Dell XPS QHD+ Drivers for Kali

[Rocko]

I've started using Kali via VMWare Workstation on a Dell XPS 13 with the QHD+ display - It seems to have some issues with regards to scaling etc.

Does anyone know if there are display drivers available that might rectify the issue? I've searched around the Dell website and their offerings for Linux are minimal to say the least!

Thanks!!

[Sebkinne]

2 hours ago, Rocko said:

I've started using Kali via VMWare Workstation on a Dell XPS 13 with the QHD+ display - It seems to have some issues with regards to scaling etc.

Does anyone know if there are display drivers available that might rectify the issue? I've searched around the Dell website and their offerings for Linux are minimal to say the least!

Thanks!!

Have you got the equivalent of Virtualbox's "Guest Additions" installed? That takes care of the scaling pretty nicely.

[Rocko]

Yeah, I've got VMWare tools installed, and it does indeed make Kali run at the QHD+ resolution (3800 x 1800 or something) but Kali doesn't scale icons / txt very well - they all appear tiny.

Unless there's a setting within Kali to adjust text / icon scaling?  I've looked into Accessibility and it doesn't seem to be supported in there.. 

 

[Sebkinne]

9 hours ago, Rocko said:

Yeah, I've got VMWare tools installed, and it does indeed make Kali run at the QHD+ resolution (3800 x 1800 or something) but Kali doesn't scale icons / txt very well - they all appear tiny.

Unless there's a setting within Kali to adjust text / icon scaling?  I've looked into Accessibility and it doesn't seem to be supported in there.. 

 

Using the gnome teak tool will allow you to do this.

[Rocko]

Thanks! I'll give that a look :)

[Rocko]

Sebkinne - Thank you very much, it would have taken me ages to find those options! It's definitely a lot easier to use now.

[digip]

On a side note, because it's a VM, resizing(at least for me in my verison of VMware) tends to go wonky at times when I switch between host and guest machines, I use a little bash script to use xrandr to set my resolution to a size not listed in the default background settings for 1920x1080. You can mod this to change your settings as needed for different monitor sizes to get a higher res output, vs stretching which on my machine, looks crappy compared to the native resolution size. I also turn off stretching in VMware settings because of this.

 

#!/bin/bash
### fixres.sh - sets 1920x1080 in VMware for Kali Linux 2.0 2016.+ ~ DigiP
gtf 1920 1080 60
xrandr --newmode "1920x1080_60.00"  172.80  1920 2040 2248 2576  1080 1081 1084 1118  -HSync +Vsync
xrandr --addmode Virtual1 "1920x1080_60.00"
xrandr --output Virtual1 --mode "1920x1080_60.00"

Some documentation on xrandr - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/X/Config/Resolution

[Rocko]

Thanks Digip - That actually looks better than the Gnome Tweak Tool method!

+1 for the Hak5 forums! :)