nvidia 173 driver screen resolution issues

[bakula22]

Hi, I am currently running the nvidia 96 series driver with my GEforce 5200 graphics card. It generally works pretty well, except that when I enable desktop effects, Amarok and OpenOffice menu text disappears, leaving only little horizontal lines behind. I don't care about enabling desktop effects, except that I really really want to run avant window navigator.

So, I tried activating the 173 driver, but the best resolution I can select is 640x480. The Oo and Amarok menu issues seem to be gone with 173 and desktop effects enabled, but my desktop is four times the size of my monitor. Not good. I've spent a number of hours trying different solutions, but quite frankly, many of them (especially the ones involving modification of the xorg file) are over my head and I can never quite pull it off. Can anyone help me or point me to a reasonably clear walk through?

Thanks in advance.

[Lance1968]

have you tried updating to the 180 restricted driver. It should also install the nvidia x-server settings menu where you can change your settings

[bakula22]

173 is the highest that my 5200 is compatible with. I can install 177 and 180, but cannot activate them with either the hardware drivers utility or envyNG. If there is a feasible, and more importantly, stable workaround to use these drivers, I would be ok with that solution.

[guitar_man]

your on ibex?

[bakula22]

Yep. 8.10

[guitar_man]

I have used the driver 173 and it runs smoothly...