On Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala, Dell Studio 1737 with ATI, the display config became corrupted and the system would only boot into low res mode. I often reconfiguring the display for dual mode and disable the laptop display to force the menus onto the larger external display then re-enable the laptop display to use both spaces. This was working fine on Ubuntu 8.10 Intrepid Ibex. After updating to 9.10 the display settings become corrupted while attempting this same sequence of operations. To fix it, delete: /etc/X11/xorg.conf Then execute: dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg Reconfiguring the display alone didn't work.