TV as second monitor on OpenSuse 11.3 issue

English Hardware
1

Trying to set up an opensuse 11.3 32 bit box to use a tv as a second monitor, only wanting to do this for the purpose of sending video files to the tv

I can get it working but it always ‘prefers’ the tv over the monitor, meaning the taskbar etc always show up on the tv screen instead of the monitor, and as the back of the tv is visible from the computer desk not the screen it’s kinda difficult to open up the video file to be watched in the first place

When I go into Menu - System Settings - Display the tv is shown as the first screen as DVI-1-0, the monitor as the second on VGA-1-0. The vga monitor has the usual options absolute, left of, right of etc whereas the tv only has the absolute setting

In Multiple Monitors even with the display working on both screens it says ‘This module is only for configuring systems with a single desktop spread across multiple monitors. You do not appear to have this configuration’ so I can’t do anything in there

What I need to do is have the taskbar etc appear on the monitor as opposed to the tv and I assume for this to happen I need the monitor appearing as the first screen not the tv, I tried putting Identifier “VGA-1-0” in 50-monitor.conf instead of Identifier “Default Monitor” but this had no effect

Anyone have any ideas what I can try to make this work the way I want?

Incidentally this is something I’m trying to help a friend do so I may not be able to try any suggestions given on the same day they’re given to me

2

Who makes your video card? NVIDIA, ATI, Intel? Thanks

3

Thanks for the quick reply mate

The card is an Nvidia Geforce 8400GS, it’s not using the nvidia drivers

4

Ive only used dual monitors with NVIDIA while using the proprietary driver. When you are using the proprietary drivers, there is a tool you can install along with the driver called nvidia-settings that lets you specify your “primary” display. I.e. thats the display that will have your taskbar.

Unless you have reasons NOT to use the proprietary driver (to each his own!), Id give it a try.

5

The reason I have for not using the nvidia driver is I couldn’t get it work properly on his card when I installed the suse for him lol

Must be a way to specify the primary display in one of the xorg.conf.d files … I just don’t know what it is

6

Take a look at this X.Org/Dual Monitors - Gentoo Linux Wiki

example from the page…


Section "Monitor"
  Identifier     "Monitor0"
  # Preferred resolution for the monitor
  Option         "PreferredMode"  "1280x1024" 
  Option         "Primary"    "True"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
  Identifier     "Monitor1"
  Option         "PreferredMode"  "1280x1024" 
  Option         "RightOf" "Monitor0" 
  Option         "Primary"    "False"
EndSection

looks like you an add an option “primary” to the monitor section of xorg.conf

Maybe that will do it?

7

That could well be it mate, the Option “Primary” “True” parameter, didn’t know there was one

xorg.conf is depreciated now though, it’s split into a series of files in the /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/ directory now so I’ll head over to my friend’s house tomorrow and try it in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/50-monitor.conf

Thanks for that, I’ll post back if it works, may help someone else with a similar issue

8

**** my memory. I forgot its being depreciated…Guess Ive been spoiled, I havent had to edit one of those things in awhile :wink:

good luck!

9

I think the issue might be down to using hdmi

I’ve tried a dual monitor setup with one monitor on hdmi and the other on dvi and have the same problem (plus a few others I won’t really go into here)

Can only get it to work properly if I have the one I want to use as the ‘main’ monitor on dvi and the second one on the hdmi cable

The boot screens etc always come up on the screen that’s not hdmi too so I think it might be something like hardware detecting hdmi last as opposed to the operating system itself

I’ve no idea whether anything can be done about that

Incidentally xrandr doesn’t even detect the hdmi monitor when there’s another plugged in on dvi, so I have to use an xorg.conf file to get the second one to detect

Doesn’t seem ideal to be using a method that’s being deprecated to get dual monitors working using modern cables … but whatever works I suppose