Dual-Head ATI X800 and FreeBSD
I figured I would post this here for the archives…
I spent most of last night and a better part of this morning trying to get my personal desktop configured with a dual-head X display. I thought I would just use the configuration for the ATI FireGL V3100 that I had used yesterday at work with some minor changes for device BusID’s and what not. However, that didn’t work.
I tried a number of configs on my personal box and most of them would lock up the machine. Not just X Windows, but the machine itself requiring a “poke in the eye” to reboot it. I finally went through the config line by line and found the culprit. The AGPFastWrite directive that worked like a champ on the FireGL card hosed up the x800 box. Once I commented that line out in the config my X Windows session fired off and worked as expected.
My x800 Config is listed below. It is basically the same as the previous config for the FireGL minus that one directive.
# /etc/xorg.conf - 2006-09-30
Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "X.org Configured"
Screen "Screen0" 0 0
Screen "Screen1" LeftOf "Screen0"
InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
EndSection
Section "Files"
RgbPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"
ModulePath "/usr/X11R6/lib/modules"
FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/"
FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/TTF/"
FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/"
FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/CID/"
FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/"
FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/"
EndSection
Section "Module"
Load "dbe"
Load "dri"
Load "extmod"
Load "glx"
Load "record"
Load "xtrap"
Load "freetype"
Load "type1"
EndSection
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Keyboard0"
Driver "kbd"
EndSection
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "auto"
Option "Device" "/dev/sysmouse"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5 6 7"
EndSection
Section "Monitor"
#DisplaySize 340 270 # mm
Identifier "Monitor0"
VendorName "DEL"
ModelName "DELL E171FP"
### Comment all HorizSync and VertSync values to use DDC:
HorizSync 30.0 - 80.0
VertRefresh 56.0 - 76.0
Option "DPMS"
EndSection
Section "Monitor"
#DisplaySize 340 270 # mm
Identifier "Monitor1"
VendorName "DEL"
ModelName "DELL E171FP"
### Comment all HorizSync and VertSync values to use DDC:
HorizSync 30.0 - 80.0
VertRefresh 56.0 - 76.0
Option "DPMS"
EndSection
Section "Device"
Identifier "Card0"
Driver "ati"
VendorName "ATI Technologies Inc"
BoardName "R420 JI [Radeon X800PRO]"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
Option "MergedFB" "True"
Option "EnablePageFlip" "True"
Option "AGPMode" "4"
#Option "AGPFastWrite" "True"
Option "MergedXineramaCRTIsScreen0" "True"
Option "CRT2Position" "LeftOf"
EndSection
Section "Device"
Identifier "Card1"
Driver "ati"
VendorName "ATI Technologies Inc"
BoardName "R420 JI [Radeon X800PRO]"
BusID "PCI:1:0:1"
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "Card0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Viewport 0 0
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024"
EndSubSection
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen1"
Device "Card1"
Monitor "Monitor1"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Viewport 0 0
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024"
EndSubSection
EndSection
Section "DRI"
Mode 0666
EndSection
Update: 2006-10-01 13:05 CDT
It’s all bad. While using the above config does put my card into dual-head mode, it tends to lock up from time to time and I have to press the reset button on my machine to reboot it… I tried another config that I just saw on one of the @freebsd.org mailing lists and it too puts my card into dual-head mode buyt it locks up from time to time. The config I am running now has a lot less defined in the conf like Screen1, Card1, Monitor1 are not referenced at all, but it still works… I will keep this post updated with my progress.
Until next time…