Running AW EDID Editor using Wine

Monitors share their capabilities with other devices with a message called an EDID. The EDID contains the monitor's manufacturer name, product name, and other metadata.

Some users find that TinyPilot's default EDID doesn't work with their target machine. So we may need to create alternate EDIDs to set the preferred input format or solve other compatibility issues.

AW EDID Editor is helpful software that allows you to view and edit EDID files. AW EDID Editor only has official packages for Windows and Mac systems, but it's possible to run the Windows version under Wine on Linux.

Install Wine

With apt on Debian-based systems:

sudo apt install wine -y

Download AW EDID Editor

Open the AW EDID Editor software tools page on the Analog Way website, then scroll down to the "software" dropdown.

Download the Windows installer and unzip the folder.

Install AW EDID Editor

In the terminal, navigate to the directory where you downloaded the Wine Windows installer and run the following command:

wine SetupAWEDIDEditor_*.exe

Click through the install wizard, accepting all the default options.

Run AW EDID

On the CLI, you can run AWEDIDEditor.exe from the Program Files (x86)/AW EDID Editor/ directory, which is in Wine's drive_c/ directory.

wine ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files\ \(x86\)/ANALOG\ WAY/ AW\ EDID\ Editor AWEDIDEditor.exe

Accessing files

When opening EDID files for editing, a Windows file explorer opens with a Windows folder structure.

Your Linux directories are in the Z: 'drive'.

To get to your home directory, click "My Computer" → "Z:" → "home" → [username].

What works

Changing the name of the display device

Toshiba-H2C is the name that appears for the display on the target machine. You can edit the name of the display device to something other than Toshiba-H2C within the Detailed Data tab.

Changing supported resolutions

Editing the supported display capabilities like screen resolution and framerate works correctly for the different timing blocks.

• Established Timings can be set and unset
• Standard Timings can be set, unset, and edited
• Preferred Timings can be set manually or with the Wizard
• Short video descriptors can be added, removed, and changed
• Detailed timing blocks can be added, removed, and modified manually or with the Wizard

There is a single hiccup with setting Establish Timings, however. The checkbox state isn't visible, but you can infer the state by checking the hexa viewer (see "Radio button and checkbox visibility").

Examining hexadecimal data

The hexa viewer tab works without any issues.

The hexa viewer is useful, as it translates each raw byte of the EDID into a human-readable representation.

What doesn't work

A few issues make using AW EDID Editor under Wine challenging to use in some cases.

Radio button and checkbox visibility

All of the radio buttons and checkboxes are blank (you can't tell whether they're selected or not), but they're still functional. This is the most significant issue when running AW EDID Editor with Wine.

As a workaround, you can check values in the hexa viewer. For example, if you want to see whether the 1280x1024 @ 75hz [VESA] established timing is set, you can find it in the hexa viewer and look at the block description.

Hexa viewer (toolbar pop out)

The toolbar hexa viewer does not work. It opens, but it jitters and disappears if you attempt to move the pop-up window. You can't reopen it until you restart the program.

This isn't a significant problem because the tab hexa viewer works.

Fonts

The default font is small and awkward to read, but the text is still legible. It might be possible to change the font in Wine.