Hi fellow Linuxinians,

I have a wee bit of problem that I have been trying to work out over the last , say 8 days (that's striaght , every waking hour). The card in question is the Radeon 7500 VE 64MB DDR-Ram with dual head. The software in question is Xinerama and the problem is how to get problem a) to work with problem b).

I haveboth displays up, unfortunately, they are both displaying exactly the same thing. So I'm watching my self type in "stereo".

Here's my XF86Config-4 file

#XFree86 4.2.0 configuration generated by Xconfigurator 4.10.7

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "ATi 7500VE Dual Head Configured"
Screen 0 "LGE" 0 0
Screen "Apple" rightof "LGE"
Option "Xinerama" "on"
InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"

EndSection

Section "Files"
FontPath "unix/:7100"
EndSection

# Module loading section

Section "Module"
Load "dbe" # Double-buffering
Load "GLcore" # OpenGL support
Load "dri" # Direct rendering infrastructure
Load "glx" # OpenGL X protocol interface
Load "extmod" # Misc. required extensions
Load "v4l" # Video4Linux
# Load "record" # X event recorder
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Keyboard0"
Driver "keyboard"
Option "XkbLayout" "us"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Device" "/dev/mouse"
Option "Protocol" "PS/2"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "off"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
VendorName "LGE"
ModelName "Studioworks 900B"
HorizSync 31.5-57.0
VertRefresh 50-70
Option "dpms"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor1"
VendorName "Philips"
ModelName "Apple Multiscan17"
HorizSync 41.876
VertRefresh 75.121
Option "dpms"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Option "nodri"
Identifier "ATI Radeon 7500 QW LGE"
Driver "radeon"
BoardName "VE"
BusID "PCI:1:5:0"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Option "nodri"
Identifier "ATI Radeon 7500 QW Apple"
Driver "radeon"
BoardName "VE"
BusID "PCI:1:5:0"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Linux Frame Buffer"
Driver "radeon"
BoardName "radeon 7500 QW"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "LGE"
Device "ATI Radeon 7500 QW LGE"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24
Subsection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1024x768"
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Apple"
Device "ATI Radeon 7500 QW Apple"
Monitor "Monitor1"
DefaultDepth 24
Subsection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1024x768"
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "DRI"
Group "Video"
Mode 0666
EndSection

And here's what lspci -v , for all you masocists,

01:05.0 VGA Compatible Controller: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon 7500QW (prog-if 00 [VFGA])
Subsystem: Unknown device 1787:1307
Flags: bus mastering, stepping, 66MHz, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 11
Memory at e0000000 (32 bit, prefetchable) [size=128M]
I/O ports at 9000 [size=256]
Memory at ed000000 (32 bit non-prefetchable) [size= 64K]
Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled][size=128k]
Capabilities [58] AGP 2.0
Capabilites [50] Power management 2.0


Any takers??

I'm not sure if this is right, but from a lot of hacking on XF86Config files I've found that the last rule tends to win, mainly with font paths, so maybe having the Option "Xinerama" "on" above the screen lines, like in this example might help.

Cheers,

Finegan

I tried moving Xinerama on above the screens, no joy. should i move the whole serverlayout section to the bottom?

Who knows, sometimes tricks like that work, most times they don't. First off, what does the /var/log/xfreelog look like. Usually its a big gangly mess, so best to remove it, restart X, and then just look at the single startup entry. Heck, post it here.

Cheers,

Finegan

Man, this is a tough one. I'm currently waiting for a friend of mine to return to me a Voodoo3 PCI card so I can try this 2 monitor stuff too...



I compared the log to a log of a guy running a dual head matrox card. It seems that your XF86Config file is getting X to list both monitors, but its only recognizing the card as a single video device. Here's his config, and heck, the rest of the site.



Some ideas, and these are some hard guesswork:



The matrox XF86config gave me the idea of assigning a screen for each video device. I think from the server layout that it assumes the first screen is the first video device.



Another one, even though you have nodri explicitely defined, don't even load the module. Mainly a housekeeping guess, but who knows.



Mainly the big difference in the files is that the matrox log is showing the explicit definition of 2 monitors, and two cards, and yours sees 2 monitors, but only one card, so the fault is probably in getting it to treat the video card as 2 devices... I guess that would be the target. In this vein, maybe take out everything from that section but the busID, the Identifier and the module info.



Honestly I think the best bet would be to build an XF86Config from the ground up that roughly emulates a working example.



Be careful where you back-up XF86Config. For instance if you stick it in /root, XFree will read that one first before /etc/X11/XF86Config.



Sorry, forgot about this one for a day or so.



Luck,



Finegan

Hey, I took a machine out of action last nght, stopped dropped and traded an old AGP card for an awesome Voodoo3 PCI card and grabbed the extra monitor in the corner. This only took me about three hours, but I had a lot of coffee. I think the big problem comes from screen to monitor declaration. One little missing number:

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "XFree86 Configured"
Screen 0 "Screen0" 0 0
Screen 1 "Screen1" RightOf "Screen0"
Option "xinerama" "on"
InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
EndSection

Now compare that to your:

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "ATi 7500VE Dual Head Configured"
Screen 0 "LGE" 0 0
Screen "Apple" rightof "LGE"
Option "Xinerama" "on"
InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"

The missing "1" may just be it.

Cheers,

Finegan

Sorry I've been away for so long ....

here's my working XF86Config-4 file.

# File generated by anaconda.

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Anaconda Configured"
Screen 0 "foo" 0 0
Screen 1 "bar" LeftOf "foo"
InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
Option "Xinerama" "on"
EndSection

Section "Files"

# The location of the RGB database. Note, this is the name of the
# file minus the extension (like ".txt" or ".db"). There is normally
# no need to change the default.

RgbPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"

# Multiple FontPath entries are allowed (they are concatenated together)
# By default, Red Hat 6.0 and later now use a font server independent of
# the X server to render fonts.

FontPath "unix/:7100"

EndSection

Section "Module"
Load "GLcore"
Load "dbe"
Load "extmod"
Load "fbdevhw"
Load "dri"
Load "glx"
Load "record"
Load "freetype"
Load "type1"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Keyboard0"
Driver "keyboard"

# Option "AutoRepeat" "500 5"

# when using XQUEUE, comment out the above line, and uncomment the
# following line
# Option "Protocol" "Xqueue"

# Specify which keyboard LEDs can be user-controlled (eg, with xset(1))
# Option "Xleds" "1 2 3"

# To disable the XKEYBOARD extension, uncomment XkbDisable.
# Option "XkbDisable"

# To customise the XKB settings to suit your keyboard, modify the
# lines below (which are the defaults). For example, for a non-U.S.
# keyboard, you will probably want to use:
# Option "XkbModel" "pc102"
# If you have a US Microsoft Natural keyboard, you can use:
# Option "XkbModel" "microsoft"
#
# Then to change the language, change the Layout setting.
# For example, a german layout can be obtained with:
# Option "XkbLayout" "de"
# or:
# Option "XkbLayout" "de"
# Option "XkbVariant" "nodeadkeys"
#
# If you'd like to switch the positions of your capslock and
# control keys, use:
# Option "XkbOptions" "ctrl:nocaps"
Option "XkbRules" "xfree86"
Option "XkbModel" "pc105"
Option "XkbLayout" "us"
#Option "XkbVariant" ""
#Option "XkbOptions" ""
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "PS/2"
Option "Device" "/dev/psaux"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
VendorName "Monitor Vendor"
ModelName "Monitor Model"
HorizSync 31.0-70
VertRefresh 31.0-70
Option "dpms"

# -- 1400x1050 --
# 1400x1050 @ 60Hz, 65.8 kHz hsync
Modeline "1400x1050" 129 1400 1464 1656 1960
1050 1051 1054 1100 +HSync +VSync

# 1400x1050 @ 70Hz, 76.8 kHz hsync
Modeline "1400x1050" 151 1400 1464 1656 1960
1050 1051 1054 1100 +HSync +VSync

# 1400x1050 @ 75Hz, 82.3 kHz hsync
Modeline "1400x1050" 162 1400 1464 1656 1960
1050 1051 1054 1100 +HSync +VSync

# 1400x1050 @ 85Hz, 93.2 kHz hsync
Modeline "1400x1050" 184 1400 1464 1656 1960
1050 1051 1054 1100 +HSync +VSync

EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor1"
VendorName "Monitor1"
ModelName "107E"
HorizSync 30-70
VertRefresh 50-75
EndSection

Section "Device"
# no known options
Identifier "Radeon 7500 QWfoo"
Driver "radeon"
VendorName "ATI Industries"
BoardName "ATi Radeon 7500 QW"
BusID "PCI:1:5:0"
Screen 0
EndSection

Section "Device"
# no known options
Identifier "Radeon 7500 QWbar"
Driver "radeon"
VendorName "ATi Industries"
BoardName "ATi Radeon 7500 QW"
BusID "PCI:1:5:0"
Screen 1
EndSection

#attache different screens to each device
Section "Screen"
Identifier "foo"
Device "Radeon 7500 QWfoo"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24

Subsection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1024x768"
EndSubsection

EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "bar"
Device "Radeon 7500QWbar"
Monitor "Monitor1"
DefaultDepth 24

Subsection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1024x768"
EndSubSection

EndSection

Section "DRI"
Mode 0666
EndSection

it was a matter of copying to my XF86Config-4 file and firing up. I had to retype the DRI line for some unknown reason, but after that, it fires up perfectly

Regards

Mick

Thanks Finegan