Ubuntu question

Wagon

Lads, is there a way you can switch between two mmonitors on Ubuntu? I only started using it today, so I'm still unfamiliar with it.

ethernet

Don't use the desktop version myself but there should be an option tucked away somewhere. Try looking under the Other --> Preferences menu, looking out for appearance or display/monitors. You should be able to enable mirroring from here.

velocirafter

system/administration/screens and graphics
has some settings there

it kinda depends on how you want to use the second monitor(extension of the current monitor/large monitor to watch movies). I ended up having to make change to my xorg.conf to get it going, just a couple of lines nothing serious.

have a look at these threads it should set you in the right direction
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=952650
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=9106
http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/ubuntu-...m-xorg-server/

croo

Do you use an nvidia graphics card?
I do and installed their settings app using
sudo apt-get install nvidia-settings

That places a new item in the System->Administration menu called "NVIDIA X Server Settings". Using this you can configure a second screen (or projector which appears as another screen).

There are different ways of arranging this second screen; as a completely separate screen with it's own menus & look & feel settings or perhaps combined with the first to create one big screen, as a clone of the first screen is another option.

The selections you make in the nvidia settings program ultimately are written to a file called /etc/X11/xorg.conf and I ended up creating my own copying a template from the web and editing as required - I guess not something a "new born" linux user would wish to do but not nearly as complex as it seems.