VGA, HDMI, USB and other mess
=============================

I have  had a problem: I  bought a GPD  Pocket 2 computer for  my wife.
It's a tiny (7") notebook but it  is powerful enough to be used also as
a desktop  (Core m5 CPU, 8GB  of RAM, 128GB eMMC).  Unlike the original
GPD pocket  it does not have  any HDMI output. The  manufacturer states
that it  is not necessary because  it has an USB-C  port which supports
the Thunderbold (or  what it is called)  and thus which can  be used to
connect an external screen.

I initially thought that I can  my USB-to-VGA card (with a SiS chipset)
which is known to work with Linux (if work with my Sharp NetWalker, for
example). The  Pocket 2  has 2 full-size  USB ports. But  it is  not so
easy: by  default the modern  Ubuntu ignores it. One  had to set  up an
xorg.conf (I  have it for  my NetWalker so  if should be  possible) and
there are also other problems like strange resolutions.

So I abandoned this idea and reserved this cart for the NetWalker. Then
I tried a USB-C adapter for VGA. It worked well except the fact that if
I  turned off  the build-in  screen  then the  external resolution  was
changed to something like  640x480 and I was not able  to fix it. There
is another  problem: the USB-C port  is used for charging.  If one puts
VGA adapter there then there is no  way to charge device. So this is OK
for presentations but not for desktop use.

My next  idea was to  find an USB-C  hub. But I  had no luck:  there is
nothing  which has  more than  2 USB-C  ports and  these ports  usually
cannot be used for video signal.

So I have got a I-Tec USB-C hub  which has 2 USB ports, two USB-C ports
(one of  them supports charging),  one full-size HDMI and  one Ethernet
port. The "normal"  USBs work, the Ethernet and the  USB-C for charging
work, too. But no one USB-C can  be used to connect and VGA adapter. So
I put my  Lenovo HDMI-to-VGA adapter to the HDMI  port. It worked, even
with the  Ubuntu. But it  worked in  the same way  as the USB-C  to VGA
adapter - if  both screens (and external and the  internal) were on the
everything was OK.  When I turned the internal screen  off the external
one became unusable.

So the last try has been a HDMI-DVI adapter. And have been working!
The only problem is that I have to use the adapter and the HDMI cable
from my ODroid computer (I have spare ones elsewhere but I'm not able
to find them at the moment...).

I understand that it is hard to make stuff compatible with the analog
VGA thing. But I cannot get why it is so hard to get an USB-C hub...

Resume: my wife now has a workstation  based on a GPD Pocket 2. And for
presentations she has  an USB-C to VGA adapter. So  she no longer needs
one computer  for desktop work  and second one  (the Asus Eee  901) for
presentations. Ghat's great. But the solution was somewhat complicated.

P.S. This post was created on my trusty SGI O2 computer with the 1600SW
LCD. There was no VGA, DVI, HDMI  or USB thing involved is the writing.
Just to be sure that there will be no surprise.