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Guidance on a future dual monitor setup
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arborsexual
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Joined: 24 Dec 2019
Posts: 17

PostPosted: Sun Oct 03, 2021 12:05 am    Post subject: Guidance on a future dual monitor setup Reply with quote

So I'm probably still a good month-ish from finishing the remodel of where my future home office is going to be. Still I am trying to plan out everything, so there are as few hiccups as possible. I got a new monitor and wanted to try stacking it with my old monitor. Multi-monitor setups are just something I have no experience with, and the more I've read through wiki's and forums the more horribly confused I am. Set up is going to be a vertical stack as follows:

24" 1080p @60hz HDMI
29" 2560x1080 @120hz HDMI or DP ; I am willing to run it at 60hz if it ends up making my life easier
GPU is an Nvidia 1060 6gb that has multiple HDMI and a single DP output; Nvidia blob driver.
Openbox WM ; picom compositing manager (willing to lose if it won't work) ; tint2 on the bottom monitor only (again willing to lose if it doesn't work in this setup)

The top monitor will never ever ever ever be used for anything else other than displaying an overly complicated conky setup, running over an animated gif background (that is different from the static background in the bottom monitor). The bottom monitor is where all of my work, writing, and gaming will be done. I don't care about being able to drag a window up to the top monitor. It is just an old Samsung with a cracked bezel that I want to use as a computer stats display.

1. Is what I desire here even possible with X?
2. If it is, can anyone direct me to good information on how to set this up?
3. What issues should I somewhat expect to run into?

Most of the things I've read are people having problems making two monitors a single big display, or making sure they can drag windows back and fourth . I did find something that sounded close to what I want to do called zaphodheads (not gonna lie, I like the Hitchhiker's reference), but most of that information was incomplete and from the early 00's. Lastly, as I was writing this post, I found this: https://nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/176/~/linux---configuring-multiple-x-screens-on-one-card

That sounds like what I want, but I am also not sure.
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turtles
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Joined: 31 Dec 2004
Posts: 1651

PostPosted: Mon Oct 04, 2021 9:57 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sounds like you want a good old fashioned multiseat xorg ?
https://www.x.org/wiki/Development/Documentation/Multiseat/
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dbtx
Tux's lil' helper
Tux's lil' helper


Joined: 20 Jan 2020
Posts: 117

PostPosted: Thu Oct 07, 2021 5:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've used a separate X screen in a similar way in the past, with the position set so they're not contiguous-- there was a forbidden zone between them in order to trap the mouse on the first one. You could follow that nvidia support article or just choose it in nvidia-settings but it will need to restart anyway. Then you just set the DISPLAY variable when doing anything on the second:
Code:
DISPLAY=:0.1 conky &
P.S. if you ever need the mouse to cross the gap, I used mouse-switchscreen, but it didn't work out nicely with XFCE and I sort of stopped wanting that. YMMV
P.P.S. the wiki link in that article can still be found at http://web.archive.org/web/20130429073111/http://en.gentoo-wiki.com/wiki/X.Org/Dual_Monitors and at least some of it is still true.
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