Howto run Linux with resolution other than 1080p

[longsleep]

Many people seem to have issues with the fixed 1920x1060@60Hz resolution i ship my U-Boot and Linux images with. Until now you needed to be a developer to change the resultion to anything else.

This has now changed.

I created a tool which can change the resolution. Say hello to sunxi-disp-tool.

I provide a binary package for Ubuntu 16.04 Xenial Xerus (arm64) in my Ubuntu Pine64 Makers PPA.

If you do not run my Ubuntu Xenial image it is now a good time to change that. See the Ubunu 16.04 Xenial Xerus thread for download and instructions.

Other than the tool itself, you need:
- U-Boot v2014.07-4-pine64 or later
- Kernel 3.10.101-0-pine64-longsleep-39 or later

I will eventually release an updated Xenial image which has those - for now update as usual (as root) with:

Code:

bash <(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/longsleep/build-pine64-image/master/simpleimage/platform-scripts/pine64_update_uboot.sh)
bash <(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/longsleep/build-pine64-image/master/simpleimage/platform-scripts/pine64_update_kernel.sh)

Then you can just add the desired resolution to /boot/uEnv.txt (eg. as optargs). By default the sunxi-disp-tool looks for a Kernel parameter called disp.screen0_output_mode to be in line with other sunxi boards.

Quick instructions for 720p60 (1280x720p@60Hz):

Code:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install sunxi-disp-tool
cat <<EOF | sudo tee -a /boot/uEnv.txt
optargs=disp.screen0_output_mode=720p60
EOF
sudo reboot

For a list of supported resolutions see README.md.

I will work on other distributions as well, but you need to install it manually and integrate it manually into the boot system. I strongly advice to use my Ubuntu image.


Your feedback is most welcome.