Ubuntu xorg.conf for Parallels
(2 votes, average: 3 out of 5)
Loading ...I’ve recently been running, on my Mac Pro, parallels desktop 3.0 with Ubuntu 7.10 as the guest operating system. The installation of Ubuntu on parallels is covered very nicely by Shane Duffy I, perhaps a little naively, attempted to change the graphics driver that was being used to attempt to utilise, the nvidia graphics card that is in the Mac Pro and ended up with a busted xorg.conf and an unusable ubuntu install.
To get the nvidia driver installed, I ended up using envy, as the download from nvidia itself failed to detect the hardware. After downloading a whole host of additional packages, this still failed to produce a working xorg.conf. I struggled for several days editing the xorg.conf, top tip always backup your xorg.conf in triplicate before making any changes to it. Through the System->Administration->Screens & Graphics gui, I attempted to select my graphics driver & monitor, again with no useful results except an incorrectly displaying ubuntu installation.
It was only on installing a new parallels vm, that I was able to find a working xorg.conf and then edit my original vm’s xorg.conf properly. So here a few top tips for having an ubuntu xorg.conf running under parallels:
-
The graphics card has to be prlvideo
- Plug ‘n’ Play monitor will do
-
You need the magic LVDSBiosNativeMode option
In fact I ran into another unusual error, when I attempted to reconfigure my xserver-xorg:
sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg FATAL: Error inserting battery (/lib/modules/2.6.22-14-generic/kernel/drivers/acpi/battery.ko) : No such device
So to save other parallels users some the pain that I went through, I present the most pertinent entries in my now working xorg.conf:
# Parallels video driver
Section "Device"
Identifier "Parallels Video"
Driver "prlvideo"
BusID "PCI:0:2:0"
EndSection
Section "Device"
Option "LVDSBiosNativeMode" "false"
Identifier "Generic Video Card"
Driver "vesa"
BusID "PCI:0:2:0"
EndSection
#Parallels monitor
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Parallels Monitor"
VendorName "Parallels Inc."
EndSection
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Generic Monitor"
Option "DPMS"
HorizSync 30-70
VertRefresh 50-160
EndSection
#Parallels screen
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Parallels Screen"
Device "Parallels Video"
Monitor "Parallels Monitor"
Option "NoMTRR"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1024x900"
EndSubSection
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Device "Generic Video Card"
Monitor "Generic Monitor"
DefaultDepth 24
EndSection
# Server layout
Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Default Layout"
Screen "Parallels Screen"
InputDevice "Parallels Mouse" "CorePointer"
# Screen "Default Screen"
InputDevice "Generic Keyboard"
InputDevice "Configured Mouse"
EndSection
I think it is issues like having to hack your xorg.conf that will prevent Linux from marching onto the enterprise desktop and indeed, your typical home user. Most users just don’t want this sort of pain.
March 13th, 2008 at 4:32 pm
Indeed this is why Apples and OSX are gaining popularity with the masses much more rapidly than Linux, it’s the ‘it just works’ syndrome.
March 13th, 2008 at 7:35 pm
/me attempts to install OSX within VMware running on Ubuntu. Oh wait…
March 14th, 2008 at 8:45 am
Hello there Brett & John,
Well, I don’t think these views are actually incompatible.
I think you have to choose the right tool for the job. Linux/open source fine on your server.
Might not be appropriate on the desktop in the enterprise. Maybe when “it just works”. then sure.
That being said one of our developers is running Ubuntu natively on a Mac Pro it looks very nice.
But it took him about a week to get the configuration just right, me running OSX was up and working within the hour.
March 15th, 2008 at 9:31 am
Is it that surprising that OSX (written by Apple) is up and working within an hour on a Mac Pro (manufactured by Apple)?
I can’t see you can criticise Ubuntu (or Linux in general) for the amount of disparate computer hardware out there (much of it without open specifications).
Anyway, you don’t get wobbly windows on OSX :)
January 11th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
This is great news - I am still struggling to adapt this for my intel chip (not much experience with xorg.conf). - I am wondering, if this works in the end, do you get opengl hardware acceleration ?