interesting problems with dual monitors

omega52390 · Post by **omega52390** » Fri Feb 26, 2010 4:17 pm

ok so i will start off with some specs to help you, help me, help us all.
i am running ubuntu karmic 64bit, corei7, 6gigs ram, and 2 nv gts 250s(wont be able to run sli until they add dual monitor sli support to linux drivers) ignore the fact that i have a second card its not used in linux. but my big problem lies somewhere in my two monitors running twinview (both monitors resolutions are 1680x1050). when i say games i mean any source engine game (hl2 portal css etc.)

whenever i try to play a game it different things will happen depending on a few setting with wine config. if everything is set to initial defaults in graphics tab of wine config (only the desktop integration stuff enabled) then the game will start up and it is working but you can only see half of the screen, this is because for whatever reason the game is forced to run at a resolution of 3360x1050 and is not expanding across both screens if i go in game and try to change the resolution it gives me no options other than what it is already set to if i set it to windowed mode i still get no options other than 3360x1050 but the game will span both screens

if i disable the desktop integration in wine config then the game will span both screens in full screen and windowed mode but i still cant change the resolution.

my last option is to run the games in windowed mode set to 1680x1050 via wine config. this option has worked for me with another game that had a similar problem. i just went back and tested halflife2 and it works this way (introvideo doesnt) although something wasnt right it looked like it was running at dx8 even though it said it was running dx9 however i dont know much about this kind of stuff (i hope i make sense here: the polygon count and texture resolution looked to low for my settings) the video of breen on the screen in the station looked more pixelated than it should have and when people talked their mouths looked jumpy and jagged like an older game would. in portal once i start a game i just get a black screen with audio. the intro commands like the thing on the right that tells you about WASD shows up and so does an unmodifed targeting reticle but nothing else and i cant move

i dont know if this is a wine problem, compiz/metacity problem, or an nvidia/xorg problem but i came here because this forum seemed the most relevant to the issue

im sure there is something else that i should mention. if you need more info to help me ill be glad to get it to you. thank you to everyone in advance

vitamin · Post by **vitamin** » Fri Feb 26, 2010 9:28 pm

omega52390 wrote:if i go in game and try to change the resolution it gives me no options other than what it is already set to if i set it to windowed mode i still get no options other than 3360x1050 but the game will span both screens

Post output of 'xrandr' command.

omega52390 · Post by **omega52390** » Wed Mar 03, 2010 12:47 pm

vitamin wrote:
omega52390 wrote:if i go in game and try to change the resolution it gives me no options other than what it is already set to if i set it to windowed mode i still get no options other than 3360x1050 but the game will span both screens
Post output of 'xrandr' command.

this is what i got

Code: Select all

Screen 0: minimum 3360 x 1050, current 3360 x 1050, maximum 3360 x 1050
default connected 3360x1050+0+0 0mm x 0mm
   3360x1050      50.0*

omega52390 · Post by **omega52390** » Wed Mar 03, 2010 1:54 pm

sorry it took so long to reply didnt notice the email
also i kind of understand what that output is saying but i have no idea how to fix it i guess i have to change the minimum allowed resolution size so how do i do that

PleegWat · Post by **PleegWat** » Wed Mar 03, 2010 3:18 pm

omega52390 wrote:

sorry it took so long to reply didnt notice the email
also i kind of understand what that output is saying but i have no idea how to fix it i guess i have to change the minimum allowed resolution size so how do i do that

Just noticing this thread, and I'm seeing the same thing with world of
warcraft, and similar xrandr output:

Screen 0: minimum 3200 x 1080, current 3200 x 1080, maximum 3200 x 1080
default connected 3200x1080+0+0 0mm x 0mm
3200x1080 50.0*

This may have something to do with the xorg.conf generated by the nvidia
configuration tool, which does not contain any resolution information.
It has the following Screen section:

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "Device0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24
Option "TwinView" "1"
Option "TwinViewXineramaInfoOrder" "DFP-0"
Option "metamodes" "DFP-0: nvidia-auto-select +1920+0,
DFP-1: nvidia-auto-select +0+0"
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
EndSubSection
EndSection

If I'm reading the manpage correctly (man xorg.conf) the 'Display'
subsection should have one or more 'Modes' lines describing allowed
screen resolutions. Nvidia doesn't generate any, and I'm not sure the
directive is supported here by nvidia at all. Nvidia may have more
documentation, but I don't particularly feel like going to look for it
right now.

Remember, when changing the xorg.conf, you will then need to restart
your X server (or the entire machine) to apply the changes.

PleegWat

omega52390 · Post by **omega52390** » Wed Mar 03, 2010 5:01 pm

well isnt that just lovely

vitamin · Post by **vitamin** » Thu Mar 04, 2010 10:32 am

PleegWat wrote:If I'm reading the manpage correctly (man xorg.conf) the 'Display' subsection should have one or more 'Modes' lines describing allowed screen resolutions. Nvidia doesn't generate any, and I'm not sure the directive is supported here by nvidia at all.

Correct, that's the source of your problems. You'll have to read Nvidia's manual on how to generate meta modes for twinview.

Or you can use external programs that generate xorg.conf like sax2 for example.

omega52390 · Post by **omega52390** » Thu Mar 04, 2010 11:48 am

vitamin wrote: Correct, that's the source of your problems. You'll have to read Nvidia's manual on how to generate meta modes for twinview.

Or you can use external programs that generate xorg.conf like sax2 for example.

could you give some advice on using sax2 cli is definately not my strong point

Post by **dimesio** » Thu Mar 04, 2010 12:13 pm

omega52390 wrote:
vitamin wrote: Correct, that's the source of your problems. You'll have to read Nvidia's manual on how to generate meta modes for twinview.

Or you can use external programs that generate xorg.conf like sax2 for example.
could you give some advice on using sax2 cli is definately not my strong point

Sax2 is part of openSUSE; you won't find it on Ubuntu. Ask on the Ubuntu forum if they have something equivalent.

omega52390 · Post by **omega52390** » Thu Mar 04, 2010 4:58 pm

Sax2 is part of openSUSE; you won't find it on Ubuntu. Ask on the Ubuntu forum if they have something equivalent.

so what exactly is sax2 i took a look at it online and it kinda looks like gconf is that even close?

Post by **dimesio** » Thu Mar 04, 2010 5:31 pm

omega52390 wrote:
Sax2 is part of openSUSE; you won't find it on Ubuntu. Ask on the Ubuntu forum if they have something equivalent.
so what exactly is sax2 i took a look at it online and it kinda looks like gconf is that even close?

Sax2 is openSUSE's GUI configuration tool for X. I have no idea what gconf is; I assume it's a Gnome thing, and I use KDE. As I said, ask on the Ubuntu forum about this. It's not really a Wine question.

omega52390 · Post by **omega52390** » Thu Mar 04, 2010 5:57 pm

alright guess i gotta go make a new thread on ubuntu forums thanks for the help though at least im on the right track now