Re: IPX framebuffer refresh rates

> Does anyone know how (or if it's possible) to alter the FB refresh
> rates such that a standard VGA LCD will work?  I've got a regular CRT
> but it's slowly dying and I'd like to use my desktop LCDs in its
> place.

My experience is limited, but, in my experience, flatscreens will sync
to an unmodified Sun video signal.  Most of them will scale the
1152x900 up to whatever their native resolution is, and the result
usually looks pretty horrible, but it's plenty good enough for text
console use.

Some flatscreens can be told to _not_ scale up, in which case you get
the display with a (usually black) border around it.  But those appear
to be rare these days; of my own flatscreens (I have about six), for
example, _one_ is capable of this (two of about 12 if you include
laptop screens).

Many cgsixes can be told to run at alternative resolutions by setting
output-device in the OBP to something like "screen:r1024x768x66".
Whether this is possible, and the full list of resolutions available if
it is, depends on the cgsix and possibly other things (OBP version?).
Use the OBP cd command to get to the device (on an IPX it's typically
something like /sbus/cgsix@3,0) and then use "words"; if you see words
like those in the list, it's worth trying.  In some cases it's even
possible to manually construct a resolution-setting word to get a mode
that's not in the framebuffer's built-in list; I did this with a cg14
back in 2008 - you can find my report on that experience at
http://mail-index.netbsd.org/port-sparc/2008/08/08/msg000133.html.
(Sorry, I don't know of any non-Webified archive of the list.)

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