Xrandr errors. BadName (named color or font does not exist)

Question

Hi, I've been looking and googling a lot, but I didn't find a solution to this problem.

I was successfully using xrandr to extend my desktop in my work place with this little "script".

#!/bin/sh

xrandr --newmode 1920x1080  220.64  1920 2056 2264 2608  1080 1081 1084 1128  -HSync +Vsync
xrandr --addmode VGA 1920x1080
xrandr --output VGA --mode 1920x1080

Everything was going well till one day that magically stop working. When I try to use it. I just get this message.

X Error of failed request: BadName (named color or font does not exist)

The laptop display resizes in a strange way, but nothing happens with the extended monitor.

I've restored gnome desktop default config. I changed the font config, I tried with other layouts and monitors, but always occur the same.

So any Idea will be welcomed.

My best regards.

Answer 1

same situation here trying to fix my resolution

a@a-desktop:~$ xrandr --newmode "1024x768"   63.50  1024 1072 1176 1328  768 771 775 798 -hsync +vsync 
X Error of failed request:  BadName (named color or font does not exist)   
Major opcode of failed request:  149 (RANDR)   
Minor opcode of failed request:  16 (RRCreateMode)   
Serial number of failed request:  18   
Current serial number in output stream:  18

Answer 2

Have you tried using a different name for that mode? I was getting this error and tried using the name "1080p" (e.g. xrandr --newmode "1080p"...) instead of the "1920x1080" name that I usually use and it worked. I'm not sure what's causing the error, as the 1920x1080 mode isn't even listed by xrandr, nor can it be removed via --rmmode, but creating a new mode with a different name seemed to work for me.

Answer 3

I had a similar problem, I believe it was because I had already created that setting before (then rebooted). If I skip that stage and go straight to:

$ xrandr --addmode LVDS1 1280x720

in the terminal it does it straight away, maybe we were trying to create something that already exists in our system? If it's doing it on the first try though I can't come up with an explanation, sorry, I'm new to working with ubuntu code, 9.04 worked perfectly, upgrading to 10.10 is a bit more of a headache!

Hope it works for someone else.