When running RHEL 5.8 on a virtual guest, why do I not see all the display configuration options I expect?

Solution Unverified - Updated -

Environment

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.x
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.x
  • KVM

Issue

The RHEL 5.8 OS is not showing me all the resolution, color and refresh rates I expect. I want to change the settings but cannot.

Resolution

The display settings in RHEL are based upon the drivers that RHEL installed. RHEL bases those drivers on the video card that is presented to it by the VM Manager. Shutdown the guest virtual machine, change the video configuration in VM manager, and boot the virtual machine. On reboot, RHEL should detect the new card and load the correct drivers accordingly. Then the display options should reflect what that video configuration provides.

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