Starvin’ Marvin

I came back to this issue today. While I’m waiting for an “apt-get upgrade” on my ps3 machine I decided to enlighten you how to setup correctly your video resolution. So what you have to do is to play a little bit with ps3videomode command. If you try this on CLI:

jsantos@clarke:~$ ps3videomode -h
ps3-video-mode (ps3-utils) 2.0.2
Usage:
ps3-video-mode [options]
Options:
--help, -h print this message
--video, -v set video mode ID
--full, -f use full screen mode
--color, -c use HDMI full range
--dither,-d use dither ON mode
Video mode ID:
0:auto mode
YUV 60Hz 1:480i 2:480p 3:720p 4:1080i 5:1080p
YUV 50Hz 6:576i 7:576p 8:720p 9:1080i 10:1080p
RGB 60Hz 33:480i 34:480p 35:720p 36:1080i 37:1080p
RGB 50Hz 38:576i 39:576p 40:720p 41:1080i 42:1080p
VESA 11:WXGA 12:SXGA 13:WUXGA
full screen mode: + 128
dither ON mode : + 2048
Example:
ps3-video-mode -v 3 -f 720p 60Hz with full screen mode.
ps3-video-mode -v 131 Same as above.
If no argument is given, displays the current video mode.
Send bug reports to Geoff Levand .

First off all, you need stop GDM before proceeding. This is not an exact science here so you have to see the options available for you. In my case I have a Half HD TV so I can get 1080i tops. So looking for the table obtained above it seems that I should use 4 mode (ps3videomode -v 4), right? Wrong! It didn’t work well for me, i got the image shifted to one side and cut. Then I tried the full screen mode (128 + 4, so ps3videomode -v 132). Not yet there, although it worked on CLI, when I started GDM I got my LCD to 576p. That sucked, but I didn’t give up: I tried dither ON mode (2048 + 4 - ps3videomode -v 2052). Worked OK both on CLI and with a GDM restart!

So now I know how to set my resolution correct, lets make it permanent:

sudo vim /etc/event.d/ps3videomode

Then write this on the file:

start on runlevel 2
exec /usr/bin/ps3videomode -v INPUT_YOUR_VIDEOMODE

That’s it! Reboot and check if it is OK. My experience says that gnome based ubuntu has a jerky performance so I’m currently trying something lighter like XFCE based desktop (Xubuntu) and cleaning some startup apps that I do not need.

Next steps will be to check mplayer’s performance and get the damn wireless to work. And… A screenshot just for you: