On T500 thinkpad, I enabled KMS on i915, and noticed that only a single mode shows up as enabled for the laptop's screen. Without kms, all display modes are supported. Tested on 2.6.31-rc2, 2.6.30 and 2.6.29.4-167 that ships with Fedora. xrandr output: With kms enabled (i915.modeset=1): Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1680 x 1050, maximum 8192 x 8192 VGA1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) LVDS1 connected 1680x1050+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 331mm x 207mm 1680x1050 60.1*+ 50.1 DVI1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) DP1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) DVI2 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) DP2 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) DP3 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) Without kms enabled: Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1280 x 1024, maximum 1680 x 1680 VGA disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) VGA disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) LVDS connected 1280x1024+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 331mm x 207mm 1680x1050 60.1 + 50.1 1400x1050 74.8 60.0 1280x1024 85.0 75.0 60.0* 1280x960 85.0 60.0 1152x864 75.0 1024x768 85.0 75.0 70.1 60.0 832x624 74.6 800x600 85.1 72.2 75.0 60.3 56.2 640x480 85.0 72.8 75.0 59.9 720x400 85.0 640x400 85.1 640x350 85.1 HDMI-1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) HDMI-2 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) $ X -version X.Org X Server 1.6.1.901 (1.6.2 RC 1) Release Date: 2009-5-8 X Protocol Version 11, Revision 0 Build Operating System: Linux 2.6.18-128.1.6.el5 i686 Current Operating System: Linux tuck.tlv.redhat.com 2.6.31-rc2-mst-dbg #4 SMP PREEMPT Sun Jul 5 12:04:15 IDT 2009 x86_64 Kernel command line: root=UUID=4670fcf0-09a8-4011-bf25-6e5e97f263c6 ro i915.modeset=1 Build Date: 18 May 2009 02:47:59PM Build ID: xorg-x11-server 1.6.1.901-1.fc11 Before reporting problems, check http://wiki.x.org to make sure that you have the latest version. $lspci 00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Memory Controller Hub (rev 07) 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 07) 00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 07) 00:03.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset MEI Controller (rev 07) 00:19.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82567LM Gigabit Network Connection (rev 03) 00:1a.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 (rev 03) 00:1a.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #5 (rev 03) 00:1a.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #6 (rev 03) 00:1a.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #2 (rev 03) 00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 03) 00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 1 (rev 03) 00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 2 (rev 03) 00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 4 (rev 03) 00:1c.4 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 5 (rev 03) 00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 03) 00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 03) 00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 03) 00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #1 (rev 03) 00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge (rev 93) 00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation ICH9M-E LPC Interface Controller (rev 03) 00:1f.2 SATA controller: Intel Corporation ICH9M/M-E SATA AHCI Controller (rev 03) 00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) SMBus Controller (rev 03) 03:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation PRO/Wireless 5100 AGN [Shiloh] Network Connection 15:00.0 CardBus bridge: Ricoh Co Ltd RL5c476 II (rev ba) 15:00.1 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Ricoh Co Ltd R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller (rev 04) 15:00.2 SD Host controller: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C822 SD/SDIO/MMC/MS/MSPro Host Adapter (rev 21) 15:00.3 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C843 MMC Host Controller (rev 11) 15:00.4 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C592 Memory Stick Bus Host Adapter (rev 11) 15:00.5 System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd xD-Picture Card Controller (rev 11) 00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 07) Subsystem: Lenovo Device 20e4 Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- DisINTx- Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR- INTx- Latency: 0 Region 0: Memory at f4200000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=1M] Capabilities: [d0] Power Management version 3 Flags: PMEClk- DSI+ D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold-) Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME- lspci -vv output: 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 07) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller]) Subsystem: Lenovo Device 20e4 Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- DisINTx+ Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR- INTx- Latency: 0 Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 28 Region 0: Memory at f4400000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M] Region 2: Memory at d0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M] Region 4: I/O ports at 1800 [size=8] Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled] Capabilities: [90] MSI: Mask- 64bit- Count=1/1 Enable+ Address: fee0100c Data: 4189 Capabilities: [d0] Power Management version 3 Flags: PMEClk- DSI+ D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold-) Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME- Kernel driver in use: i915 00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 07) Subsystem: Lenovo Device 20e4 Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- DisINTx- Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR- INTx- Latency: 0 Region 0: Memory at f4200000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=1M] Capabilities: [d0] Power Management version 3 Flags: PMEClk- DSI+ D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold-) Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME- Since things work properly without modesetting in kernel, this seems like a problem with the i915 driver.
This looks like https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=20801, which has been fixed in 2.6.30. It's strange it still exists in new kernel. To further track this mode issue, I'd suggest you to file a bug on freedesktop.org attaching logs with ModeDebug enabled for both UMS and KMS case, referring to http://www.intellinuxgraphics.org/how_to_report_bug.html. Thanks.