[ubuntu-uk] Screen resolution problems on dual-monitor setup

[Jim Price]

On 11/08/11 12:13, James Morrissey wrote:
> So Colin's suggestion worked!
>
> Once i logged in with Ubuntu classic desktop (no effects) i could set
> the resolution i wanted (via monitor preferences) and everything
> works. I am somewhat embarrassed that i didn't see that option when i
> first tried this.
>
> The only issue i am left with now is that screen size appears to be
> taken from the larger 19" monitor. This means that the mouse can fall
> off the top or bottom (or both) of the smaller monitor, depending on
> where i position the smaller monitor in relation to the larger one
> (again, in 'monitor preferences'). This isn't much of an issue however
> as the GNOME menus bound the size to which applications maximise in
> the smaller monitor. So i am happy to live with this.

If you want to use a cloned display, so that you have the same GNOME 
menus on both screens, I think you'll be stuck with that. If you now try 
using the system>preferences>monitors dialog to uncheck the clone 
displays checkbox and resize the monitors to fit, you should get the 
right resolution on both and a GNOME menu on one. If you see display 
corruption on the screen on one or both monitors, you won't be able to 
use this mode, and may need a hard reset (switch it off and on again) to 
clear the corruption.

> One last thing then, since i had enough memory to run the resolutions
> but the advanced effects were messing up the presentation, is it worth
> filling a bug on this?

I suspect there are already a number of bugs on this, but it is an issue 
which is difficult for the open source driver developers to address, as 
it can be different on different machines and they probably don't have 
access to every machine with ATI graphics. If you're not happy with the 
workarounds, do a search for similar bugs on Launchpad before you decide 
to file one. I almost always find an extremely similar one and subscribe 
to that rather than create a new one which someone then has to read, 
understand and maybe mark up as a duplicate.

> Thanks again, for all the help.