Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

[Oceanwatcher]

I discovered something today. Take a look at this thread:

http://forum.kde.org/ati-radeon-9550...2-t-47263.html

I have been participating in a couple of threads in this forum with no solution. So I decided to post in the KDE forum to check why the Display setup was (in my eyes) incomplete. The answer came as a bit of a surprise.

Some things in the Display settings seem to be missing! In the official KDE release, there are several buttons and a whole subsection extra compared to what I see in my Kubuntu 9.04 setup.

If you have a dual head setup, could you please take a look at it and tell me if you are missing the same things? (compare with the screenshots in the kde forum thread).

Maybe it is time to write a bug report? How can something like this just disappear?

[dagfinn]

Re: Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

I have the same problem. I've never seen the Multiple Monitors section. when I boot Kubuntu 9.04 (or 8.10 for that matter) from CD, it looks practically identical to your screen shots. I've also run xrandr --verbose as suggested in the other thread to make sure there are two CRTCs.

(It's a little bit different in my installed Kubuntu. With the restricted ATI drivers running and dual monitors set up with aticonfig, the KDE display settings section sees only one large virtual screen. So the lack of a Multiple Monitors section doesn't seem surprising.)

[dagfinn]

Re: Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Also, I can boot from the Ubuntu 9.04 (Gnome) CD and get the dual monitors set up just fine.

[Oceanwatcher]

Re: Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Yeah, it seems like Ubuntu/Gnome is ok. I have a Linux Mint setup running on a Matrox card and it works fine on dual monitors (8.10 base).

Wonder what happened with Kubuntu...

[Oceanwatcher]

Re: Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Here are my experiences so far:

Decided to scratch all and go again from zero.

Got a tip about this page and followed most of it, but combined with others:

http://wiki.debian.org/XStrikeForce/HowToRandR12

Then I started with the failsafe setup and worked through section by section. It actually took very little to activate dual monitors! From here, it is all about tweeking the setup to get more things right...

BUT: ATTENTION!!!!!!! Do NOT go to the Display setting under System Settings. That will revert your monitors back to the mirrored state or whatever it was before. Forget that the Display setting even exists. It is not working for dual monitors. Period!

Section "Device"
	Identifier	"ATI Technologies Inc RV350 AS (Radeon 9550)"
	Driver		"ati"
    BusID      "PCI:3:0:0"
      Option     "Monitor-DVI-0" "Samsung SyncMaster 940B"
      Option     "Monitor-VGA-0" "Compaq 5017"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
  Identifier   "Samsung SyncMaster 940B"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
  Identifier   "Compaq 5017"
  Option     "RightOf" "Samsung SyncMaster 940B"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
	Identifier	"Default Screen"
	Monitor		"Samsung SyncMaster 940B"
	Device		"ATI Technologies Inc RV350 AS (Radeon 9550)"
EndSection

My first challenge is to get different resolutions for the two monitors. The Samsung monitor should be 1280x1024 and the Compaq should be 1024x768 and both can use 60 and 75 hz. I will post back with more info later.

[Oceanwatcher]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Dual head works, and I have different resolutions. Here is the xorg.conf that worked on this particular computer:

Section "Device"
	Identifier	"ATI Technologies Inc RV350 AS (Radeon 9550)"
	Driver		"ati"
    BusID      "PCI:3:0:0"
      Option     "Monitor-DVI-0" "Samsung SyncMaster 940B"
      Option     "Monitor-VGA-0" "Compaq 5017"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
  Identifier   "Samsung SyncMaster 940B"
  HorizSync 30-81
  VertRefresh 56-75
  ModeLine "1280x1024" 109.62 1280 1336 1472 1720 1024 1024 1026 1062 
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
  Identifier   "Compaq 5017"
  HorizSync 30-61
  VertRefresh 56-75
  ModeLine "1024x768" 60.80 1024 1056 1128 1272  768 768 770 796
  Option     "RightOf" "Samsung SyncMaster 940B"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
	Identifier	"Default Screen"
	Monitor		"Samsung SyncMaster 940B"
	Device		"ATI Technologies Inc RV350 AS (Radeon 9550)"
    DefaultDepth  24
    SubSection "Display"
          Depth      24
          Modes      "1280x1024"
          Virtual     3072 1200
    EndSubSection
EndSection

I agree that the virtual setting is a little odd, it should have been 3072 1024, but somehow I got that one added and it works. Going to change it and test again.

I have not tested acceleration and 3D yet. For now, this is great :-)

[dagfinn]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Thanks, I'll try that. But it doesn't answer the questions you posed in the title of this thread. The question is what happened to the Multiple Monitors section as in the left column of this screen shot. [img width=400 height=250]http://imagebin.org/index.php?mode=image&id=46730[/img]. Right?

[Oceanwatcher]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Not only that, you also have the position buttons under each monitor in this screenshot...

Someone in IRC said that the Multiple Monitors subsection only applies to some certain situations and is otherwise hidden. I would love to get some of the developers/packagers in Kubuntu to comment on this.

Right now, I have a computer that has dual monitors working - for the most part. I tried enabling desktop effects, but got some crashes and decided to leave it off for now.

The user is happy so far, the next project is to get Pulseaudio working correct on his system...

Stuff like this should be easy as it is so "in your face" for new users. Wonder where the usability people are...? :-)

[dagfinn]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

I've tried it on another, newer laptop to make sure this is somewhat general. It looks exactly the same. No Multiple Monitors section.

[dagfinn]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

I've reported it as a bug, since nothing else seems to work: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+s...ce/+bug/368422

[Arkad]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Hi, I have a dual monitor setup too and I had some issues to make it work properly in both Intrepid and Jaunty. I have never seen the dual monitor section in the display menu. I have used both times Catalyst Control Center to configure an extended desktop. My video card is a RADEON HD4850.

BUT: ATTENTION!!!!!!! Do NOT go to the Display setting under System Settings. That will revert your monitors back to the mirrored state or whatever it was before. Forget that the Display setting even exists. It is not working for dual monitors. Period!

In Intrepid, I noticed the same bug but I can now access it in Jaunty without problem. The menu shows only one default display with the dimensions of my extended desktop (3360x1050). When I identify the outputs, it displays one "default" text in the center of my extended desktop.

In Jaunty, I had to add these 2 lines in my xorg.conf:

Option	  "EnableRandR12" "false"
Option	  "DesktopSetup" "horizontal"

I think someone already wrote it in this topic or in the other but I assume it doesn't hurt to rewrite it. Without this manipulation, Catalyst Center doesn't allow dual monitor configuration.

I have also activated many desktop effects, transparency, 3d effects like the cube... All seem to work properly (only 2 days of testing), except that my monitors have been reverted to mirrored, like 3 times yesterday. I have yet no clue about why it happened but it seems it was after an inactive period. I first thought it was the screensaver and I deactivated it but the bug happened once again after that. The display was ok until I move the mouse and each monitor suddenly displayed the whole 3360x1050 desktop. So when I moved the mouse, the whole desktop moved too to show the hidden part if you understand what I mean. If it happens again I will try to take a screen capture, because the rest seemed to work normally. Then I reseted with ctrl-alt-backspace and I could restart the session with the extended desktop still well configured.

Edit: it's happening again right now. Here is a capture of what I see on both screens. I haven't opened any new application and I have had no problem for hours before now.

[Arkad]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Well, the problem persists. I deactivated all desktop effects, I uninstalled hardware driver to replace it with the one from the ati website... I reseted xorg.conf then tried to reconfigure with aticonfig but no improvement. The bug keeps happening after a period of inactivity. Since I already deactivated the screensaver, I also unchecked PowerDevil options in advanced settings.

Also I need to keep aticonfig because of the low fan speed problem with the HD 4850. Without it, the temperature grows easily up to 82-83°C with a normal desktop activity. (If Google is right, it's around 180°F.)

If no solution comes up, I will stick to my stable Intrepid until I can try the next ATI driver or a Kubuntu update. (Or I'll try to never let my computer alone.)

[Oceanwatcher]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Also I need to keep aticonfig because of the low fan speed problem with the HD 4850. Without it, the temperature grows easily up to 82-83°C with a normal desktop activity. (If Google is right, it's around 180°F.)

I installed Kubuntu on a friends laptop. Well, actually, before I got that far, I had to solve a temperature problem first. I was able to boot the live cd and open the plasmoid that shows the temp. Rising steadily, it got to 104 Celcius before the computer shut down by itself...

It was a Toshiba made in Brazil, and I looked at the underside. Then took off the cover over the processor, memory and graphics (one big cover). I noticed something strange. There was a piece of plastic covering the intake for the air under the laptop. I took a chance and removed it, because I could not see any other way for the air to get in.

Problem solved!

Someone at the factory had forgotten to remove this piece of plastic, so my friend had a lot of problems getting the laptop to run stable.

He is now happy running Kubuntu, and I am going there on Saturday to give him and his wife a little training in some of the software.

But that is the hottest I have seen a laptop so far

[Arkad]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Oh that was hot! They are lucky you have seen it in time.

I have done more tests with my dual monitor configuration and I have found ONE interesting pattern: I came back to Intrepid (where all was working fine) and I have done ONE change. I have installed kde 4.2 and now I have the same "reverting to mirrored state" bug! Same situation, it occurs when there is no activity on my computer. It really looks to me like some problem with the power settings. Also I don't understand why there are so many different places related to power settings. I have found:
- screen saver in the Desktop menu,
- energy management for monitors in the Display menu,
- another power settings menu in System configuration > advanced

I have played with all that but no result. And it occurs without desktop effects too.

Since I haven't changed my ATI drivers (9.3) on Intrepid, it seems they are not faulty in this case.

[Oceanwatcher]

Re: Kinda solved - Dual head setup removed by Kubuntu? Or merely a huge bug?

Seems to be some rough edges on Kubuntu. I have installed KDE on top of a Ubuntu server, and that one detects things in my VERY old ATI card just fine. It also has the placements buttons and I am allowed to change them :-)

So something has happened when Kubuntu started using KDE 4.2 and I am very curious about the reason. I can not think of any good reason for leaving out the tools to set up multiple monitors.

My guess - time. They did not have time to do it right. But they SHOULD have added this in release notes: Known problems. There is no way they could just have forgotten it as they would have to actively take it out.

I will try to chase down someone that can reply.