Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Fedora 17 & XFCE: Dual monitors - disabling LVDS display

I have a laptop with external monitor plugged in via VGA. And Fedora 17 with XFCE. I don't need laptop display to be on but disabling it from UI doesn't save the settings so LVDS display is the primary again on next login.
Turning off lvds using xrandr (xrandr --output LVDS1 --off) does it for current session only. I googled a lot and finally found this topic. Ubuntu dedicated but nevertheless. Shortly - need to modify xorg.conf in the following way (applying to my display - LVDS1):

Add to the "Device" section of the xorg.conf the following:
Option "monitor-LVDS" "LVDS1"
and finally create a new "Monitor" section like this:
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "LVDS1"
Option "Disable" "true"
EndSection

Fedora 17 doesn't have xorg.conf by default (WTF???) so first you should create it:
run Xorg :1 -configure (it will create /root/xorg.conf.new file)
then copy it to /etc/X11/xorg.conf and modify accordingly.
Restart X server.
That's it, kids - it now works.

--
up

Sometimes, it gets loosing the primary monitor screen resolution, the solution is as follows:
$ cvt 1920 1200
the output will something like
# 1920x1200 59.88 Hz (CVT 2.30MA) hsync: 74.56 kHz; pclk: 193.25 MHz
Modeline "1920x1200_60.00"  193.25  1920 2056 2256 2592  1200 1203 1209 1245 -hsync +vsync
$ xrandr --newmode "1920x1200_60.00"  193.25  1920 2056 2256 2592  1200 1203 1209 1245 -hsync +vsync
$ xrandr --addmode VGA1 1920x1200_60.00
$ xrandr --output VGA1 --mode 1920x1200_60.00

To enable LVSD screen and extend monitors (making VGA as left one):
$ xrandr --output VGA1 --left-of LVDS1

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