Hello, I have been trying LinuxMint but i cannot turn off my laptop screen to use my monitor only. I have tried menu pref. display, but still have two screens working with icons on both,and my mouse icon moving from one screen to the next,Have i missed something,any advice will be appreciated.
Regards Ken.

My laptop offers a way to control that with hardware.

Look on your Function keys for one that has an icon that looks sort of like a monitor or screen and press it (you may have to use the Fn key). On my Zareason laptop, doing that cycles through laptop-->external-->both-->laptop.

I assume you don't want the mouse to travel outside the secondary display? In some bios's there is a selection.

I'd think you could force a single display.

https://help.ubuntu.com/stable/ubunt...-monitors.html

It might help to know the make/model of the laptop.

Thank you everyone,I fully installed Mint, and following you advice, 2 cups of tea and 4 biscuits, i have all icons and mouse icon on monitor screen, laptop screen is still on but only showing Mint icon which is good enough for me. I may investergate further when i know a bit more.
Regards Ken.

I've managed to do what I think you're trying to do but I was using an external keyboard and mouse on a Macbook and the VGA port on my monitor---I'd just close the laptop and it worked though I found it handy to keep the laptop open and using the laptop display for Outlook and the big monitor for real work. I can try that on my openSUSE-based Dell and report back. (I have to track down the USB splitter for the keyboard/mouse.)

What happens if you simply close up the laptop? Or do you still need to use the laptop's keyboard/mouse?

Cheers...

Hi mturn, My laptop is a Toshiba about 9 years old which shipped with Windows originally,i need the laptop open to use the keyboard, if i closed the laptop it turned off the OS.Such is life, never mind. Cheers.

Yeah, I know of no way to keep the screen off if the laptop is opened so you can use the keyboard. In my case, I was looking to use a full size keyboard as opposed to the smaller laptop keyboard.

Q: Does your Toshiba's space bar still work? The missus has a Toshiba of about the same vintage and the space bar is a real problem. (If only we could go back in time and avoid that purchase.)

Cheers...

Can you pop the space bar off and be sure the area underneath is clean. May not be the switch, may just be a stale donut crumb in the way (been there, done that).

(sorry for the off-topic post)

Probably. That's only one problem with the Toshiba, though. Don't get me started on the iffy power connector. The way too easy to tun off wifi switch. Etc. All sorts of things you wouldn't pick up on a big box store test drive.

Yeah... let's wrap this up here.

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Hello again ,i have just found out ( by Accident) if i close my laptop it shuts off my monitor, but after a few seconds it turns back on with my laptop still closed,but i still have to open the laptop to use the keyboard, still beggars can`t be choosers. Cheers Ken.

what plug does the monitor use? Maybe /opt/vc/bin/vcgencmd could help, i don't know if linux mint uses it though.