Setting up a second monitor

[Jean Hollis Weber]

James Gray wrote:

> Indeed - it IS possible but not normally handled "out of the box".  So be 
> prepared to edit some text files and poke around the "back end" of Linux's 
> GUI which is called the "X server".  Read on.

No problem on editing text files, once someone tells me what to 
change, in words that I can understand. Between you and Daniel 
(and anyone else who is willing to talk at my level), I should be 
able to work this out.

> First - is it an nVidia or ATi chipset?  Something else?

Ermmm... I haven't a clue. I'll try to find something that will 
tell me.

> What is the monitor you're trying to plug in (Brand/Model)?

Samtron 76E. It's a CRT.

> The volume of documentation exists because of there are literally thousands 
> (millions?) of different Card+Monitor combinations.  What works with one 
> combination is completely broken in another. 

Oh, great! I didn't want to know that. ;-)

> This exists in the Windows 
> world too - but it's mostly hidden.  Ever changed a monitor on Windows only 
> to get a "Frequency out of range" and can't see anything to fix it? ;)

No, I've never seen that problem. Heh! Guess I've been lucky.

> Anyway, back to your problem.  Often the drivers in Linux wont initialise a 
> second monitor if it wasn't connected when the GUI (X server) started.  
> Plugging it in AFTER starting wont work.  [...]
> 
> ...If you get a cloned desktop on the second monitor (or anything 
> really), then you're almost there!

The external monitor was plugged in and powered on when I booted 
Ubuntu. Nothing shows on the second monitor at all.

Here is the result of lspci | grep VGA

0000:00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corp. 82852/855GM 
Integrated Graphics Device (rev 02)


> Unfortunately, this is the bit that gets 
> little "complicated" and involves editing the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file.

This is what Daniel is walking me through, too, isn't it?

> You'll need to consult your video driver documentation as to the best way to 
> enable multi-head (the second monitor) in something other than clone mode.

First I'll have to find some video driver documentation. ;-)

> ...good old xorg have Xinerama which works with almost any multi-monitor-capable 
> video card and I'll write the rest of this based on Xinerama and a 
> "traditional" multi-monitor setup.

I'll come back to this after I get the monitor working as a 
clone. I think I understood (most of) what you said, which is 
encouraging. :-)

Cheers, Jean