So I finally got that new monitor....
My old desktop monitor was the result of the really old one dying unexpectedly sometime in early 2019 or maybe early 2018, at a time when we figured we'd be moving real soon now, besides which cash was short, so I basically went to the nearest Fry's in search of the cheapest thing they had that was somewhere around 24" diagonal and 1080P. Ended up with a demo unit, which was (by gotta-have-it-today standards) reasonably cheap.
Post-move, and taking into account the size of my office and thence my desk, I figured a 32", 1440P monitor would be about right. I had one from ViewSonic bookmarked, but, came time to buy, settled on something from LG that looked a little better for about the same price.
Unpack out in the garage. Basic test: plug it into the lab PC (second-hand Dell business box running Linux Mint). Comes up at 1080P, and no higher options. Hm. Not so good. Wait... I wonder...
The monitor came with two cables: HDMI and, as it turns out, DisplayPort. I had it hooked up to the PC using a DisplayPort-to-HDMI adapter. Try the native DisplayPort cable: success! I now have a second monitor (the first being on the VGA port, because reasons) at 1440P, as it should be. The adapter says "4K" on it, but apparently wasn't designed for 2K.
Spend some time futzing around with the dual-monitor setup before remembering that this is supposed to be a replacement monitor, not a second monitor. Time to set it up in my office.
Dismount monitor arm from desk and monitor from arm. Find base of old monitor and re-attach it after a moment of confusion as I try to figure out how it's meant to attach. Set about attaching arm to new monitor.
The LG monitor is nicely designed, and it's very easy to remove and re-attach the supplied base. The 100mm VESA mount is recessed, and ordinarily covered by the snap-in mount for the base. But! The bracket on the arm sticks out just a little too much around the corners. Considerable Dremelation of the bracket is required, but eventually I get it assembled and back on the desk.
The power supply for the monitor could be greatly improved in two areas: the wall wart covers a large area of the outlet strip, and the cable isn't very long - so those of us with outlets under the desk and cable routing through a hole in the desk, then over to the monitor arm, then up to the monitor, well, it looks like a short 3-prong extension cord may be in order.
Then the real test: the computers! Remember, they're connected to the monitor via an HDMI KVM switch; allegedly playing nice with 1440P was a selection criterion for said switch, but that capability remains untested. And....
Following a reboot with the new monitor connected, the new workstation thinks it's 1440P. Win!
Before and after reboots, though, the old workstation thinks it's 1080P, and the file server thinks it's 1280x1024, the latter not even giving square pixels. Ah, well. The server normally runs headless anyway, and I guess until such time as I finish migrating to the new workstation I'll just have a distractingly big 1080P display hanging over my desk.
More incentive to complete the migration!
But not now. Not enough sleep. Must nap. Brain not working.
Update: While I was playing on the workstation, I noted that there were a great many software updates available, so I installed them. There was a warning that the NVIDIA driver would be removed, but a new version was to be installed, so that ought to be OK. Then, just to make sure nothing has gotten broken, I rebooted. Oops! Not only were some applications broken before the reboot (notably, the logout app; I ended up switching to a text console and rebooting from the command line), but after the reboot 'twas command-line only. The X server wouldn't start, and I couldn't find useful debugging information right away.
Wait... didn't I have an issue with the NVIDIA driver before? Yup. Did it somehow get frotzed by the update because it came from backports? Let's just try that incantation again:
apt install -t buster-backports nvidia-driver
And, the GUI comes right back up. Reboot again, and it's still working.
Guess I need to tuck that apt
line in maybe a fix-drivers
script somewhere (/usr/local/sbin
maybe), and invoke it when things have stopped working.
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