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Cannot get reasonable resolution

J

JBot

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 9, 2006
271
1
Calgary.Alberta.Canada
I just plugged in a G5 Powermac that i got at work, into a Dell 19' 1907FP monitor.

http://accessories.dell.com/sna/pro...l.aspx?c=ca&l=en&s=dhs&cs=cadhs1&sku=320-5293

I have a vga to dvi convertor connecting it to the machine. However, the best resolution i can get is 640x480, and clearly that is as good as useless to anyone including myself. I looked on the dell website for mac drivers for the monitor, however i am unable to find any.
The monitor is capable of producing a resolution of 1280x1024.

I am wondering if this (640x480) is the best possible res i can get while using a vga cable, or if there is anything i can do to possibly get it higher.

Thanks in advance for your help.
 
JBot said:
...no
Click to expand...

No as in
have not tried?
does not work?
no idea how to do that?

Any 10+ year Mac can do that resolution. Does the PowerMac work with other displays? Did you recently got the PowerMac (perhaps someone damaged the system and might need fresh install)?
 
Is it the Apple "vga to dvi convertor"?

Some cheapie converters are bandwidth limited, in my experience. I've had good luck with the Apple converter from a Mac mini, but not so much luck with the cheapie converter sometimes thrown in with PC video cards.

I would try and find a dedicated VGA to DVI converter cable.
 
no i tried that and it doesnt work. the only resolution it shows is 640x480. ive tried another dell monitor, different series, and again i couldnt get anything better.
the graphics card says its installed properly with the ati radeon 9600 card.

also for some reason the graphics are faulty as in it leaves little squares by the mouse randomly when you click, then if you drag a selection box over the sqaure of 'dead pixels', it seems to refresh the image and it goes away.
I have done a fresh install of the os, and it did not correct the problem.

*edit- Yes, its the apple convertor for vga to dvi going from the box, then i have the vga plugged into the monitor.
 
Hi,

Have you tried to reset PRAM? And maybe not just once, but several times in
a row?

sash
 
yea i reset the pram already too.

is there any way to know forsure if it is infact a bad vga card?like is there a test app that can run tests tosee if it performs properly? i dont want to replace something before knowing forsure thats the problem...
 
And what about removing the card and then reinstalling it?

I've got a problem with the new Apple HD 30" on a 9600 ATI: maximum resolution was 1200 by something. That was a real voodoo and shamanism which I had to do to establish the native resolution. I believe that removing and reinstalling the card was a decisive element in this voodoo thing, although I'm not sure (quite a long ago). In the end I've got the native res and was using this card till the upgrade arrived.

sash
 
one more question.
I went to reinstall the os and my problem now is that i cant get to the bottom of the dialog box to advance in the installation. the box is too big/resolution is too big and i cant seem to resize the window to click the all important next button. i cant seem to be able to zoom out (using command -, or view > zoom), nor can i tab through for some reason.
EDIT* Clearification, i can tab through, but i cant press enter to select the highlighted button.
any suggestions on what i can do now?
i tried to find a way via terminal to zoom/change res but i couldnt find anything..
 
sash said:
And what about removing the card and then reinstalling it?

I've got a problem with the new Apple HD 30" on a 9600 ATI: maximum resolution was 1200 by something. That was a real voodoo and shamanism which I had to do to establish the native resolution. I believe that removing and reinstalling the card was a decisive element in this voodoo thing, although I'm not sure (quite a long ago). In the end I've got the native res and was using this card till the upgrade arrived.

sash
Click to expand...

Surely the problem there is that the Radeon 9600 doesn't support dual-link DVI, and will therefore never ever run a display at any resolution above 1920x1200?
 
peskaa said:
Surely the problem there is that the Radeon 9600 doesn't support dual-link DVI, and will therefore never ever run a display at any resolution above 1920x1200?
Click to expand...

ATI RADEON 9600 PRO 4x/8x AGP 256MB Dual DVI Video Card has one Dual-link DVI, thus supporting Apple HD 23" and Apple HD 30" (which means up to 2560 x1600).

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/ATI Technologies/100435065/
or this link:
http://ati.amd.com/products/radeon9600/radeon9600propcmac/specs.html

I wasn't satisfied with card's performance that much though.

sash
 
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