TVOut question

[mrn]

Any way to be able to work on one display and show a movie on another one?

I was thinking something like either overlay? (mplayer running minimized and still showing on the tv or something), running a seperate X session for the tvout (would work great if it worked when I switch back to my main one), or maybe a "fake" twinview? If the window manager couldn't access the part the tv is in. I got the tv away from my monitor, so I'd rather keep my main display and my tv seperate.

[Thunderbird]

Use the seperate X display approach then the tv and monitor are seperate. By specifying another display using DISPLAY or some application switch you can then easily start apps on the second screen. Note that by default the second screen is empty. (there's no window manager and so on running on it)

[mrn]

Originally Posted by Thunderbird

Use the seperate X display approach then the tv and monitor are seperate. By specifying another display using DISPLAY or some application switch you can then easily start apps on the second screen. Note that by default the second screen is empty. (there's no window manager and so on running on it)

I know... but as soon as I switch away from :1 to :0 the tv will black out.

//edit, after rereading the documentation I have it working rather flawlessly.
Hell I can play movies on one display while playing games on another, I love this .

[Thunderbird]

We both mean something different. The approach you are describing uses actually two X servers but the approach I mean is differently. Using my approach you use a single X session and then one screen becomes :0.0 and the other :0.1 you can just move your mouse over from screen I to screen II but you can't move windows over further both desktops can use a different resolution. For more information check appendix R of the driver readme.

[kurre]

mrn: Would you mind posting the relevant parts of your X-config ? Which lines did you have to change ?

It seeems that I'm stuck in the same situation as you were ...

What I'm trying to do is to get MythTV run on separate X-server/display on TV-out connector, while I'd personally be able to use another X-Server on the console. The problem is that if I start the X-server with TV-out settings, also my console screen goes blank and if I switch the X-server on console, the TV goes blank.

I'm not quite sure if the hardware is even capable of doing what I'd like it to do, but there seems to be a some sort of bug with V. 6629 drivers as I'm able to run separate X-servers with VGA+TVOUT, but NOT with DFP (connected to CRT)+TVOUT. My current graphics card is Asus V9570TD. I have checked that with this card the TVout is wired togetger with the VGA-connector (ie.
text-mode console screen displays on the TV
when using VGA-connector only).

[mrn]

a bit much to post, so I put it here:
http://hollowtube.mine.nu/XF86Config-4

note the double monitor,screen and device lines.

You can move the mouse in between sessions but not windows.

to start something on display2 from display1 do DISPLAY=":0.1" <program>

for example:
# DISPLAY=":0.1" mplayer *.avi

Using this setup I can play movies on the tv, and play 3d games on my main box. I even set up alsa so the sound output is seperate (I had an onboard card I turned on for the tv). Let me know if you want my alsa configs aswell

[kurre]

mrn: Ok, thanks! It seems that you current configuration is similar than mine for now.

What I'm still wondering however is, has anyone been able to run two separate X-servers/displays so that they are NOT connected to each other in any way ?

I even tried to start a X-server running on pure TV-out alone and run another X-server on local CRT-monitor, but without success.

It would be just great to run MythTV display continuosly on TVOUT and still be able to run a few separate login-screens on the CRT-monitor (two users in this flat and I'm not eager to logout :-)
Currently, if I switch the X-display running on the CRT-monitor, the TV-screen switches as well ---> Not good. And as there is no way to install more than one AGP-card ...

[Thunderbird]

You can't start start the outputs using two different Xservers. This is because physically it aren't two seperate videocards, the driver does some tricks to make this possible but it only works when they are in the same X session. Using the current way the displays are already seperated for X namely one is :0.0 and the other :0.1 you can just run a graphical login on both screens without a problem.

[moramartin]

Tries the same config as mrn posted. Works very good, with one exception: My tft screen ends up as display 1 and my tv ends up as display 0. This in turn screws up the modes which X thinks the two displays can use, etc. I think I configured it correctly. I have:

Screen 0

In the section for the TFT device and

Screen 1

In the section for the TV device.

I also have this in the ServerLayout section:

Screen 0 "Screen0"
Screen 1 "Screen1" rightOf "Screen0"

Another problem is that when I boot with the TV connected, the screen on my TFT gets garbled a bit. I can still read the text but it doesnt look right, and the bottom lines is outside of the screen so everything I write is visible after a while when I written some more commands.

Any ideas what might cause this?

/Moramartin

[moramartin]

Here is my xorg.conf if that helps:
http://www.dataphone.se/~planet/files/xorg.conf

Using 1.0-6629 drivers.

[moramartin]

Another clue.. I just switched back to my normal xorg.conf that I had before I started trying to get TV-Out to work, and when I start X, it too tries to start on the TV screen. Seems like when I have the TV connected, it becomes the primary device. I rebooted without the TV connected and after that X started on my TFT display again.

[mrn]

Originally Posted by moramartin

Another clue.. I just switched back to my normal xorg.conf that I had before I started trying to get TV-Out to work, and when I start X, it too tries to start on the TV screen. Seems like when I have the TV connected, it becomes the primary device. I rebooted without the TV connected and after that X started on my TFT display again.

look into the option "ConnectedDevices" or something like that.