper Start-up login screen resolution,
- proper Desktop screen resolution,
- ability to use the 'gnome/preferences/Screen Resolution' Dialog,
- decent 3D acceleration from the free ATI drivers (not using the closed-source binary drivers).
- no errors in the /var/log/Xorg.0.log.

This is an improvement to where I was in Gusty, since I never managed to get the Login screen to show the proper resolution.

I would be happy to help you guys to make this work better for the next upgrade! It seems to fail for nearly everyone every time.

I attach my xorg.conf and /var/log/Xorg.0.log files in a tgz archive for your reference.

Cheers,
GF
<email address hidden>

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. Could you include the following information please? Then set the bug status to 'new' to signify that it is ready for triage / review.

Resolution, rate, or other parameter expected
Resolutions, rates, or other parameters actually obtained

output of sudo ddcprobe
output of xrandr

I'm not sure if I understand your request.

When I upgraded, I could not set the screen resolution at all and the xorg.conf file was absent.

I wanted to set it to 1024 x 768 at 85 Hz, which is what I had before the upgrade. All I could see was 3 possible resoutions, all far higher than I could use, and disproportioned, too. i cannot remember what they were. The only available rate was 60 Hz.

Also before the upgrade I had an issue with the login screen which had some other resolution and could not be set.

As I said in previous comments, I did quite some re-building since the upgrade and it now works properly at the resolution and rate as above.

The requested outputs are below.

Thanks for all your help!
I am a solid Ubuntu supporter!
GF.

$ sudo ddcprobe
vbe: VESA 2.0 detected.
oem: ATI RADEON 9200
memory: 16384kb
mode: 800x600x16
mode: 1024x768x16
mode: 320x200x32k
mode: 320x200x64k
mode: 320x200x16m
mode: 1600x1200x256
mode: 640x400x256
mode: 640x480x256
mode: 640x480x32k
mode: 640x480x64k
mode: 640x480x16m
mode: 1600x1200x32k
mode: 800x600x256
mode: 800x600x32k
mode: 800x600x64k
mode: 800x600x16m
mode: 1600x1200x64k
mode: 1024x768x256
mode: 1024x768x32k
mode: 1024x768x64k
mode: 1024x768x16m
mode: 1280x1024x256
mode: 1280x1024x32k
mode: 1280x1024x64k
mode: 1280x1024x16m
mode: 132x25 (text)
mode: 132x43 (text)
edid: �
edidfail

$ xrandr
Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1024 x 768, maximum 1024 x 768
VGA-0 connected 1024x768+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 0mm x 0mm
   1024x768 85.0* 75.0 70.1 60.0 59.9
   832x624 74.6
   800x600 85.1 72.2 75.0 60.3 59.9 56.2
   640x480 85.0 72.8 75.0 59.9
   720x400 85.0
   640x400 85.1
   640x350 85.1
DVI-0 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
S-video disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)

At least in my setting I don't have any usefull information for thre screen resolution in xorg.conf. All information has gone and I really would like to know where this info is stored now. Or do you expect everybody to build their own xorg.conf when problems occur? Please, at least give us a changelog info or something concrete _where_ these settings have gone. 8.04 seems to be the only distro around with this new behaviour, so some info could at least be expected. Here are my xorg.conf settings:
Section "InputDevice"
 Identifier "Generic Keyboard"
 Driver "kbd"
 Option "XkbRules" "xorg"
 Option "XkbModel" "pc105"
 Option "XkbLayout" "us"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
 Identifier "Configured Mouse"
 Driver "mouse"
 Option "CorePointer"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
 Identifier "Synaptics Touchpad"
 Driver "synaptics"
 Option "SendCoreEvents" "true"
 Option "Device" "/dev/psaux"
 Option "Protocol" "auto-dev"
 Option "HorizEdgeScroll" "0"
EndSection

Section "Device"
 Identifier "Configured Video Device"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
 Identifier "Configured Monitor"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
 Identifier "Default Screen"
 Monitor "Configured Monitor"
 Device "Configured Video Device"
EndSection

Section "ServerLayout"
 Identifier "Default Layout"
 Screen "Default Screen"
 InputDevice "Synaptics Touchpad"
EndSection

The resolution isn't stored anymore. Xorg gets all the needed information on start which sometimes doesn't work with faulty hardware. To change resolution the Gnome screen resolution is used which is able to save the requested resolution per user base.

Faulty hardware? It all worked fine in Gutsy. In Hardy, ddcprobe has no problem getting hardware information, but System/Preferences/Screen resolution can't find it.

To unggnu: I don't have faulty hardware, I just would like to see my screen settings as usual. And the GUI interfaces don't allow me to change drivers. I don't want to have to re-write my xorg.conf in whole just because the X server hides all the details.

BTW, this is not an Ubuntu bug, as it seems to be the normal behavior of the X server now if I understand correctly. This information I have from the #radeon channel on freenode. But I consider this to be a real regression, as one has to dive into the Xorg logs to see which driver is loaded and running.

In most cases there is only one driver per graphic card so you don't have to change it in xorg.conf. Both exceptions Nvidia and FGLRX have a setup for the change. How do you know if your hardware sends wrong or no information? And X doesn't hide it. Most information should be available in /var/log/Xorg.0.log. What is the difference to check a conf or the log file?
The big advance is that you can configure your system without knowing the details and X should even start in most cases if xorg.conf was removed. The resolution/keyboard/mouse changes are easy possible with the GUI which should be enough for most users. If you can't select all supported resolutions most likely your hardware sends wrong information which can possibly fixed through a quirk. If not this is normally the only reason for having modelines in xorg.conf.
Displayconfig had broken several configurations so I think the current system is no regression.