I have a Compaq Presario 1700 that I've been using for several years.
The laptop, however, has issues running Linux w/ XFree. Whenever I
install Linux on it, if I leave it on for an extended period (several
hours) with X running, I will return and find the screen completely
white. This occurs even if it's running with the top closed, shutting
off the screen
backlight. I just replaced the screen on my laptop, and it is working
fine under Windows, but I'd prefer to run Linux on it; Can anyone
figure out why this happens, and how to prevent its recurrence?

More detailed description of problem:

Once the screen has died once once, shutting down and rebooting the
laptop will fix it temporarily. However, it will continue to occur,
with the screen lasting progressively shorter periods of time before
it dies. Eventually, the screen dies immediately after boot, with only
the Compaq logo showing up for a tiny instant before fading out to
white. Oddly, the screen goes back to normal for a moment to show the
LILO boot screen, and immediately fades back.
This has happened three times now, and each I've sent in the laptop,
under extended warranty, and had the screen replaced. The problem
began each time shortly after installing Linux, and while Linux was
running, but once it occurs, the screen will continue to die even in
Windows.
For reference, the three distros I was using each time were:
-Mandrake 9.0
-Slackware 9.1
-Debian "woody" stable 3.0

hanji-ga:

The problem *appears* to be support for the display resolution.  X11
requires the  screen resolution which is adentified automatically for
most video cards, but not for some.  From brief search, your display
seems to have the native reslution of 1400x1050.  Check your
XF86Config-4 file (/etc/X11/  directory usually, check your
installation and online help for your distribution) to see of there is
a modeline for it.  If not, you can add a modeline - see
http://www.its.caltech.edu/~pinelab/wagenaar/compaq_linux/  for help
(after verifying your display resolution).  Another useful URL is
http://www.dkfz-heidelberg.de/spec/linux/modeline/  to calculate the
modeline.  As you can see, doing this right needs some work, but other
people have reported success in running Linux on the make/model
machine.  Good luck.

--
I am not an official GA researcher.

Any idea on how I can find the native resolution?

There appear to be a variety of Presario 1700s, and my specific model
number has worn off, so I can't look it up with Compaq; Windows can
push it up to 1024x768, I imagine that would indicate that's its
native resolution? For a CS geek, I'm fairly useless when it comes to
hardware...

If you stated what version of linux your using you might get more help with this.

I guess that what ever X mode freq your running your monitor at cooks
it since after extened use in the white screen range it no longer
works .

In other words the X setting are wrong.  Lilo screen usse text mode
screen low resolution so that is why you can see that.

hanji-ga:
You may be able to find the exact model number with a utility similar
to SiSoft Sandra http://www.sisoftware.net/    (the "standard" version
should do) and running it when you boot MS-Windows.