extended desktop, not session desktop over 2 monitors
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extended desktop, not session desktop over 2 monitors
Hi,
I'm new to linux and have managed to succesfully set up 2 monitors on my NVIDIA 5900 PCIe card using Fedora core 3.
What I would like to do is have an extended desktop like I do in windows XP where a single desktop is split over two screens.,
Currently I seem to have 2 independant desktop sessions, which is better than nothing but I cannot drag and drop my windows from the left monitor over to the right for example or drag a single application over 2 screens.. For an application to appear in the right monitor I need to open it in the right monitor.
Currently, I run 2 screens of 1024x768 and I guess my aim is to expand this to 2048x768, if that make sense.
I use nVidia's twinview for my dual-head setup, although I run both monitors at 1280x1024. This gives me a 2520x1024 'virtual' desktop that I can drag apps back and forth between...
Notice that if you use twinview rather than xinerama, the two displays are handled at the hardware level rather than software, and so the config is placed in the 'Device' section of xorg.conf.
Note also that your apps (WM etc...) still need to be compiled with xinerama support so that they 'know' where the desktop boundaries are. ie: so apps don't start up in between screens, and so when you maximize an app it maximizes in one screen rather than both...
Do you have the Nvidia drivers actually installed? This would mean you have an entry in your conf file that says "Driver nvidia" instead of "Driver nv"
And during X startup you see a nice NVIDIA startup logo across your entire screen(s).
yes the nvidia driver is installed i am using the nvidia driver in the config.
Like i said before, i have got 2 screens working just fine but they seem to be independant sessions, which is ok but it's not really any use to me as i want to drag and drop between each monitor as i see fit. currently, the only way to open up in the left monitor is to use the menu in the left monitor to run a program and the same for the right monitor.
what i want to achieve is a single stretched desktop which would be like having 2048x768 resolution.
the config file above only switches on my left monitor.
When I first used an nvidia card with 2 outputs, the default for me (after making the minimal changes in the config, such as driver=nvidia) was the desired effect for you It may be that your window managers aren't setup for xinerama, as noted by Bulliver. I'm not sure how you could check this on FC3, but if you were to compile your window managers by hand (again not sure of your level of experience, so this is just a suggestion) you could ensure the xinerama compile option was enabled, and see if that makes the difference.
yeah i will leave it at that if nothing else works. I heard twinview was hardware drawn while xinerama was software meaning its slower.
I have the Geforce 5900 PCIe card. it certainly has twinview support in windows and the "twinview" mode gave me dual monitors last time, just 2 seperate desktop sessions.
cheers for all the replies. I have a satisfactory solution but if i can get it working in twinview i woudl prefer that. I noticed i can't change screen res or refresh rate of the monitors in gnome anymore.
I heard twinview was hardware drawn while xinerama was software meaning its slower.
Me too, which is why I use it. I have never actually tried just Xinerama though, so I cannot compare the speed. I can say that I have noticed _zero_ slowdown of my desktop using twin-view.
Quote:
I have the Geforce 5900 PCIe card. it certainly has twinview support in windows and the "twinview" mode gave me dual monitors last time, just 2 seperate desktop sessions.
This is very strange. Time to see what the Nvidia README has to say about this....
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