Issue with two nvidia cards and three monitors (projectors)

[Guest]

I have been scouring the internet looking for answers and have not found one. I have two cards, GT 520 and Geforce 210 in a Linux Mint box. I have the HDMI to the monitor and VGA to a projector on the main graphics card. I can get that set fine using Twinview with a desktop on each (extended). When I enable the other graphics card using separate x it has the first graphics card spanning/extending one desktop from the monitor to the projector which obviously won't work for me. I need the two individual desktops (extended) on the first card described for PowerPoint presentation on the extended desktop. I am using the 3.10 beta driver. I have tried the non-beta driver also. The second card is also hooked up VGA to another single projector and desktop and all I need is a browser open on it. Is there an answer to this puzzle? I have tried the nouveau driver and it does not recognize the second card.
Thank you.
John

[dmeyer]

Nouveau can't handle SLI. You need to install the proprietary drivers, which you have. Have you tried playing with the nvidia-settings? Its a really nifty GUI to work with Nvidia cards and allows you to get most things done. This guide exists but I think its hopelessly out of date:

http://us.download.nvidia.com/XFree8...hapter-25.html

[Guest]

I have clicked and tried everything I could think of in nvidia-settings, including deleting the xorg.conf file a couple times to start from scratch with no luck. It sure doesn't seem like it should be that difficult and Win7 recognizes the setup easily. Thank you for your reply.

[dmeyer]

If that's true then I have a feeling you are going to have to manually edit the xorg.conf. Unfortunately I came to linux long after that was still required. Hopefully somebody experienced comes along and can help you.

[oshunluvr]

SLI does not mean "using two graphics cards." SLI is using both cards to compute graphics processing while displaying from only one card and is not enabled by default and may not work with your two dis-similiar cards anyway. SLI will allow two monitors from two cards, but AFAIK not three.

Nouveau may be able to "handle" two video cards and monitors in separate X sessions, but the performance will not be satisfactory.

Bottom line: you're going to use the nvidia driver and yes, you're going to have to dig into xorg.conf to get this working. I have been messing around with xorg.conf for a decade or so and borked more display setups than I can remember (not much of a confidence builder, eh? ).

I suggest you begin with:

Get intimate with /var/log/Xorg.0.log. This is where you will see all your problems and successes documented. Read it after every edit.

Make a backup of every xorg.conf as you edit and test new options. You always want to be able to step back one or two steps to the previous working xorg.conf as you test and try new things. I use a numbering scheme. Each new xorg.conf gets copied to xorg.conf.00, then xorg.conf.01 and so on until I'm totally satisfied with my final xorg.conf. Then and only then delete the backups.

First things first. Get your initial xorg.conf as finely tuned as possible. Explore all the options like triple buffering, DPI, backing store, and so on. Do web searching on what works best with your cards and test them using gtkperf to test performance. glxgears is useless except to verify gl is working.

Learn how to recover from a bad xorg.conf. Learn the commands necessary to edit, rename, or replace a broken xorg.conf from the command line because chances are you'll end up there once or twice. A bootable USB or CD standing by is also a good idea.

Learn how to restart your GUI session without rebooting. Most changes will not require a reboot and restarting the GUI without rebooting can save lots of time.


Basically, you're going to define both graphics cards (Devices) and three Monitors/Screens and then "attach" them in the way you want. Mouse control may or may not be a problem (that's the last thing to work on) and getting specific programs to use a specific monitor will likely require some effort. Disable twinview right away and start creating an xorg.conf with two device sections and three monitor and screen sections. Define each piece of hardware correctly using the right scan freqs and resolutions. Once all that works, we'll worry about controlling the output.

Here's an example xorg.conf:

Section "ServerLayout"
    Identifier     "Monitor"
    Screen      0  "Screen0" 1500 0
    Screen      1  "Screen1" 0 0#LeftOf "Screen0"
    InputDevice    "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
    InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
    Option         "Xinerama" "0"
EndSection
 
Section "ServerLayout"
    Identifier     "TV"
    Screen      0  "Screen1" 0 0
    InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
    InputDevice    "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
EndSection
 
Section "Files"
    ModulePath      "/usr/lib64/xorg/modules"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/misc/"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/TTF/"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/OTF"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/Type1/"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/100dpi/"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/75dpi/"
EndSection
 
Section "Module"
    Load           "extmod"
    Load           "glx"
    Load           "dbe"
    Load           "record"
EndSection
 
Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier     "Keyboard0"
    Driver         "kbd"
EndSection
 
Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier     "Mouse0"
    Driver         "mouse"
    Option         "Protocol" "auto"
    Option         "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
    Option         "ZAxisMapping" "4 5 6 7"
EndSection
 
Section "Monitor"
    Identifier     "Monitor0"
    VendorName     "Unknown"
    ModelName      "Idek Iiyama BX3811U"
    HorizSync       30.0 - 60.0
    VertRefresh     55.0 - 75.0
EndSection
 
Section "Monitor"
    Identifier     "TV0"
    VendorName     "LG"
    ModelName      "Monitor Model"
EndSection
 
Section "Monitor"
    Identifier     "Monitor1"
    VendorName     "Unknown"
    ModelName      "LG Electronics DT-3003X"
    HorizSync       30.0 - 80.0
    VertRefresh     56.0 - 85.0
EndSection
 
Section "Device"
    Identifier     "Device0"
    Driver         "nvidia"
    VendorName     "NVIDIA Corporation"
    BoardName      "ION"
    BusID          "PCI:3:0:0"
    Screen          0
EndSection
 
Section "Device"
    Identifier     "Device1"
    Driver         "nvidia"
    VendorName     "NVIDIA Corporation"
    BoardName      "ION"
    BusID          "PCI:3:0:0"
    Screen          1
EndSection
 
Section "Screen"
    Identifier     "Screen0"
    Device         "Device0"
    Monitor        "Monitor0"
    DefaultDepth    24
    Option         "TwinView" "0"
    Option         "TwinViewXineramaInfoOrder" "CRT-0"
    Option         "metamodes" "CRT: 1024x768_75 +0+0; CRT: nvidia-auto-select +0+0"
    SubSection     "Display"
        Depth       24
    EndSubSection
EndSection
 
Section "Screen"
    Identifier     "Screen1"
    Device         "Device1"
    Monitor        "Monitor1"
    DefaultDepth    24
    Option         "TwinView" "0"
    Option         "metamodes" "DFP: 1360x768_60 +0+0"
    SubSection     "Display"
        Depth       24
    EndSubSection
EndSection

Here's some other useful links:

http://askubuntu.com/questions/94062...idia-and-intel
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1502753
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1811366

If you want specific help, your need to post specific information.