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D630 External VGA - Mirror


Freedomrock

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Wow it has been a year or since since I posted. The site looks great. I sold both my D630 a while back and bought a used Mac Book. I haven't been messing with a Hackintosh in a while. The same customer that gave me 2 D630s  gave me another one. This one has damaged on-board video (Intel). The screen itself looks fine but the image is messed up. However the external video works fine. From what I remember I got Extending Desktop to work on my D630 but not mirroring.

 

My question to you D630 users before I waste my time installing OSX -  does Mirroring work? I still have my USB boot with all saved kexts, Extra, EDP etc. but I thought I would ask before i installed.

 

On a side note I priced the hardware to build a decent Hackintosh desktop. Once i added everything up it was more than i wanted to spend. I would up buying an old Mac Pro 2.66 ghz with 2 dual cores 4 MB, and 160 MB HD for $350.00!!!!

 

The older Mac Pros lost their falue because they use a 32 bit EFI and can not run Mountain Lion. I haven't tried it yet but you can install Chameleon and make a few other bootlist changes, swap out the video card, and you wind up with a 64 bit EFI; and can run Mountain Lion. Most likely i will just run Snow leopard. This should more than suit my needs as a DVD ripping work station and media server. Quite a few being sold on EBAY for under $500 if any fellow Hackintoshers have a need. Ram and video cards are more than the norm but I figured I couldn't go wrong for $350.

 

Thanks for any answers on Video Mirroring, also wondering if mirroring would work with the display closed?

 

 

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I did some tests on my D630 GMA X1300 HiRes running Lion 10.7.5 and the last D630-Intel-HiRes EDP package. Results are as follows:

 

1) Hook external LCD to VGA port (at boot time or after) -> extended mode (default) kicks in

Extended_mode.jpg

2) Select mirror mode -> both screen get completely garbled

Mirror_mode.jpg

3) close the lid -> no sleep and external LCD becomes fully usable as main screen after about 5s

Mirror_ClosedLID.jpg

4) re-open lid -> garbled screen

 

5) reboot with external LCD connected -> both screens go garbled again on boot completion, i.e. Mac OS X remembers the last used display mode.

 

6) closed the lid, placed my mouse on menu bar display icon, open lid (got garbled screens) and with a bit of dexterity and several attempts, blindly managed to click on the display icon and move down within the menu to 2nd item to cancel mirror mode and return to extended mode.

 

When in mirror mode, lid closed, if you disconnect the external LCD and re-open the lid, the internal LCD stays dark for about 5s and then returns to normal display. Naturally, if you reboot without external screen, the internal LCD is Ok until you connect the external screen as you go back to point 2) above.

 

-> So the answer is kind of yes: you can use the D630 X3100 in mirror mode, only if you close the lid. I would strongly advise to configure BIOS to 'wake on USB' in such a case. The major difficulty is then to "blindly" configure the Hack to return to extended mode.

 

I'll try tonight with my D630 X3100 LoRes in case that one behaves differently...

 

PS: if display on internal LCD appears messed up but no on external screen, I'd say there's nothing wrong with the video controller. In all likelyhood, it's actually the flat/ribbon cable connecting the internal LCD to the mobo that is damaged. It's happened to me on my D620 nVidia HiRes. The cable can wear/get damaged with time at the hinge area... All the trouble was finding the right flat cable as they are different between HiRes and LoRes screens... You'll find LoRes cables without problem.

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Thanks for taking the time to post and I do have the low res version. I also appreciate your comment concerning ribbon. I have torn apart a few laptops and I know how things can bind as you describe. I could live with this in extended mode.

 

Thanks again. I knew this site would have the answers. You guys (gals?) are the best!

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Just to let you know: exact same behaviour with D630 GMA X3100 LoRes.

 

NB: Mirroring also tested with:

- D630 nVidia 135m HiRes (ML) -> Ok

- D620 GMA950 LoRes (SL) -> Ok

- D620 nVidia 110m HiRes (Lion) -> NOk, could not get VGA output to work...

 

Maybe a DSDT tuning would fix the issue on the D630 GMA X3100

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I not sure what you mean by DSDT tuning. For my past installs I used the tools from this sight. Most everything worked so I never tuned DSDT.  Depending upon what is involved it may be beyond my skill set.

 

I will take a look at the cable and take it from there. I hadn't really though of the cable being the problem. If I can repair on board video I would sell the laptop with OSX and Mint. I'm much better with hardware than software.

 

If I can't get on board video fixed I was thinking of using the D630 as a Plex Client. If I can't get it to work with OSX I will just install Linux Mint. OSX is always my first choice. I'll be back ......

 

Thanks again.

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