Can't get my monitor to work at 144hz

[jlongcheck]

Hi, I solved the problem by incrementally adding ModeValidation Parameters to /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-nvidia.conf until I could add whatever mode I wanted. Then I generated a modeline using this command:

cvt12 2560 1440 144 -b
# 2560x1440 @ 144.000 Hz Reduced Blank (CVT) field rate 144.000 Hz; hsync: 222.192 kHz; pclk: 586.59 MHz
Modeline "2560x1440_144.00_rb2"  586.59  2560 2568 2600 2640  1440 1529 1537 1543 +hsync -vsync

As you can see it uses -b which makes it use CVT 1.2 reduced blanking timings.

Here is the updated 20-nvidia.conf:

# nvidia-xconfig: X configuration file generated by nvidia-xconfig
# nvidia-xconfig:  version 465.31

Section "ServerLayout"
    Identifier     "Layout0"
    Screen      0  "Screen0"
    InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
    InputDevice    "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
EndSection

Section "Files"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    # generated from default
    Identifier     "Mouse0"
    Driver         "mouse"
    Option         "Protocol" "auto"
    Option         "Device" "/dev/psaux"
    Option         "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
    Option         "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    # generated from default
    Identifier     "Keyboard0"
    Driver         "kbd"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
    Identifier     "Monitor0"
    VendorName     "Unknown"
    ModelName      "Unknown"
    Option         "DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Device"
    Identifier     "Device0"
    Driver         "nvidia"
    VendorName     "NVIDIA Corporation"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
    Identifier     "Screen0"
    Device         "Device0"
    Monitor        "Monitor0"
    DefaultDepth    24
    SubSection     "Display"
        Depth       24
    EndSubSection
    Option         "AllowIndirectGLXProtocol" "off"
    Option         "TripleBuffer" "on"
    Option         "UseEDIDFreqs" "FALSE"
    Option         "ModeValidation" "AllowNonEdidModes, NoMaxPclkCheck, NoEdidMaxPclkCheck, NoHorizSyncCheck, NoVertRefreshCheck"
EndSection

For Reference: Appendix D. X Config Options

I also added this to my /etc/profile:

export __GL_SYNC_TO_VBLANK=1
export __GL_SYNC_DISPLAY_DEVICE=DVI-D-0
export VDPAU_NVIDIA_SYNC_DISPLAY_DEVICE=DVI-D-0

I don’t know if that has anything to do with the solution but I read somewhere that it might help in some cases. Here is the link to the corresponding arch wiki paragraph: NVIDIA - ArchWiki

I’ve also updated the nvidia driver to v465.31:

Graphics:  Device-1: NVIDIA GP106 [GeForce GTX 1060 6GB] driver: nvidia v: 465.31 bus-ID: 20:00.0
           Display: server: X.org 1.20.11 driver: loaded: nvidia resolution: <missing: xdpyinfo>

Thank you so much for your help!