Gateway MX8738 display brightness is either on or off solved

[mschilling]

The dimmer for the display doesn't work correctly and just shuts off the LCD when at the lowest setting. Is there a driver to download for this 17" display? Any tips would be appreciated. I loaded Daryna gnome, (and Ubuntu 7.10 gnome did this too).

[Husse]

Forgive me my ignorance - but the dimmer for the display?

[mschilling]

This is on a laptop LCD display. I realize now that desktops do not have display brightness controls on their keyboards, and I'm not sure why there is a difference between DTs and LTs in this regard. It could be power consumption on laptops is a concern. My problem may be because of the incomplete installation and the common home folder, so I'll try reinstalling the system sometime and see if the brightness control works. The LCD on my display is very bright when on full. Maybe my computer is designed for viewing in a brightly lit sunny room and a dark room so thereby working in all environments.

[Husse]

I get you - I thought there were separate controls for that, but I don't find any when I check a laptop
If it is nvidia you can do it in nvidia settings - check out the how to section for a sticky about making the settings sticky (sorry for the unintentional joke)

[mschilling]

OK, I reinstalled Daryna and the problem of display brightness persists. It is either on or off. When I go to the display control the display is on full when set to 75% brightness, but off at any other setting. This is odd because I don't have that problem with Ubuntu 7.10 or the earlier versions of Mint. The other bug I'm experiencing is the wireless connection seems solid, but Firefox can't find any servers even after a relaunch (after suspend and then wake), but is ok after a complete reboot. Anyone else have these problems on a laptop? Other than that, this version of Mint is very nice indeed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The wireless in this Gateway laptop is RTL8187 and the main board with graphics is 945GM according to the device manager.

[mschilling]

It must be something with this Gateway, because my old Dell D600 laptop screen dimming works normally. I have since found another keyboard control that gives me 3 steps of dimming which includes a nice dim one for dark room viewing, so not bad. And the wireless now works fine if I use the keyboard function key to turn off the radio, and turn it back on again after resuming from suspend, which causes the wireless to search and reconnect to the router. I'm happier now!