How I got Dual Monitors with Nouveau Driver

CaptainKirk · 2009-11-07 22:15:38

After the latest Xorg update my nvidia drivers don't work. So I switched to http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Nouveau. This is how I got dual monitors to work.

First I ran

sudo X -configure

and then tested the new xorg.conf, as the screen said. I then had 2 monitors back (before I only had one) but both show the same display, i.e. one is not "to the right of" the other.

So I found this page http://wiki.debian.org/XStrikeForce/HowToRandR12 . Based on that I ran:

xrandr

to find the identifiers of my two monitors. I first tried manually setting one monitor to the right with:

xrandr --output VGA-0 --right-of DVI-I-0

and it worked. So I updated my xorg.conf to use the identifier reported by xrandr and then I manually added the second monitor section:

Section "Monitor"
    Identifier   "VGA-0"
    Option       "RightOf" "DVI-I-0"
EndSection

I restarted X and it worked!

BUT the right monitor was not showing a viewscreen as tall as the left one, and I could see the refresh rate was 60MHz and giving me a headache. So I copied two lines from the other monitor and then had:

Section "Monitor"
    Identifier   "VGA-0"
    HorizSync    30.0 - 72.0
    VertRefresh  50.0 - 120.0
    Option       "RightOf" "DVI-I-0"
EndSection

That fixed it. That's all I had to do--add the new monitor section as above. In case anyone is interested, here's my full xorg.conf:

Section "ServerLayout"
    Identifier     "X.org Configured"
    Screen      0  "Screen0" 0 0
    InputDevice    "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
    InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
EndSection

Section "Files"
    ModulePath   "/usr/lib/xorg/modules"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/misc"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/100dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/75dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/TTF"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/Type1"
EndSection

Section "Module"
    Load  "glx"
    Load  "record"
    Load  "extmod"
    Load  "dri"
    Load  "dbe"
    Load  "dri2"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier  "Keyboard0"
    Driver      "kbd"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier  "Mouse0"
    Driver      "mouse"
    Option        "Protocol" "auto"
    Option        "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
    Option        "ZAxisMapping" "4 5 6 7"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
    #DisplaySize      310   230    # mm
    Identifier   "DVI-I-0"
    VendorName   "BNQ"
    ModelName    "BENQ G774"
    HorizSync    30.0 - 72.0
    VertRefresh  50.0 - 120.0
    Option        "DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
    Identifier   "VGA-0"
    Option       "RightOf" "DVI-I-0"

    HorizSync       30.0 - 72.0
    VertRefresh     50.0 - 120.0
    EndSection

Section "Device"
        ### Available Driver options are:-
        ### Values: <i>: integer, <f>: float, <bool>: "True"/"False",
        ### <string>: "String", <freq>: "<f> Hz/kHz/MHz"
        ### [arg]: arg optional
        #Option     "SWcursor"               # [<bool>]
        #Option     "HWcursor"               # [<bool>]
        #Option     "NoAccel"                # [<bool>]
        #Option     "ShadowFB"               # [<bool>]
        #Option     "VideoKey"               # <i>
        #Option     "FPDither"               # [<bool>]
        #Option     "FPScale"                # [<bool>]
        #Option     "ScalingMode"            # <str>
        #Option     "EXAPixmaps"             # [<bool>]
    Identifier  "Card0"
    Driver      "nouveau"
    VendorName  "nVidia Corporation"
    BoardName   "G98 [GeForce 9300 GS]"
    BusID       "PCI:4:0:0"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
    Identifier "Screen0"
    Device     "Card0"
    Monitor    "Monitor0"
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     1
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     4
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     8
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     15
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     16
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     24
    EndSubSection
EndSection

shining · 2009-11-09 10:50:35

Ah interesting.
Maybe archwiki should also have a HowToRandR12 page. Then the Nouveau wiki page could just link to that.
Do you feel like doing that ?

CaptainKirk · 2009-11-09 10:58:10

I am not opposed to that idea, but I only actually know what I wrote above. I don't know anything more about xrandr

Should I make a page and just post that much? Seems a bit lacking. Or perhaps post page saying "needs more data" with links to this page and to the Debian page?

shining · 2009-11-09 11:00:28

CaptainKirk wrote:

I am not opposed to that idea, but I only actually know what I wrote above. I don't know anything more about xrandr
Should I make a page and just post that much? Seems a bit lacking. Or perhaps post page saying "needs more data" with links to this page and to the Debian page?

That sounds perfect.

CaptainKirk · 2009-11-09 11:44:10

I made http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/HowToRandR12 which links here and to Debian and to a man page for xrandr. I also linked the Nouveau wiki page to this new page.

Thanks for the encouragement. My first wiki page.

shining · 2009-11-09 12:17:30

CaptainKirk wrote:

I made http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/HowToRandR12 which links here and to Debian and to a man page for xrandr. I also linked the Nouveau wiki page to this new page.
Thanks for the encouragement. My first wiki page.

Hmm, I think it would be better to reproduce your bbs post to the wiki, rather than just giving a link

But now I see there was already something here :
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Xor … tor_setups

Maybe the main information lacking from that section, is that you can also write an entry in xorg.conf rather than calling xrandr ?

CaptainKirk · 2009-11-09 12:23:43

> Hmm, I think it would be better to reproduce your bbs post to the wiki, rather than just giving a link

You may be correct.

> Maybe the main information lacking from that section, is that you can also write an entry in xorg.conf rather than calling xrandr ?

No, it says that, but now HOW to. I added a link to the page I just made.

shining · 2009-11-09 12:51:42

Hmm, I just found this one : http://nouveau.freedesktop.org/wiki/Randr12Howto
Maybe that wiki article is good enough, and there is no need for one in arch.

Arch Linux

#1 2009-11-07 22:15:38

How I got Dual Monitors with Nouveau Driver

#2 2009-11-09 10:50:35

Re: How I got Dual Monitors with Nouveau Driver

#3 2009-11-09 10:58:10

Re: How I got Dual Monitors with Nouveau Driver

#4 2009-11-09 11:00:28

Re: How I got Dual Monitors with Nouveau Driver

#5 2009-11-09 11:44:10

Re: How I got Dual Monitors with Nouveau Driver

#6 2009-11-09 12:17:30

Re: How I got Dual Monitors with Nouveau Driver

#7 2009-11-09 12:23:43

Re: How I got Dual Monitors with Nouveau Driver

#8 2009-11-09 12:51:42

Re: How I got Dual Monitors with Nouveau Driver

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