Dual head, display driven by mga driver has "X" cursor and is unusable

[Chris Fisichella]

Quoting Chris Fisichella <chris at communityrenewables.com>:

> Quoting Felix Miata <mrmazda at earthlink.net>:
>
>
>> Do note that ATI is supported by KMS drivers (as are Intel and NVidia),
>
>
> Hi Felix, All,
>
> I went out and bought a NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS. It can support one  
> VGA display and one HDMI display. I have two HP displays each hooked  
> up to the appropriate port. When I boot into Windows, the display  
> control panel allows me to set each to 1600x1200 @ 60Hz.
>
> I can't get it right on Debian. Here is what I tried
> 1. Run Xorg -configure by booting first into recovery mode.
>    ..This command returned an error "Number of created screens does  
> not match number of detected devices. Configuration failed. When I  
> use this for /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/xorg.conf, Debian boots to two  
> very nice backgrounds. But that is all I get. No window manager.
> 2. Boot without any xorg.conf file. Both screens show a checkered  
> pattern. One screen has a nicely rendered login prompt, but I can't  
> type anything.
> 3. Edit the conf file to try a lower resolution, 1280x1024. It was  
> previously at 1600x1200. I just got a different checkered pattern.
>
> I read the output from the Nouveau driver. It does not list NVIDIA NV98.
>
> Is this the end of the road?
>
> Any other advice? I don't know what else to try at this point. I  
> can't even get to an xterm. Booting in recovery mode helps. I can at  
> least get to a command line.
>
> Thanks,
> Chris
>
>
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All,

Please disregard that last email. I did not do #2 correctly. I moved  
the files in /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/*.conf

When I returned them and booted without any  
/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/xorg.conf file, The two displays came up nicely.

Thanks, Felix for helping me out. The card was cheap enough. Having  
two monitors going is really nice.

Best,
Chris