Re: Setting up a second monitor

On Fri, 21 Apr 2006 10:23 am, Jean Hollis Weber wrote:
James Gray wrote:
Indeed - it IS possible but not normally handled "out of the box". So be
prepared to edit some text files and poke around the "back end" of
Linux's GUI which is called the "X server". Read on.

No problem on editing text files, once someone tells me what to
change, in words that I can understand. Between you and Daniel
(and anyone else who is willing to talk at my level), I should be
able to work this out.

First - is it an nVidia or ATi chipset? Something else?

Ermmm... I haven't a clue. I'll try to find something that will
tell me.

No biggie - the "lspci" you quote below tells me it is an Intel Integrated
Graphics 855GM chipset. I've never played with those, but we'll see if we
can get you sorted anyway :)

What is the monitor you're trying to plug in (Brand/Model)?

Samtron 76E. It's a CRT.

OK - so one of these? http://www.samtron.com/PRODUCT/76e_fea.html
If so, (for the archives) it's frequency ranges are:
Horizontal 30-70kHz
Vertical 50-160Hz

(We need these for later on when we configure the second monitor).

The external monitor was plugged in and powered on when I booted
Ubuntu. Nothing shows on the second monitor at all.

Bummer - we'll have to edit the xorg.conf file and see how we go. All is not
lost!

Here is the result of lspci | grep VGA

0000:00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corp. 82852/855GM
Integrated Graphics Device (rev 02)

Excellent :) Thanks.

Unfortunately, this is the bit that gets
little "complicated" and involves editing the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file.

This is what Daniel is walking me through, too, isn't it?

Yes.

You'll need to consult your video driver documentation as to the best way
to enable multi-head (the second monitor) in something other than clone
mode.

First I'll have to find some video driver documentation. ;-)

Ah - but with the info you've given me so far, I've turned up this:
http://www.ubuntuforums.org/archive/index.php/t-77049.html

and this:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-x/2005/09/msg00253.html

The second of these has a "working" xorg.conf file that you can use as a
template for your setup. It's not 100% as the external monitor modeline is a
bit screwy so just leave it out or comment it out (see below).

The other reference I found that might be useful:
http://www.xiaprojects.com/www/manuali/d400/main.php?action=dualhead

Seems that if you enable Xinerama, you'll loose DRI (accelerated 3D) - if DRI
is important to you, don't enable Xinerama. However, if you DON'T enable
Xinerama, you wont be able to move applications from one screen to the other.
You will be able to move the mouse etc but apps launched in one screen, stay
there. Of course, this can also be a desirable feature for some people :)

...good old xorg have Xinerama which works with almost any
multi-monitor-capable video card and I'll write the rest of this based on
Xinerama and a "traditional" multi-monitor setup.

I'll come back to this after I get the monitor working as a
clone. I think I understood (most of) what you said, which is
encouraging. :-)

Cool. Have a look at those URL's and see if you can adapt one of the configs
to your setup. It's not too hard to match option-for-option in the config
file. Anything after a "#" in the config file is a comment so not used by
the server. REMEMBER TO BACKUP YOUR WORKING CONFIG FIRST!

Cheers,

James
--
I cannot and will not cut my conscience to fit this year's fashions.
-- Lillian Hellman

Attachment: pgpNqBFceNlQE.pgp
Description: PGP signature

--
ubuntu-users mailing list
ubuntu-users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-users

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Giving up - help to recover data? Have some X (Krandrinithack crash)
    ... > config files. ... > with the old crt monitor. ... There is an option to tell sax not to use an existing configuration, ... Seems like I need to edit ...
    (alt.os.linux.suse)
  • Re: Dual monitors two VMR9s
    ... detail your config. ... is that despite setting monitor_ config to the second monitor, ... VMR9 seems to desperately want to share the same videowindow as the first, ... and I want to display it independently on the second monitor. ...
    (microsoft.public.win32.programmer.directx.video)
  • Re: Monitor Squeal
    ... > The problem is almost certainly with X's config file. ... > what reasons) or the Hsync and Vsync ranges you entered for your monitor ... EndSubsection ...
    (comp.os.linux.hardware)
  • Re: [opensuse] Video problems with 11.4
    ... KDE4 you have a Monitor module in the System Settings window that you ...  I'm running KDE and I don't see any "randr" ... spell out the GUI config path. ...
    (SuSE)
  • Re: Problems with nVidia-3D and Yast
    ... communications protocol built in which allows the monitor to communicate ... This communications protocol ... So I could tell the config utility ALL DAY LONG that I wanted to work at ...
    (alt.os.linux.suse)