Installing Sparky on GPD Win Max

[Sabungayam]

https://www.reddit.com/r/gpdwin/comments/ik3dje/gpd_win_max_display_fix_in_linux/

I started with the FIX LINK, this is basically what you need to do to get your screen working.

I have just tried the 2 more recent Sparky iterations. I started with rolling as that's my preference. It did better in that with the computer connected via HDMI to my
projector, I was able to see clearly because this screen without the custom EDID presents very bad refresh giving you a quad blur vision effect. Very hard for me to
read.

So I often do a live hooked up to the projector so I can see. The screen will be somewhat readable if set to 800x600 until the fix is done. I can get other Distros to make it to X usually with the HDMI setup explained here. Many Distros can't make it to X at all without that and many simply can't.

Before, I got this computer right around July or August direct from Crowd funding, Sparky would not make it in either, with or withour HDMI to a normal screen that feeds it's EDID info.

I saw that you updated images in 2020-12 rollinng and beginning of this month 5-14.

I actually got better results with rolling in that it did see and feed to the projector. Alas, but it never started X. It got hung up.

Restarting X or the lightdm did not help. It just hangs on a black screen and never gets anywhere.

Sparky Stable 5-14 for the oddest reason does not see or feed to the HDMI connection at all. It aslo hangs with a black screen.

I pretty much have read that the bigges issue with this device is that you need the newer kernels.

I can get MXLinux to boot but, I can see X. I can achieve an install. Unfortunately, they have done something and using a joystick or controller in a game is still moving the cursor and you end up going off screen and other problems since for whatever reason their driver sees your controller as a control for the cursor.

They also after all these months have never answered the question about it or how to fix it.
In addition there's no true upgrade path from their STABLE offering. In the end you have to reinstall.

So, given the link and what you see is necessary to get this screen working. Has anyone any suggestions on how I can get an install so I can just set up the Screen FIx. I expect Sparky to work well on this as it has been my goto Distro on most of my machines .

Lastly on 5-14, it gives a message that it can't match the audio and some other functions. I am not on or near the unit now as I am at work. It does appear that rolling works better in hardware recognition. But an interesting aspect of 5-14 is that with that kernel, I did not get the blur effect at all? It was sideways, but I could read it clearly. One thing I noted was that it did not seem to detect the thunderbolt port. So these are things that may become missing functions if I do get 5-14 to boot.

Again, an suggestions why it's not making it to X? Using safe mode will give you nothing. It won't ever get as far as just normal booting and this seems to be across the board with all distros.

In case their  is any problem with the LINK:

The EDID information identifying the display isn't in ACPI like on the Win 2. I extracted it from Windows (still not sure what the source is, it could be only in the registry) and saved the copy in /lib/firmware/edid/gpdwinmax.bin, then passed the kernel parameters to load it: video=eDP-1:800x1280 drm.edid_firmware=eDP-1:edid/gpdwinmax.bin fbcon=rotate:1. This sets the console rotation and video mode, but not the GUI rotation; in gnome, this had to be set to "Portrait Left". The kernel parameters were in my case stored in /etc/default/grub.

If you want a copy of my EDID, paste the following into base64 --decode > /lib/firmware/edid/gpdwinmax.bin:

AP///////wAJ5QMAAwAAAAEdAQOACxF4LwAAoFdJmyYQSE8AAAABAQEBAQEBAQEBAQEBAQEBwhog
UDAAEFAQEDIAbKwAAAAYAAAA/ABUVjA4MFdVTS1OTDAKAAAA/QA8PBAQBwAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMM=
If your system starts DRM early, as mine does, you'll want to have the EDID in the initramfs to get the console mode right. I did this using a hook /etc/initramfs-tools/hooks/edid, so update-initramfs -u would add the EDID file. Contents of the hook script:

#!/bin/sh

case $1 in
prereqs)
        exit 0
        ;;
esac

. /usr/share/initramfs-tools/hook-functions

copy_file EDID /lib/firmware/edid/gpdwinmax.bin