Red Hat Bugzilla – Bug 80210
nv driver doesn't work with external monitor on GeForce2 Go
Last modified: 2007-04-18 12:49:13 EDT
This is probably an upstream bug, but... The nv driver can operate the LCD display of my Dell Inspiron 8000 perfectly well, but if I try to switch to an external display, it loses badly. Even switching back to the laptop screen requires X to be restarted, or at least a quick tour through text mode. The VESA driver works better with the external display, but sometimes switching corrupts the text-mode display, such that the screen is split horizontally in two halves, and odd lines are displayed in the left half, and even lines are displayed in the right half (or the converse, who knows?). I could only get it back to a normal state with a reboot, or by switching back to the nv driver. Hard to tell which driver to recommend for GeForce2 Go :-(
Oh, I meant to add another bit of information: redhat-config-xfree86 won't start if the enabled display is the external display. With both drivers, it will only work when using the laptop's display.
Please report this to mvojkovich@nvidia.com also. While we have the source code for the nv driver, we do not have the technical specifications for the Nvidia hardware, and are very likely unable to fix this problem. Nvidia on the other hand, maintains the nv driver, has the specs, and the source, and the knowhow of their hardware. If they aren't aware of this problem it probably wont get fixed, and we'll have to disable GeForce 2 Go support for this release again. Please report upstream so that direct 2 way communication between the driver maintainer and yourself can help get the problem resolved.
For the record... I just heard back from Mark, and he suggested adding the following options to the driver section in /etc/X11/XF86Config to get the external display to work: Option "FlatPanel" "0" Option "CrtcNumber" "0" These seem to only work if you switch to the external display right after a reboot. After X starts, you can't go back to text mode, so, if you're not going to have an external display on the next reboot, you'd better fix XF86Config before logging out of X. This is not ideal, but it can be a lifesaver if you have to use a projector for a presentation... Keep the lines above commented out for regular use, and change them before the presentation starts, with enough time for a reboot and perhaps some troubleshooting :-)
Now that XFree86.org has a bugzilla, bugs like this one (nv) should probably be filed there so that Mark can directly track them. I'm not sure if this is an actual bug, or would be considered a configuration-by-hand to get desired behaviour type of thing. No idea how Nvidia hardware works though, so there isn't any chance of any driver changes unless Mark makes them anyway. Best to keep this stuff upstream.
Filed upstream.