I have a desktop that's been running strong for over half a decade with Windows 7: core i7-920, dual GeForce GTS 250 graphics card (identical, no SLI bridge). It's hooked up to 3 monitors with 2 on the first card, and 1 on the second. On Windows, this works completely fine.
On Linux however, I only have one ancient version of Linux Mint Debian Edition with an old version of the Nvidia drivers working. But only in a configuration where each screen is a separate X session, so no moving windows across monitors. That's fine by me, but I don't use this install anymore because everything is out of date.
On any recent distro of Linux, the default is to use Nouveau drivers which can get all screens to activate after messing with the configurations. BUT, I either run into screen flickering, invisible mouse cursor, instability, or poor performance. That is issue #1. My thinking is ok, back to Nvidia drivers. They install fine, but I cannot get any combination of settings to activate all 3 screens either as one X session (third screen never works) or as separate X sessions like in my old install (depending on the DE I choose, either no DE is launched on the other monitors, or they do launch but the only way to run programs on the other X sessions is to manually configure the DISPLAY value to those screens and launch the program in a terminal).
Ignoring the fact that I had to give up on using the GUI configuration programs and edit xorg files like I was back in the 2000s, can you figure out a way to get my environment working in a sane manner?
> as separate X sessions like in my old install (depending on the DE I choose, either no DE is launched on the other monitors, or they do launch but the only way to run programs on the other X sessions is to manually configure the DISPLAY value to those screens and launch the program in a terminal).
the issue is not with the drivers, but with whatever DE you want to use. Since the vast, vast majority of people nowadays do not run multiple X screens, there isn't a lot of interest on the part of desktop environment coders to get them working (also because likely they don't have that hardware themselves and so can't try it either)
I personally also run two separate nvidia cards with two separate X screens on them, I run i3 but have had to patch several things to get it to work well enough for myself, it was doable for me to patch i3 due to having spent many years deep into X11/Xt way back, but definitely not something the average user could do and not something useful enough to a large enough number of people to warrant including in it for everybody
A desktop environment coded to expect that it's run once per computer in general won't like being launched twice in parallel (one for each screen), if you want something easy I suggest doing something like running KDE on your primary card and Gnome on the other: you will very likely have to mess with your .xinitrc to launch each separately on :0.0 and :0.1 but it should be doable
I only mentioned the separate X session part because that has been suggested as a "workaround" for over half a decade; hence why I even have that setup on my old install. I was simply anticipating someone posting a response claiming that it would work with such a configuration as I know the inevitable answer (I revisit trying Linux on this computer maybe once a year).
> Since the vast, vast majority of people nowadays do not run multiple X screens, there isn't a lot of interest on the part of desktop environment coders to get them working (also because likely they don't have that hardware themselves and so can't try it either)
Yup, I get that it's uncommon. It's just sad that what used to work years ago has regressed and simply does not work at all anymore. I also considered doing the .xinitrc thing you suggested, but stopped myself from wasting more time as it would just result in a frankenstein DE that wouldn't be very usable (Gnome & KDE are quite far apart in usability philosophy).
(edit: Also remember that to a non-technical user, they would simply try what the GUI suggests. Nvidia defaults to separate X sessions across different cards. Since DEs don't work with that configuration anymore, that would appear no different than a driver issue to the end user.)
> This constant regression in features is what I dislike most about Linux lately. Eternal September in software form.
This is what pushed me from using Linux full time for almost a decade to jumping ship to Apple a year ago. That and people like AsyncAwait who never seem to respond to people like me who post concrete real world problems despite claiming everything negative is FUD.
I understand why a Mac OS X virtual machine might not be completely compatible with Apple's overall business model but perhaps something available through the Apple developer program? Something, anything, would be nice.
I believe that there's a DLL patcher for Windows VMware that allows OS X guests. Back when I tried it last time, it worked nicely but then again I only used it for creating USB install media for repairing / reinstalling broken Macs and didn't require stuff like high-performance USB or GPU acceleration.
- Trackpad is awful and all the synaptics software and tweaks and configs I've tried can't make it work half as well as a MBP trackpad - graphics switching + sleep + power brick replugging + lid closing doesn't work ever - high power usage unless powertop --autotune is run, which breaks USB replugging and causes more havoc with sleep - mfg defect with the ribbon cable under the space bar causing the space bar to be almost unusable. Required a new keyboard and me tearing the whole thing apart to fix
The screen is gorgeous though (thin bezels + 4K IGZO + capacitive touch which I don't need) and the hinge works well even when touching it. Build quality is OK but not micron-level perfect like MBPs (the seam where the metal meets the bottom shell is off by a tiny bit and catches my finger). The power brick is bigger than an MBP equivalent and they're not ubiquitous as the MagSafe2s now are. Having real USB ports is nice, since I hate the USB dongle I have Velcro'd to the USB-C power cable for the tbMBP.
It also doesn't run Mac OS, which FWIW on the 2016 tbMBP fares about as well as the Dell with re-plugging two 4K DP USB alt-mode adapters -- I end up hard-powering the MBP >50% of the time since the internal displays and external displays won't show anything, even though the stupid touch bar lights up.
I got the Dell used on eBay for about half of retail, which is about what I consider it to be worth, while I consider the 2015 rMBP to be worth ~$1600 and the 2016 tbMBP much less.
I'd be interested to hear what kind of problems you had with Linux drivers on a desktop, that isn't something most of us, Linux users, had major problems with for almost a decade.
Even Pascal GPUs are supported, unlike on a Hackintosh.