Display problem + Suggestion

Jean-Dom · August 16, 2016

Hello everybody,

I have recently bought an Orange Pi Lite.

First, I have downloaded an image with Ubuntu Mate, but it finally decided to take the Armbian one which seems more precise and well prepared.

First of all, great thanks for the work already done.

I have encountered 2 problems during my installation:

Everything was preestablished for US, and it is sometimes boring or difficult to use it.
I have some problems with the display.

Note that I have taken the Xenial image, and I expect it is the Linux 4 version on which we cannot run Xorg.

I start with the easier one: Internationalisation (and I have not written internationalization to remind US people that even English language may change from one country to another).

We will have to interact with the machine.
- The keyboard needs to be configured directly at first boot. The password 1234 selected for root is perfect, but it is really difficult to remember the US keyboard configuration. Even h3disp is difficult, because the m key is located on US keyboard where the question mark is located on mine. Please, run dpkg-reconfigure at first boot, because we can use it with <Enter>,<Tab> and <Space>.
- Also, I think a good idea to start dpkg-reconfigure tzdata.

The second one is a problem. After having searched, I guess the answer is located in the fex file but I cannot find the script.bin file (on some topic, suposed to be in a separate partition) and I do not dare to change it directly without help.

Display problem.
- Symptom: On my screen, I loose 4 characters on the left of the line, and one line at the bottom of the display. In other words, when "4 updates are available. Run apt-get upgrade." is written, I cannot see "4 up". And when I enter a command, I cannot see the text.
- More detailed symptom:
  - I have two displays: My TV (LG 42LG5500, HD capable), and a standard display (LG W2252V, RVB/DVI @ 1680 x 1050 + HDMI @ 1080i/p @ 50/60 Hz).
  - I have two HDMI cables: The first one is an old Meliconi cable, and the second one is bought on AliExpress (Premium V1.4 HDMI Male to Male HD Cable High Speed Gold Plated).
  - On the TV: I can use a lot of HDMI modes (selected with h3disp), but I loose characters. I have to zoom on the TV with the ratio button, and I take something perfect with 1080p when requesting the "Select original signal" to drive the zoom.
  - On the display: The second cable does not work, in any mode, while it was working on the TV.
  - On the display, with the Meliconi cable, various modes a working properly except that I loose characters and I have no way to adjust it.
- Analysis:
  - I think the new cable has less wires inside, even if it is supposed to be Ethernet capable. It is probably the reason why the new cable does not work properly on my standard display. This information is mainly to inform new users to check the device with various displays and cables, before telling it does not work. Also, for technicians (if any), it could give a clue.
  - For the display shift, I consider that the synchronization does not start at the right moment. I do not know the way the HDMI is defined, but with previous standards was found that synchronization could be positive or negative. I suppose that this parameter still exists in the video chip/part of the chip, and that an extra argument should/could be added to h3disp to change it. Also, maybe it can be a value of an offset, adjusting when the synchronization should start (earlier/later), or something like a scale factor. If so, it could be harder to change it easily.
- Solutions?
  - Is there a way to easily change the synchronization?
  - Is there another origin of my problem?

Thanks in advance for your help,

Jean-Dominique, Annecy, France, Europe, Earth, Sun system, Milky way, Somewhere...

wildcat_paris · August 16, 2016

Bonjour @jean-dom

(only one tip on my side)

on Ubuntu "dpkg-reconfigure locales" is not going to work as Ubuntu compared to Debian because Ubuntu packages language files separately which is bothering to me

so I install "aptitude" first then with aptitude I can install the appropriate packages

language-pack-fr-base

language-pack-fr

maybe

sudo dpkg-reconfigure console-data

http://askubuntu.com/questions/342066/how-to-permanently-configure-keyboard

I build an Armbian image with default fr_FR as it is pretty convenient.

[gr@bpi:/armbian_kernel] $ set | grep FR
LANGUAGE=fr_FR.UTF-8

Guillaume (Les Lilas, 93)

note : ah! beautiful Annecy... priceless

Jean-Dom · August 17, 2016

Hello Guillaume,

Yes, you are right: It was a bit late and the message was a bit long.

What I have ran at initial login was:

dpkg-reconfigure keyboard-configuration
dkpg-reconfigure tzdata
dpkg-reconfigure console-data

The last item mainly requested to confirm UTF-8 selection. It is a good thing to check, but not mandatory during installation because we often use commands without special characters. keyboard-configuration is absolutely needed, because keyboards are really different from one country to another. tzdata is between both, because it is not very important to be synchronized to a local timezone, but it is used by a lot of programs.

I keep in mind the change of full language packs. I have not downloaded any graphical environment (because Xorg is not working properly on my image).

Thank you for your support,

Jean-Dominique.

Igor · August 17, 2016

Regarding display. New modes are coming within next kernel update - you can try today if you build on your own.

Jean-Dom · August 17, 2016

Thanks Admin for your information.

May I only ask some more:

Scheduled date, if any?
The problem of shifting display should it be solved by this update? I mean: Do you add modes which includes my display specification on a more accurate manner, or anything else?

Again, thanks for the work done.