GNU/Linux on a Sony Vaio PCG-FX801

From: Tristan Miller <psychonaut@nothingisreal.com>
Subject: [XFree86] Multihead setup: ATI 3D Rage P/M Mobility AGP 2x and Xinerama
Message-Id: <200411080143.15163.psychonaut@nothingisreal.com>
Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 01:43:14 +0100

Greetings.

I am trying to set up a multihead display with the Xinerama extensions to 
XFree86 4.3.0.1 on GNU/Linux (SuSE 9.0). I have a Sony Vaio laptop with a 
3D Rage P/M Mobility AGP 2x video card. I know that this video card is 
capable of dual display mode as I've got it working with Windows XP. I 
also have no problem running single displays either on the built-in LCD or 
on the external monitor (or on both, but of course in that case both 
monitors display the same thing rather than separate desktops).

I understand that for multiheaded video cards, the XF86Config file must be 
set up with two "Monitor" and two "Screen" sections, one for each monitor, 
and also two separate but nearly identical "Device" sections. If the video 
card has two separate BusIDs (as revealed by /proc/pci), then each 
"Device" section must specify a unique BusID. However, if the video card 
has a single BusID, then the line "Screen 0" should be added to the first 
"Device" section, and "Screen 1" to the second. (Sources: 
<http://www.kclug.org/pipermail/kclug/2002-September/010412.html> and 
<http://freedesktop.org/bin/view/XOrg/FAQMiscellaneous#How_do_I_set_up_a_multihead_conf>.)

My video card has only one entry in /proc/pci:

  Bus  1, device   0, function  0:
    VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Rage Mobility P/M AGP 
2x (rev 100).
      IRQ 5.
      Master Capable.  Latency=66.  Min Gnt=8.
      Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xe9000000 [0xe9ffffff].
      I/O at 0x9000 [0x90ff].
      Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xe8100000 [0xe8100fff].

Therefore I set up my XF86Config file with the "Screen 0"/"Screen 1" 
variant. However, when I try to test the configuration, I get the 
following error message (extracted from the log file /var/log/Xorg.0.log):

(II) LoadModule: "ati"
(II) Loading /usr/X11R6/lib/modules/drivers/ati_drv.o
(II) Module ati: vendor="The XFree86 Project"
	compiled for 4.2.0, module version = 6.4.7
	Module class: XFree86 Video Driver
	ABI class: XFree86 Video Driver, version 0.5
(II) v4l driver for Video4Linux
(II) ATI: ATI driver (version 6.4.7) for chipsets: ati, ativga
(II) R128: Driver for ATI Rage 128 chipsets: ATI Rage 128 RE (PCI),
	ATI Rage 128 RF (AGP), ATI Rage 128 RG (AGP), ATI Rage 128 RK (PCI),
	ATI Rage 128 RL (AGP), ATI Rage 128 SM (AGP),
	ATI Rage 128 Pro PD (PCI), ATI Rage 128 Pro PF (AGP),
	ATI Rage 128 Pro PP (PCI), ATI Rage 128 Pro PR (PCI),
	ATI Rage 128 Pro ULTRA TF (AGP), ATI Rage 128 Pro ULTRA TL (AGP),
	ATI Rage 128 Pro ULTRA TR (AGP), ATI Rage 128 Mobility LE (PCI),
	ATI Rage 128 Mobility LF (AGP), ATI Rage 128 Mobility MF (AGP),
	ATI Rage 128 Mobility ML (AGP)
(II) RADEON: Driver for ATI Radeon chipsets: ATI Radeon QD (AGP),
	ATI Radeon QE (AGP), ATI Radeon QF (AGP), ATI Radeon QG (AGP),
	ATI Radeon VE QY (AGP), ATI Radeon VE QZ (AGP),
	ATI Radeon Mobility LW (AGP), ATI Radeon Mobility LY (AGP),
	ATI Radeon Mobility LZ (AGP), ATI Radeon 8500 QL (AGP),
	ATI Radeon 8500 BB (AGP), ATI Radeon 7500 QW (AGP)
(II) Primary Device is: PCI 01:00:0
(II) ATI:  Candidate "Device" section "Rage Mobility 1".
(II) ATI:  Candidate "Device" section "Rage Mobility 0".
(II) ATI:  Shared PCI/AGP Mach64 in slot 1:0:0 detected.
(EE) ATI:  XF86Config Device sections "Rage Mobility 1" and "Rage Mobility 
0" may not be assigned to the same adapter.
(EE) No devices detected.

Fatal server error:
no screens found

Apparently some part of my system (video driver? XFree86?) does not 
recognize my video card as multihead-capable. Any suggestions on how to 
work around this? Are there some other options I can use in the "Device" 
sections to convince XFree86 that the card can drive two monitors with 
separate displays?

I have tried both the standard ati driver which comes with XFree86, and 
also the ati.2 driver from <http://gatos.sf.net/>.

For reference, below are the relevant sections of my XFree86.config file.

Regards,
Tristan

Section "Monitor"
  Option       "CalcAlgorithm" "CheckDesktopGeometry"
  HorizSync    31-68
  Identifier   "Vaio LCD"
  ModelName    "1024X768@75HZ"
  VendorName   "--> LCD"
  VertRefresh  50-85
  UseModes     "Modes[0]"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
  Option       "CalcAlgorithm" "CheckDesktopGeometry"
  HorizSync    81-81
  Identifier   "SyncMaster"
  ModelName    "SyncMaster 193T"
  VendorName   "Samsung"
  VertRefresh  75-75
EndSection

Section "Modes"
  Identifier   "Modes[0]"
  Modeline 	"1024x768" 94.50 1024 1072 1168 1376 768 769 772 808 +HSync 
+VSync
EndSection

Section "Screen"
  DefaultDepth 24
  SubSection "Display"
    Depth      24
    Modes      "1024x768" 
  EndSubSection
  Device       "Rage Mobility 0"
  Identifier   "Screen 1"
  Monitor      "Vaio LCD"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
  DefaultDepth 24
  SubSection "Display"
    Depth      24
    Modes      "1024x768" 
  EndSubSection
  Device       "Rage Mobility 1"
  Identifier   "Screen 2"
  Monitor      "SyncMaster"
EndSection

Section "Device"
  BoardName    "3D Rage P/M Mobility AGP 2x"
  BusID        "1:0:0"
  Driver       "ati"
  Identifier   "Rage Mobility 0"
  Screen       0
  VendorName   "ATI"
  Option	"crt_screen"
EndSection

Section "Device"
  BoardName    "3D Rage P/M Mobility AGP 2x"
  BusID        "01:00:0"
  Driver       "ati"
  Identifier   "Rage Mobility 1"
  Screen       1
  VendorName   "ATI"
  Option	"crt_screen"
EndSection

Section "ServerLayout"
  Identifier   "Multihead"
  InputDevice  "Keyboard[0]" "CoreKeyboard"
  InputDevice  "Mouse[5]" "CorePointer"
  Option       "Clone" "off"
  Option       "Xinerama" "on"
  Screen       1 "Screen 2"
  Screen       0 "Screen 1" Relative "Screen 2" 1024 432
EndSection

Section "DRI"
    Group      "video"
    Mode       0660
EndSection

-- 
   _
  _V.-o  Tristan Miller [en,(fr,de,ia)]  ><  Space is limited
 / |`-'  -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=  <>  In a haiku, so it's hard
(7_\     http://www.nothingisreal.com/   ><  To finish what you
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Component	Details
CPU	Mobile AMD Athlon XP 1400+
RAM	256 MB
Hard disk	20 GB
Modem	Internal V.90
Ethernet	Sony RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+
Monitor	Built-in 14.1" TFT display
Floppy drive	3.5" floppy
Graphics	ATI 3D Rage P/M Mobility AGP 2x
DVD drive	QSI DVD-ROM SDR-081
IEEE 1394 (FireWire) controller	Sony TSB12LV26
Sound	VT82C686 AC97
Ports	FireWire
	2× USB
	2× PCMCIA
	Ethernet
	serial
	parallel
	VGA

Component	Status
ACPI	not tested
APM	working
DVD	working
Ethernet	working
FireWire	not tested
floppy drive	working
graphics	working
graphics, 3-D acceleration	not tested
graphics, dual monitor mode	not working
hard disk	working
modem	not tested
parallel port	not tested
PCMCIA	not tested
serial port	not tested
sound, MIDI	not tested
sound, wave	working
TV-out	not tested
USB	working

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GNU/Linux on a Sony Vaio PCG-FX801

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Summary

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Preparation and installation

ACPI/APM power management

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