Dual head setup

Hi Hans,

Hans du Plooy wrote:
> Hi guys,
>
> I'm banging my head against this one - with little effect...
>
> I just installed Etch on my workstation, which has a Radeon 7000 and two
> Dell 19" LCD screens. I'm trying to set up an extended desktop - sort of
> need it that way to be able to work efficiently.
>
> I followed various howtos and posts in the internet, and what I have now
> seems to be what I'm supposed to have but I'm still getting just a cloned
> display, and KDE doesn't give me the option to change anything (in Control
> Center --> Peripherals --> Display).

I feel your pain. I just had several weeks of trying to fix the same
problem but with an ATI X600 PCIE.

> Is there anything special I have to do - some package I forgot to install?

To get my video card working and stable, I had to use the fglrx module
provided by ATI. (http://ati.amd.com/support/driver.html -> Linux x86 ->
choose your card, etc etc) The Debian package created by the ATI
installer did not work for me (because I am on stable with Xorg off
backports.org, their 'stable' package created an XFree86 driver and
their 'testing' package wanted Xorg >=7.0, I'm running 6.9...) so I had
to use their installer to just install the module directly into the
filesystem rather than a Debian package. Because I did not build the
kernel module, I miss out on 3D, but I don't care :p Since you are on
Etch you may have more luck.
Once you have run the installer in whatever way works for you, use the
'aticonfig' program to generate correct driver/screen/monitor stanzas in
your xorg.conf. My working xorg.conf is below.

Before I did all the above, I did get the dual head working under Xorg
with the radeon module, but it would frequently crash with this message
in Xorg.0.log:
(EE) RADEON(0): FIFO timed out, resetting engine...
This xorg.conf is also included below.

Apparently this error can cause outright lockups (as in my case) or have
no effect whatsoever. I think it depends on the combination of video
card and motherboard.

> Here is my config.

My crashing xorg.conf with the radeon module:
Section "Files"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/cyrillic"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/:unscaled"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/:unscaled"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/Type1"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi"
EndSection

Section "Module"
Load "bitmap"
Load "dbe"
Load "ddc"
Load "dri"
Load "extmod"
Load "freetype"
Load "glx"
Load "int10"
Load "record"
Load "type1"
Load "vbe"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Generic Keyboard"
Driver "keyboard"
Option "CoreKeyboard"
Option "XkbRules" "xorg"
Option "XkbModel" "pc104"
Option "XkbLayout" "us"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Configured Mouse"
Driver "mouse"
Option "CorePointer"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
Option "Protocol" "ImPS/2"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "true"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "ATI Radeon X600 (DVI)"
Driver "radeon"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
Screen 0
Option "CRT2Position" "RightOf"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "ATI Radeon X600 (VGA)"
Driver "radeon"
BusID "PCI:1:0:1"
Screen 1
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor for ATI Radeon X600 (DVI)"
Option "DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor for ATI Radeon X600 (VGA)"
Option "DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "PCIEScreen0"
Device "ATI Radeon X600 (DVI)"
Monitor "Monitor for ATI Radeon X600 (DVI)"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024"
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "PCIEScreen1"
Device "ATI Radeon X600 (VGA)"
Monitor "Monitor for ATI Radeon X600 (VGA)"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024"
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Dual-head Layout"
InputDevice "Generic Keyboard"
InputDevice "Configured Mouse"
Screen 0 "PCIEScreen0"
EndSection

Section "DRI"
Mode 0666
EndSection

#########################################################

And here is my working xorg.config with the fglrx module:
Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Dual-head fglrx Layout"
Screen 0 "aticonfig-Screen[0]" 0 0
InputDevice "Generic Keyboard"
InputDevice "Configured Mouse"
EndSection

Section "Files"

FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/cyrillic"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/:unscaled"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/:unscaled"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/Type1"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi"
FontPath "/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi"
EndSection

Section "Module"
Load "bitmap"
Load "dbe"
Load "ddc"
Load "dri"
Load "extmod"
Load "freetype"
Load "glx"
Load "int10"
Load "record"
Load "type1"
Load "vbe"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Generic Keyboard"
Driver "keyboard"
Option "CoreKeyboard"
Option "XkbRules" "xorg"
Option "XkbModel" "pc104"
Option "XkbLayout" "us"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Configured Mouse"
Driver "mouse"
Option "CorePointer"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
Option "Protocol" "ImPS/2"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "true"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "aticonfig-Monitor[0]"
Option "DPMS" "true"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "aticonfig-Monitor[1]"
Option "DPMS" "true"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "aticonfig-Device[0]"
Driver "fglrx"
Option "DesktopSetup" "horizontal"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "aticonfig-Device[1]"
Driver "fglrx"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
Screen 1
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "aticonfig-Screen[0]"
Device "aticonfig-Device[0]"
Monitor "aticonfig-Monitor[0]"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Viewport 0 0
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024"
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "aticonfig-Screen[1]"
Device "aticonfig-Device[1]"
Monitor "aticonfig-Monitor[1]"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Viewport 0 0
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024"
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "DRI"
Mode 0666
EndSection

Good luck!

--
Greg Vickers
IT Security Engineer & Project Manager
IT Security, Network Services,
Information Technology Services
Queensland University of Technology
L12, 126 Margaret St, Brisbane

Phone: +61 7 3138 9536
Mobile: 0410 434 734
Fax: +61 7 3138 2921
Email:
IT Security web site: http://www.its.qut.edu.au/itsecurity/

CRICOS No. 00213J

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