"Out of scan range"

[Ben Scott]

On 1/24/06, mike shlitz <mshlitz at yahoo.com> wrote:
> The issue I have, is that the monitor I
> have available here is older, and when RH boots, I get
> the msg. "Out of Scan Range".

  That typically means the vertical refresh rate (measured in Hz) of
the signal being generated at the computer is too fast for the
monitor.

> What would be the most sensible way to go about
> changing the monitor settings?  ... Is it possible to
> boot into a "safe" mode in order to change the
> settings via the desktop?

  What you'll want to do is boot into runlevel 3.  Runlevel 5 (the
default on Red Hat, most of the time) goes directly into X and the GUI
login.  Runlevel 3 starts all the same services, but stays at the
text-mode login on the console.

  To specify the boot runlevel, add it to kernel boot parameters. 
You're most likely using GRUB.  When the system first boots (after
BIOS init and POST), you should get a boot menu.  (It may timeout
after a few seconds, so be ready.)  Hit the [A] key to append boot
parameters.  Type a space (to separate from the previous parameters)
and then a "3" (a bare digit three).  Hit [ENTER] to accept the
parameters and boot into runlevel 3.

  Once you've got a usable console, you can run the X configuration
utility, and specify that your monitor doesn't support the higher
refresh rates.  If needed, pick a generic monitor type and limit it to
60 Hz.

  The command you run to configure X can vary on different releases of
Red Hat.  What release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux are you running?

-- Ben