PROB | nVidia drivers & automatic resolution

[cn0saj]

I have recently come across a problem with my current unattended software installation procedure and am looking for some ideas of where else to look for a problem or if anyone has seen this before.

Basically we have an established unattend procedure which works well and have always had the display set to 1024x768x32 as a minimum using the [Display] part of the std windows unattend.txt procedure.

After recently changing the monitors on one of our systems (we used to run some cheap no name brand and have now attached some LG Studioworks 995E 19" displays) - each time we do a rebuild the system defaults to 640x480x32 rather than out chosen resolution.

Unattend is running a XP with slipstreamed Sp2. We are using OemPnPDriversPath driver install procedure for the forceware 81.98 but changing back a version doesn't alter anything - we have already tested it.

The unattend procedure works fine if the no-name brand displays are attached but not if the LG ones are. (We tested this on the same PC with 2 rebuilds)

The LG displays are detected correctly and assigned the internal windows drivers. The no-name monitors default to the "Default Display" hardware driver. Thinking this might be the issue I edited the inf file in the windows build files to remove the LG 995E drivers from the MS inf files. The LG monitors defaulted then to "Plug and Play Monitor" but still behaved the same way. I then removed the PnP monitor class and now windows defaults to "Default Display" with the LG displays as well but it still doesn't correct the resolution not being assigned the correct params. We have tried clean rebuilds of the system on each test described above but still can't determine why the unattended install behaves in this way.

The LG displays are 19" and have a max resolution /colour depth / refresh of way above the 1024x768x32@75hz specs we are setting in the unattend - but the unattend does not seem to be able to set the required parameters or is being overriden by something. We can change to these specs after a rebuild with no issues and all seems to be ok, but it stuffs up some of our other apps if the resolution is set too low to begin with.

The driver tree contains no other LG drivers of any sort and has been static along with the unattend build files and scripts during this whole ordeal. (except for inf file changes as described above) This can also be verified as the old displays still work correctly when attached to the PC and an unattended rebuild of the PC done.

Edited March 18, 2006 by Bâshrat the Sneaky

[Guest]

Windows may not be able to see that your LG monitor can handle those settings with its included drivers. Have you tried adding the LG monitor drivers to your unattended setup?

[cn0saj]

Windows may not be able to see that your LG monitor can handle those settings with its included drivers. Have you tried adding the LG monitor drivers to your unattended setup?

Thats a really great idea. Unfortunately I had already thought of this but forgot to mention it This should have appeared before the first step above. ie. Before even allowing windows to use its internal driver I tried a driver from the LG website which would suit this device - which is always my primary preference. Unfortunately it worked no better than the windows shipped one. On investigating the two they were remarkably similar....

[RogueSpear]

You may have better luck setting the resolution from RunOnceEx using NirCmd. I've always found that work when the settings in WINNT.SIF won't.