9.10 Dual Monitor setup issue on laptop

[Lateralis]

I have an issue with my dual monitor setup on my laptop. This is a problem that appeared after I upgraded last week from Jaunty to Karmic.

My laptop uses the Intel HD4500 graphics card. I have my regular laptop screen (13" widescreen) which is configured fine. The "external" monitor is a 19" (4:3 aspect ratio) monitor that supports resolutions up to and including 1280x1024. In Jaunty I was able to use this dual monitor setup perfectly fine - both the laptop and external monitors were configured optimally without any problems. Since upgrading to Karmic, I cannot get Ubuntu to set the correct resolution for the external monitor. The resolutions I have available are:

1360*768 (16;19)
1152*864 (4:3)
1024*768 (4:3)
800*600 (4:3)
640*480 (4:3)

If it is useful, my xorg.conf looks like this:

Section "Monitor"
	Identifier	"Configured Monitor"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
	Identifier	"Default Screen"
	Monitor		"Configured Monitor"
	Device		"Configured Video Device"
	SubSection "Display"
		Virtual	2560 1024
	EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "Device"
	Identifier	"Configured Video Device"
EndSection

... and looks pretty bare. Doesn't look especially correct to me but I don't know much about Xorg! Any and all advice would be gratefully received. =)

[Boababa]

I had the same problem with an X1600 card, then in frustration turned off the visual effects. That seems to have fixed it.

System -> Preference -> Appearance --> Visual Effects - select None.

Caveat: the mouse keeps getting lost in the "phantom" space - within virtual big desktop, but beyond the smaller monitor's resolution.

-b

[Lateralis]

Hmmm... Turning off visual affects would be a step backwards.

I'll try this out when I'm next able, but again it is irritating that it worked perfectly fine in Jaunty and now doesn't in Karmic, and to get it to work in Karmic I have to stop using all my visual effects? Very odd!

[hanzj]

I have dual monitor setup, too and have problem with low resolution in 9.10 (no problem in Ubuntu 9.04). See my post here: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=8255396 .

Changing from "Normal" desktop effects to "None" did not make any difference with the problem.

[debayanm]

hi all,

I have a dell inspiron 1525, quite new, 2 GB ram 160 GB HDD, core 2 due T 5750 processor, 2 MB Cache, etc etc

I downloaded ubuntu 9.10 desktop version and ubuntu 9.10 netbook version..They are in ISO version..but when i am running them using DAEMON tools lite, and restarting system, they UBUNTU is just showing a small logo and after that , system is going black..

Plz help..

[JEREMIAHBARLOW]

Boa! You are my hero!!!

I have a Dell D620 with Intel video card on a D-Dock with dual HP2035 displays (1600x1200)

I tried and tried and crashed and crashed and tried to get these to work right like they did in XP or Vista

Finally!!! Whaa HOO! Boa to the rescue! I disabled the Visual Effects and both work at the correct resolutions.

"System -> Preference -> Appearance --> Visual Effects - select None."


Between that and getting my Verizon 595 air card to work, I am totally falling in live with Ubuntu 9.10 .... WhaaHooountu!

[Lateralis]

What is your graphics card Jeremiah? I've tried disabling the visual effects on mine (HD 4500) but to no avail - I still have a crappy (and incorrect) selection of resolutions.

[JEREMIAHBARLOW]

I have here a Dell D620 laptop with the Intel GMA 950 (1440 x 900 resolution) shared memory

If you ever get a choice on graphics cards get the one not integrated or built on the mother board! Choose the Nvidia if you can.

I have been well please with Ubuntu 9.10 driver support on all my hardware.

[Lateralis]

I don't mean to sound rude or offensive, but you are kinda stating the obvious. Everyone knows that nVidia graphics cards are well supported and, if possible, always get standalone graphics cards, not ones integrated onto the motherboard. But:

1) We're talking laptops. Getting dedicated graphics cards isn't always possible on the budgets most normal people have to work with.
1b) The reason I chose my laptop is because it was primarily for work. I have a kick-*** desktop at home which I built myself from scratch on which I play games. The laptop is for the office, when I visit synchrotrons, central research facilities and go to conferences. Essentially it is for work. A kick ***, dedicated graphics card isn't necessary. I did see a good Samsung laptop which I nearly went for that had a dedicated nVidia graphics card. This laptop though was about £200 more expensive than my current one but actually, overall, had worse hardware.

Therefore, suggesting people only get dedicated nVidia graphics cards isn't good.

2) Secondly, my main point still remains; dual monitors worked *perfectly* in Jaunty with my current laptop. The update to Karmic broke something and along with it my dual monitor setup.

[MrMacman2u]

Also having issues here, I've tried every hoop-jump and work around i know of and still having utter fail on my IBM T42 Thinkpad (ATI Radeon 7500 32mb)

Mirroring works great, but I'll be dipped if I can get the second monitor to work correctly for two independent displays (Via VGA).

This worked with no trouble and no additional tweaking outside of the "automatic" configuration of the virtual desktop size in 9.04

That's not to say that I can't unselect the option to mirror the displays, but once I choose "apply" I still have a mirrored screen.... but it's only "pretending" the second monitor is there. I get an identical output on both the laptop LCD and via VGA, but the entire desktop changes and will allow the mouse (and windows) off the screen as if was actually working.

It's kinda hard to explain really.

I have tried turning off compositing, switching to the metacity window manager, an "old" xorg.conf file from 9.04, building a new xorg.conf file, pursuing /var/log/xorg.0.log for errors, checking the Xorg log for errors or warnings to no avail... Everything is coming up clean, both the laptop LVDS and the external VGA monitor are being detected and automatically configured correctly... independent dual displays just isn't working for no man's money.

Pardon my expression, but "wtf?"