Dual monitors configuration problems

[Husse]

You have to tell us more facts.
The minimum is exactly which Mint you have - which version and which edition (main or any of the CEs)
We also need to know a bit about all your hardware.
Run " lspci " in a terminal and post here (to avoid misunderstanding - the first character is a minor L and you copy by marking with the mouse and then right click - telling you this just in case )
Some wifi and possibly built in sound can be connected to USB even if they are internal - if you suspect you have one of these run " lsusb " in a terminal.
Also tell us if this is using mint4win or not, quite important
This is a standard answer so it may not be fully applicable to your situation
And welcome to Mint

[Lantesh]

I had the same problem, and it took me a while to find an acceptable compromise solution. First let me ask you this. Do you need your TV and your PC monitor to be running at the same time, or do you simply need a good solution that you can use one or the other?

I found the program switchconf to be a great solution if you only use one at a time. Basically what it does is give you different boot configurations, so that depending on how you wish to utilize your PC, you can boot to one of many pre-defined configurations. I have mine set that when the grub menu comes up I choose one of two options, one of which is for my PC monitor, and the other is for my TV. Each option has it's own xorg.conf file, so the screen resolution is set different for each. You are not limited to just xorg.conf files, but that is all I use it for.

What's nice with switchconf is that your video card is not driving more than what you need, so your resources are not being wasted. If this interests you there is a brief tutorial here:
http://meandubuntu.wordpress.com/2008/0 ... witchconf/

[Husse]

I have to read this from the beginning again
Dual monitors can be a problem, but I guess it mostly works or I'd see more questions about it

[DrHu]

I have been searching for almost 1 month and still haven't found a reasonable solution so I can use both monitors at the same time using their native resolutions.

The standard multiple monitor setup is two video cards + two monitors, separately controlled
--the single video card, 2 or monitors, will likely always have some problems with the setups; due to the x-server/xorg setups..
http://www.multiplemonitors.org/Pages%2 ... cards.html
http://www.realtimesoft.com/multimon/gu ... _cards.asp
http://www.astahost.com/info.php/Connec ... t8930.html
TV output/display is the wrinkle..

A nice overview of xorg.
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Xorg
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Xor ... r_supports

• Xorg "can't see" the resolutions your monitor supports
  
  I found myself in a situation where if I used one of my monitors (a gnr ts902), Xorg would only present me with the options 640x480 and 320x480 which of course was less than I desired. After a lot of research I found through read-edid (in AUR) that part of my EDID was corrupt and so I could only read my HorizSync with read-edid. This fortunately was enough and after adding the right HorizSync line to the xorg.conf's Monitor section (I didn't have to add VertRefresh) I restarted X to see the right resolution :)

--only if read-edid or acquire-edid works, that is it can detect the monitor's hardware

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extended_d ... ation_data
http://wiki.mandriva.com/en/Tools/monitor-edid
http://john.fremlin.de/programs/linux/read-edid/

In terminal, check

• apt search edid
  p read-edid - hardware information-gathering tool for VE

[DrHu]

Is there a way to disable the virtual destop and make one desktop using one resolution and the other one using the other resolution just like it's done by Microsoft since Windows 2000.

Make the virtual screen size match the fixed resolution you want (the physical screen size) --gui settings
--I always do that anyway to prevent mouse wrapping around screen edges..

http://www.realtimesoft.com/multimon/gu ... _cards.asp

• Please note that old PCI video cards (S3 Trio, ATI Rage, etc) need to be primary in BIOS in order to work with Windows 2000/XP and later. Because only a single card can be primary in BIOS, this means that you're limited to a single card of this type per system.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/238886
What is your windows setup for both monitors, which one is primary (the BIOS monitor); such that they can display different resolutions
--the primary or BIOS monitor is the one that displays the startup screens, including the BIOS messages, and then the Mint menus

Do you use anything in windows other than an extension of your initial monitor resolution to include the secondary monitor's resolution (screen size)
--in which case providing a larger resolution for the primary monitor, but making it resolution smaller than that maximum size and then allowing the second monitor to use the extended size (they are both enclosed within the larger primary monitor's resolution (screen size; native resolution or otherwise ), and would depend on you video card(s) setups ?

Your hardware
01:05.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 [Radeon X1200 Series]
--still not sure of your physical video card(s) setups..
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1123425

[Husse]

Does the solutions provided by DrHu help?