[rescue] OT Solaris display config Q

[Joshua D Boyd]

On Wed, Aug 07, 2002 at 10:16:37AM -0500, Leslie Connally wrote:
> this is off topic, but I think someone here knows the answer. we can do
> this off-line as well

It seems on topic to me.  Fixing improper video settings is important
to being able to use the rescued machine.  Besides, I'd like the
answer to be archived.
 
> I playing with a sun box (u30) as a desktop machine, and well, the
> desktop.. the entire gestalt of the onscreen display seems crappy.. this in
> comparison to a mac. the solaris seems horribly harsh & contrasty. Bill?
> Joshua? any hints. sure I can flatten out the monitor settings, but does
> Solaris have a gamma settting? and does it really have to be either/or on
> the 'colors for desktop' - 'colors for apps'?

OK, my answer will be assuming that the monitor, cable, and video card
are all good.

First, solaris does have a gamma setting.  Answerbook2, I believe, tells
you how, but I can't find answerbook2 on sun's site.  Here is a URL
for it that may or may not work.  It doesn't work for me, but then my 
outgoing firewall seems to block web servers on nonstandard ports here
at work.

http://sundocs.princeton.edu:8888/ab2/coll.28.19/FRAMEBUF/@Ab2PageView/3118

But anyway, for some cards, I believe you use `afbconfig -g 2.22` or
`ffbconfig -g 2.22`, or whatever the proper command is for your video
card, and whatever you want instead of 2.22.  There are various guides
on the net for figuring out the correct value for you. 

One thing I would look into is do photos look on your sun the same way
they do on the mac?  If so, maybe you want to keep tweaking different
sun settings until they do.  Things to check would be the overall
brightness and contrast, as well as the gamma and color balance.  I
think those are the main things.

If photos look the same, but you still feel that Solaris looks harsh
and contrasty, then you probably just need to customize the desktop
colors to your liking.  Professional calibration would also be nice,
but isn't really feasible.

-- 
Joshua D. Boyd