[lug] 1920 x 1200 video cards

[Hugh Brown]

dio2002 at indra.com wrote:
> i'm thinking about getting a Dell Wide Screen flat panel with 1900 x 1200
> resolution.
> 
> my current video card is very old and doesn't support anything near this
> resolution.
> 
> is anybody reliably using a high res video card like this on linux in the
> community?  if so which card and did your distro support it or did you
> have to perform some driver "magic"?
> 
> thanks


I've got an EVGA brand nVidia 6200 (might have been an LE) w/ 256MB 
video ram.  It was about $50 at newegg (but the link I sent to 
purchasing doesn't work anymore).

Output from lspci:

nVidia Corporation NV43 [GeForce 6200] (rev a1)

It has dvi and vga out and is driving a dell dfp 2405 24" at 1920x1200 
and a compaq 1825 19" lcd at 1280x1024.  Because of the res mismatch, I 
end up putting my mail client on all desktops on the 19" side and then 
do everything else in the 24" side.  I also found that KDE was much 
smarter about the dual monitor.  I could tell it to put all of its 
toolbars on the 24" and to place windows on one monitor or the other but 
not both.

This is on a RH4 box.  I'm using the closed source drivers, so I suspect 
it would work on any linux box where you could get the closed source 
drivers running.

Guys in my office also have 24" lcds running at 1920x1200 and have the 
following (from lspci):

  ATI Technologies Inc RV370 5B60 [Radeon X300 (PCIE)]
  ATI Technologies Inc RV515 [Radeon X1300]
  nVidia Corporation NV44 [Quadro NVS 285] (rev a1)


As to the driver magic, it did take some machinations to get everything 
working the way I wanted.

This is the Device section I have in Xorg.conf as well as the links/info 
that helped me get there:

# http://www.ublug.org/fedora/twinview/twinview-howto-fedora.html
# http://www.ublug.org/ubuntu/twinview/twinview-howto-breezy.html
# 
http://nvidia.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/nvidia.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=175&p_created=1101836633&p_sid=fCTSXifi&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX3Jvd19jbnQ9MyZwX3Byb2RzPTAmcF9jYXRzPTAmcF9wdj0mcF9jdj0mcF9zZWFyY2hfdHlwZT1hbnN3ZXJzLnNlYXJjaF9mbmwmcF9wYWdlPTEmcF9zZWFyY2hfdGV4dD1tdWx0aXZpZXc*&p_li=&p_topview=1
# 
http://nvidia.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/nvidia.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=174&p_created=1101836147&p_sid=fCTSXifi&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX3Jvd19jbnQ9MyZwX3Byb2RzPTAmcF9jYXRzPTAmcF9wdj0mcF9jdj0mcF9zZWFyY2hfdHlwZT1hbnN3ZXJzLnNlYXJjaF9mbmwmcF9wYWdlPTEmcF9zZWFyY2hfdGV4dD1tdWx0aXZpZXc*&p_li=&p_topview=1

# first monitor is compaq 1825
# second monitor is the dell dfp 2405 24"
Section "Device"
         Identifier  "Videocard0"
         Driver      "nvidia"
         Option      "NvAGP" "1"
         VendorName  "Videocard vendor"
         BoardName   "NVIDIA GeForce FX (generic)"
     BusID       "PCI:02:00:0"
     Option "TwinView" "1"

     # the 1825 does 1600x1200 in analog only
     # I got the DFP-0, CRT-0 labels from /var/log/Xorg.log after doing 
a startx -- -logverbose 5
     Option "Metamodes" "DFP-0: 1920x1200, CRT-0: 1280x1024; DFP-0: 
1920x1200, CRT-0: NULL; DFP-0:NULL, CRT-0:1280x1024"
     # these are the refresh rates for the analog connecter on the 1825
     #Option "SecondMonitorHorizSync" "30-82"
     #Option "SecondMonitorVertRefresh" "56-76"
     Option "HorizSync" "CRT-0: 30-82; DFP-0: 30-81"
     Option "VertRefresh" "CRT-0: 56-76; DFP-0: 56-76"
     Option "TwinViewOrientation" "CRT-0 LeftOf DFP-0"
     # this option controls whether windows can span
     # both screens.  I'd like the panels to show up on
     # the dell screen and not on the compaq
     # commented out, it does not span and it sits on the compaq
     #Option "NoTwinViewXineramaInfo"
EndSection


Hugh