• FAQ_Linux_Black_Screen_in_Fullscreen_under_X11

When I specify SDL_FULLSCREEN in X11, the screen goes black and my window is centered in the middle, instead of covering the whole screen!

X needs to be able to switch to the desired resolution. For this to work, your monitor must support the resolution, and you need to have the resolution listed in your X server configuration.

The following example is taken from my config for XFree86 4.0.1, but 3.3.x is similiar. Note that if your monitor isn't capable of using these video modes, the X server will drop these modes from the list of available video modes. Example:

Section "Screen"
    Identifier  "Screen 1"
    Device      "3dfx"
    Monitor     "Samsung LCD"
    DefaultDepth 16

    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       8
        Modes       "1280x1024" "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480" "320x240"
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       16
        Modes       "1280x1024" "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
EndSection

Note the different entries for 8 & 16 bit screendepth. I.e. the 320x240 resolution is *not* available when X is started with 16bit depth (the default).

To test these entries, restart X after you modified XF86Config and press ctrl-alt-plus and ctrl-alt-minus to cycle through the resolutions.

-- contributed by Andreas Umbach