On Mon, Aug 27, 2018 at 9:57 AM, Andrew Lunn <andrew at lunn.ch> wrote:
> On Mon, Aug 27, 2018 at 09:29:40AM -0500, o1bigtenor wrote:
>> On Mon, Aug 27, 2018 at 8:44 AM, Andrew Lunn <andrew at lunn.ch> wrote:
>> >> Running as previously, on Debian testing (10 or buster) with a pile of
>> >> ram and and (lots of resources), with what may be more unusual is 2
>> >> graphics cards and 4 monitors set up as 2 x-screens. (Would love to
>> >> condense that into 1 screen if someone has the know how and can
>> >> describe it but 2 works well enough even if 1 would be quite slick
>> >> (and very 'interesting').)
>> >
>> > Are the two cards from the same vendor? Or different vendors?
>>
>> Both are nvidia 570 cards from the same vendor.
>> >
>> > I've done this in the past using Xinerama.
>>
>> I am using xinerama but using 2 xscreens. Its using only 1 xscreen that
>> I don't know anything about!
>
> You should not need to use Xinerama in order to have one Xserver merge
> two screens on a single card.
>
> Ah, hold on. Are you using the proprietary nvidia driver? Maybe you
> have to use Xinerama for that driver?
>
> All the open source drivers should drive two displays on one card
> without any additional configuration.

You bet they run 2 screens from one card but they also don't seem to see the
other 2 cards (3 total) so that didn't much help things.
>
> You might also find the open source driver just correctly finds two
> cards, four displays, and it all just works out of the box.

Sorry - - - - not a chance!!
>
> But there is a trade off. The open source drivers might just work out
> of the box, the nvidia proprietary stuff will give you better
> performance. If it is a gaming machine, you probably want the
> performance. If its just a developers box, where you just need large
> screen acreage, mostly text, the open source driver might be
> sufficient.

Not a gamer (at all!) but I do want things to work and as I couldn't tame
nouveau - - - - oh well it was the proprietary solution (I don't think nvidia
really gives a flying rat's patootie about linux drivers!!! as their track
record shows (if someone wants to argue!!).)

I spent far too many hours over far too many days to try to achieve my own
solution to getting nouveau working. If someone has a solution - - - well I'm
all ears but I couldn't figure out how to use randr1.5, which CAN do this, set
up to use multiple cards and multiple monitors.

Regards

Dee