# Configuring GNOME HiDPI

**URL:** <https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/configuring-gnome-hidpi/1708>\
**Category:** Guix\
**Tags:** guix\
**Created:** [July 8, 2025, 11:27pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/configuring-gnome-hidpi/1708 "2025-07-08T23:27:08Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![wegei8](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/53a042/32.png) [@wegei8](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/wegei8)\
**Post date:** [July 8, 2025, 11:27pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/configuring-gnome-hidpi/1708/1 "2025-07-08T23:27:09Z")

</div>

My laptop (unfortunately) has a HiDPI display. When I ran the installer, I picked GNOME as my desktop environment. However, my display doesn’t work with the default GNOME configuration.

For some reason, GNOME says it’s scaling at 200% in the settings menu, but there seems to be some mismatch with other parts of the system. Some apps, like Emacs, appear tiny.

Anyway after checking the [Arch Wiki](https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/HiDPI), I tried running these (slightly modified) commands.

```auto
$ gsettings set org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.xsettings overrides "[{'Gdk/WindowScalingFactor', <2>}, {'Gtk/CursorThemeSize', <48>}]"
$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface scaling-factor 2

```

And everything seems to be working now! 🙌

(Gah. Zoom is still tiny. [Gotta manually fix](https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/HiDPI#Zoom). 🙁 )

* * *

Question: How do I capture this configuration in a Guix config file?? Can it go into my system or home config??

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![wegei8](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/53a042/32.png) [@wegei8](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/wegei8)\
**Post date:** [August 9, 2025, 5:01am UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/configuring-gnome-hidpi/1708/2 "2025-08-09T05:01:10Z")

</div>

Follow up:

I just realized that `gsettings` isn’t installed by default. I installed it on the **user profile** not the system.

Looks like I got `gsettings` from the `glib` package.

```auto
wegei8@guixbtw ~/guix-config$ ls -al /home/wegei8/.guix-home/profile/bin/gsettings
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 73 Dec 31 1969 /home/wegei8/.guix-home/profile/bin/gsettings -> /gnu/store/m94abzcc5q8vgbw4sqy54c6dshkf56sj-glib-2.83.3-bin/bin/gsettings

```

Looking at `guix search`, it looks like there are multiple outputs to the `glib` package. I installed `:bin`.

```auto
$ guix search glib
name: glib
version: 2.83.3
outputs:
+ doc: documentation
+ static: static libraries
+ bin: executable programs and scripts
+ debug: debug information
+ out: everything else

```

Again, in my case, I installed on the user profile and then ran the commands above. This is how you can install the `bin` output of `glib` via CLI.

```auto
$ guix install glib:bin

```

OR, if you’re using `guix home`.

```auto
(use-modules (gnu home)
             (gnu packages glib))

(home-environment
  (packages (list `(,glib "bin"))))

```

I don’t really understand the syntax, but it works. 🤷

```auto
`(,glib "bin")

```

Quasiquote, something, something. I should probably [read more](https://courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse341/04wi/lectures/14-scheme-quote.html) about Scheme…

Uh, also, wait. There’s one more thing I want to mention! If you don’t want/need `gsettings` all the time, you don’t even have to install it! You can just do this!

```auto
guix shell glib:bin

```

Then you run whatever `gsettings` command you want and exit the shell when you’re done! No need to keep it around.

(Although, [there are reasons](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/wl-copy-doesnt-integrate-with-system-clipboard/1704) you may want to permanently install `glib:bin` (on the user profile)…)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![wegei8](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/53a042/32.png) [@wegei8](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/wegei8)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2025, 4:19pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/configuring-gnome-hidpi/1708/3 "2025-08-14T16:19:19Z")

</div>

Relevant mailing list thread: [GNOME - some apps not scaling on HiDPI display/profile contains conflicting entries.](https://www.mail-archive.com/help-guix@gnu.org/msg20267.html)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![trev](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/trev/32/81_2.png) [@trev](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/trev)\
**Post date:** [September 26, 2025, 10:51am UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/configuring-gnome-hidpi/1708/4 "2025-09-26T10:51:20Z")

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Curious if you’ve figured out how to scale GDM.

I began looking into it, and found that `/var/lib/gdm` is ephemeral, which doesn’t allow you to copy and keep `monitors.xml` (with `<scale>` key) there past restarts.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![wegei8](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/53a042/32.png) [@wegei8](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/wegei8)\
**Post date:** [October 9, 2025, 5:21am UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/configuring-gnome-hidpi/1708/5 "2025-10-09T05:21:16Z")

</div>

Sorry, I ended up selling my HiDPI laptop and buying a more compatible FHD laptop instead. Still curious if you manage to figure this out though! 🙂