Trials and Tribulations of an Athlon64 Install

This page describes my installation of an ASUS K8N-E Deluxe motherboard, Athlon64 CPU, which began September 9th, 2004.

Hardware Assembly

1. First step: Old PSU removal from case: 4 screws, what could be simpler?
2. New PSU install: 4 screws back in, right? Nope, not if you remove the four wrong screws on the original PSU. There's a mounting bracket that needs to be reused.
3. Install CPU into socket. Only goes one way. Lever up, CPU in, push gently on CPU, lever down.
4. Install heatsink and fan. I thought more about this than it really required. One biug question was which way to put it: answer was with lever inwards toward AGP slot. Then hook clips under retainer posts, then turn lever down (a little bit of force), then lock level extension under retainer post. Much easier than my last AthlonXP which required about 90 foot-pounds of effort on a small flat-head screwdriver, millimeters away from the motherboard circuitry..
5. Mount Motherboard. Line up holes, insert standoffs, mount mobo.
6. Install Memory: Two 512 MB sticks in DIMMS 1 and 2
7. Install disk drives.
8. Connect disk drives data.
9. Connect chasis power/light cables.
10. Install expansion cards (video card)
11. connect power cables.
12. Connect peripherals (keyboard, mouse, monitor, speakers.
13. Power up...or not. Wierdness in power up, maybe related to inadequate UPC (which took some time to determine). Rewired, checked voltages on PSU, replugged elsewhere, eventually booted.

    Somew troubleshotting tips I followed:

    First, disconnect everything from the power supply (including MB.) Plug AC cord into the rear of the PS. IF the PS has its own rocker on/off switch, turn it ON. There should be +5v on pin 9 of the 20 pin connector (+5vsb, usually a violet wire.) There should be >0.8v on pin 14 (PS-ON, usually a green wire.) This is from an internal pull-up to the +5vsb.

    Connect PS power leads to 1 or 2 IDE HDs (for a load). Jumper pin 14 (PS-ON) to pin 13 (ground, black wire.) At this point, fan in PS should start spinning, drives should spin, and + 5/12v, -5/12v, +3.3v, and +5vsb should be present at 20 pin connector. Disconnecting pin 14-13 jumper should turn supply back off.

14. Into BIOS: set time and date, set AGP frequency to 67 (saw this in newsgroup posting)

BIOS Updating

Updating BIOS:

1. download latest bios: K8ne1004.zip
2. download: AFUDOS207.zip
3. unzip these
4. create two bootable DOS floppies: one to store orig BIOA, one with new BIOS
5. Copy:

   dd if=/import/floppies/351/dos-boot.img of=/dev/fd0

6. copy BIOS and AFUDOS to one floppy, and only AFUDOS to the other

   mcopy AFUDOS.exe K8ne1004.ami a:
   mcopy AFUDOS.exe a:

7. Do these on the new machine:

   afudos /ok8neorig.rom 
   afudos /ik8ne1004.ami

8. Do these wit the floppies on another linux machine:

   dd of=orig-bios-floppy.img if=/dev/fd0
   dd of=bios-1004-floppy.img if=/dev/fd0

Partitioning

Planned partition setup on the 74 (really 72) GB disk:

 sda1  7 GB /win2k
 sda2  7 GB /
 sda3  1 GB 
 sda4      
 sda5 28 GB /u, /local
 sda6 28 GB /fat32-share

Windows 2000 Pro Install

The thought of hunting down and using Microsoft's beta 64 bit OS would be the wrong one to have. Even their regular (so called) operating systems are very buggy, so I can't imagine what their beta products look like. Thus, I am going with a run-of-the-mill 32 install here.

Follow the bouncing buttons in the typically Win2K Pro install:

• partitioning (see above)
• install
• reboot
• setup

Now to go through and install all the drivers, updates and other software I need in the windows world:

• run motherboard driver/software CD:
• install chipset drivers (includes ethernet)
• reboot
• install AC'98 audio drivers
• reboot
• install cool and quiet drivers
• reboot
• install misc asus software
• windows update
• IE service 6 pack
• reboot
• Didn't take, redo IE service pack
• reboot
• win2k SP4 install/update
• reboot
• install 23 other critical updates
• reboot
• install 2 other recommended security updates
• reboot
• install DirectX
• reboot
• install graphics drivers
• reboot
• install cygwin
• install ntemacs
• install winzip
• install java sdk
• install firefox (plus theme)
• import firefox bookmarks
• install adobe postscript driver
• configure printer
• install tweakui
• install VNC
• install doom3
• install quake3

So after rebooting 11 times and applying all the MS recommended patches, I find that Doom3 doesn't work. Doom3 starts, let's me set preferences and start the game, and right after it finishing loading the first level/start of game, the screen blanks, the disk spins, and a few minutes later windows tells me it killed it due to an error.

I tried a fresh install of the video drivers, directx and doom3 and got a slightly different problem. Now, though I can start it set prefs and begin a game, a few seconds into the loading screen, it comes right back to thr main menu.

Only solution seems to do a fresh windows install.

Windows XP Install

Trying windows XP install then. My friend did this, and got everything running in XP. My patience ran out.

Gentoo Install, Attempt #1

• download and burn minimal ISO
• boot from CD
• no network, no SATA drive, no dice for this distribution (for now)

Fedora Core 2 Install

• basic stuff from their installation disks (their x86_64 version)
• put nvidia nforce and geforce drivers on a CD
• mistakenly tried to configure NIS, machine hung (due to no working NIC)
• rebooting and the machine keeps hanging just after swap is added.
• need a fresh reinstall
• ethernet not detected, vesa video used, but sound *was* detected
• install nvidia network drive, need to add alias eth0 nvnet /etc/modules.conf. it is recognized, comes up, but never gets a DHCP address. Reboot and it worked.

nVidia video driver can only be run without X running, and I could not get into virtual terminals from the default fedora install. I change the initial runlevel to 3 in the /etc/inittab, and rebooted. I tried telinit 3, but that just made the greeter non-responsive, didn't give me a text console. CTRL-ALT-FN was not working at all for any values of 'N'. Reboot went to console and I could then run the graphics driver installation.

After running, I needed to edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf to change driver "vesa" to driver "nvidia", and I deleted the Load "dri" line. Started it up, saw the nVidia logo flash and seemed to work. glxgears is giving me 9130+ frames per second.

Set yp.conf and startup ypbind in rc.d area

The hbext day, back to Fedora and I find mozilla has disappeared. Also, my test account cannot log in with Gnome as it crashes. Trying 'yum' install mozilla' hung after the download, and then logging out from X, the machine hung. There is no WindowMaker x86_64 either for Fedora.

Fedora strikes out.

SuSe 9.1 Install Attempt #1

Downloading SuSe x86_64 boot ISO.

  http://ops.tamu.edu/suse/x86_64/9.1/boot/boot.iso

Used my DLink USB hub/nic that worked with the i-opener to get a workable network interface for the network install. (There is a catch-22 on the network install when your network card is not supported in the install CD.

Did network install which took overnight.

Some problems getting ypbind to connect to server, but on chooser login it was showing all users...strange...did it or didn't it bind to the yp server? ypbind hangs on bootup and times out.

For some reason /dev/hde1 was not mounting to /winxp/c, so I added it to /etc/fstab and manually mounted it. Might have just messed up installation UI usage.

Now to get the proper network interface running with the nvidia drivers.

./NFORCE-Linux-x86_64-1.0-0283-pkg1.run 
echo "alias eth1 nvnet" >> /etc/modules.conf

Setting up nVidia X driver:

./NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-1.0-6111-pkg2.run
SaX2  (for X config)

/etc/yp.conf had cassandra.net instead of cassandra which was causing it to hang.

Needed to edit nsswitch.conf:

    hosts:	files nis dns  (added nis)

    automount[8877]: lookup(yp): lookup for arc failed: Request arguments bad

Seems that my auto.master NIS map had a yp: prefix in the names. This seemed to be what was causing the problem.

Having NFS hang issues...nasty.

I was having real problems with Yast hanging, and trying to reinstall was not finding dependencies. I decided to try gentoo again, using my DLink USB hub/NIC.

Gentoo Install, Attempt #2

Booted gentoo Universal AMD64 CD, but SATA drive not there. gentoo forum says: (On trying the "minimal" boot CD, I did not see thew stages tar ball)

modprobe ide-disk

Partitioning with fdisk is next, but usinbg same partitioning that I did with SuSe.

mkswap /dev/hde3
mke2fs -j /dev/hde2

swapon /dev/hde3
mount /dev/hde2 /mnt/gentoo

Trying to locate stage tarball the first time on the universal CD, the system hung, and subsequently, the CD-ROM drive was not even recognized by the BIOS. I change it from being slave drive on primary IDE chanlle to be the master drive on thge secondary channel.

This is actually a genuine hardware failure. Replaced CD-ROM drive.

 tar -xvjpf /mnt/cdrom/stages/stage1-*.tar.bz2
 mount -t proc proc /mnt/gentoo/proc
 cp /etc/resolv.conf /mnt/gentoo/etc/resolv.conf
 chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash
 env-update
 source /etc/profile

 emerge sync

Nothing I did got the DLink USB hub/nic to work (DLink DSB-H3ETX). This:

  modprobe pegasus

SuSe 9.1 Install Attempt #2

Tried to revert to a SuSe network install, but now I could not get it to talk to any server.

Gentoo Install, Attempt #3

Tried another NIC (a Linksys USB NIC I had), but gentoo didn't recognize that either.

I finally put in a regular 3com card.

On boot I then needed these:

 modprobe 3c59x
 modprobe ide-disk
 net-setup eth0

 swapon /dev/hde3
 mount /dev/hde2 /mnt/gentoo

 cp /etc/resolv.conf /mnt/gentoo/etc/resolv.conf
 chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash
 env-update
 source /etc/profile

 emerge sync

Edit /etc/make.conf (USE and CFLAGS)

    USE="emacs gif java jpeg mozilla mpeg perl plotutils png python quicktime samba sse ssl svga tetex tiff X xmms xv" 

 cd /usr/portage
 scripts/bootstrap.sh

 emerge system

'help2man' failed! did emerge again to see what happens. still failed, error says it needs perl, so I tried to emerge perl manually, then emerge system again

try to emerge help2man again after perl and it was already there...so just a minor glitch it seems.

 ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/US/Central /etc/localtime

 edit /etc/fstab

 mkdir /export0
 mkdir -p /winxp/c
 mkdir /winxp/l

 emerge sys-kernel/gentoo-dev-sources

 emerge genkernel
 genkernel --menuconfig all

Got this error after a while:

arch/x86_64/kernel/built-in.o(.init.text+0x2119): In function `late_hpet_init':
: undefined reference to `hpet_alloc'
make: *** [.tmp_vmlinux1] Error 1

Search of gentoo discussions says to just disable all HPET stuff.

I found these right at the top of /usr/src/linux/.config:

CONFIG_HPET_TIMER=y
CONFIG_HPET_EMULATE_RTC=y

More search in the gentoo forums revealed this:

  At the very top level, you should see

    [*] Provide RTC interrupt

  Then,

     Device Drivers --->
     Character devices --->
     [*] HPET - High Precision Event Timer
     [*] Allow mmap of HPET

These were not set for me, so I set them and redid the:

 genkernel --menuconfig all

This got past that error and the kernel successfully compiled.

 emerge syslog-ng 
 rc-update add syslog-ng default
 emerge vixie-cron
 rc-update add vixie-cron default   

 emerge hotplug
 rc-update add hotplug default

 rc-update add domainname default

Here's a big questions: I see all these packages:

  emerge -s nvidia
  *  app-emulation/emul-linux-x86-nvidia
  *  media-gfx/nvidia-cg-toolkit
  *  media-video/nvidia-glx
  *  media-video/nvidia-kernel
  *  media-video/nvidia-settings [ Masked ]

 passwd
 useradd test -m -G users,wheel,audio -s /bin/bash
 passwd test
 echo mymachine > /etc/hostname
 echo mydomain.com > /etc/dnsdomainname
 nano -w /etc/hosts
 nano -w /etc/rc.conf

 nano -w /etc/conf.d/net

 nano -w /etc/modules.autoload.d/kernel-2.6
   (added 3c569x and ide-disk)

 rc-update add net.eth0 default

 emerge grub-static

Then 'nano -w /boot/grub/grub.conf', and have:

     timeout 30
     default 0
     fallback 1
     splashimage=(hd0,1)/boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz
     title = Gentoo GNU/Linux
       root (hd0,1)
       kernel /boot/kernel-2.6.8-gentoo-r4 root=/dev/ram0 init=/linuxrc real_root=/dev/hde2
       initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.8-gentoo-r4
     
     title Windows NT / Windows 95 boot menu
       rootnoverify (hd0,0)
       makeactive
       chainloader  +1
     
     title Install GRUB into the hard disk
     root    (hd0,1)
     setup   (hd0)
     
     title Change the colors
     color light-green/brown blink-red/blue

Next up: # grub-install # grub grub> root (hd0,1) grub> setup (hd0) grub> quit

Finally, exit chroot, unmount and reboot

On reboot it complained that it could not mount /dev/hde2.  I guess
the kernel I compiled needs to have the ide-disk module compiled into
it.

Reboot with Gentoo CD:

  # mopdprobe ide-disk
   mount /dev/hde2 /mnt/gentoo
   mount -t proc proc /mnt/gentoo/proc

   chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash
   env-update
   source /etc/profile

Found: nvidia serial ATA in device drivers, scsi, low-level drivers

This did the trick, but the difficult part was that I found now
everythong was on /dev/sda? rather than /dev/hde?.  So I had to change
/etc/fstab and /boot/grub/grub.conf to reflect that as it failed to
boot otherwise.

Now it boots from the hard disk.

First thing I tried to do was an rsync from the CD with my nvidia
drivers to the shared vfat partition.  After the first file, the
kernal panicked.

Rebooted with the same command and got same error at same point.

Rebooted but this time tried to rsync to an ext3 partition and got
same results.

Rebooted and this time tried to just do a'sp' It works for the two
linux drivers, but on the same windows .exe driver that rsync failed,
this too failed.  Likely that an error on the CD is notr being handled
properly.

Installed the nvnet modules from nvdidias site, but could not get it
to fire up the eth0 device.

I manually did:


  # modprobe nvnet

  o added to modules.autoload.d/kernel-2.6
  o created alias in  modules.d/nvnet

  # rc-update add sshd default
  # /etc/ini.d/sshd start

These are the things I then emerged:

  emerge screen vim zip unzip 

  emerge xorg-x11

  emerge ntp net-misc/netkit-rsh net-misc/netkit-telnetd net-fs/nfs-utils ypbind dev-util/cvs

emerge keychain x11-wm/windowmaker xlockmore xscreensaver

emerge imlib  (needed to manually do this because something failed in gtk-engines.)

emerge gtk-engines

emerge emacs ispell

During emacs, I got acorrupt file, so I change the mirror site I point
to, removed the distfil and reemerged.


emerge procmail net-mail/fetchmail

emerge net-www/mozilla-firefox net-www/opera net-www/mozilla  net-www/gplflash

Added tkinter to USE in /etc/make.conf (fetchmail told me to do this)

re-emerge python to have it with Tk support.

emerge python abiword gnumeric

Gnumeric died, so from the forums I added these to the USE in
/etc/make.conf:

And I added ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="~amd64" in there too.  Interesting thing
is that one of these caused it to fetch a different version of
gnumeric (trying to rebuild before setting these just tried to
recompile from the already downloaded tar ball).

emerge gnumeric 

This worked.

emerge gdb gnuplot

emerge xmms gxine mplayer

emerge mtools tcsh dosfstools

emerge gentoolkit octave

octave emerge failed due to no fortran compiler.  It told me to add
"f77" to my USE env var in /etc/make.conf and reemerge gcc. So I did
this.

emerge octave

emerge media-gfx/xv xfig app-office/dia

emerge app-office/openoffice-bin

emerge kdebase apache mysql net-p2p/gtk-gnutella dev-java/ant jikes junit xerces


X and Desktop Configuration


Xorg -configure
X -config /root/xorg.conf.new  (testing)
cp /root/xorg.conf.new /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Following:

  http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/nvidia-guide.xml

emerge nvidia-glx
modprobe nvidia

edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf

   remove Load dri
   Add nvidia driver
   adjust resolution and depth
   add video ram amount

modules-update

opengl-update nvidia

glxgears is giving me 9870+ frames per second whcih is faster than I
was geting previously. Wow, all this pain and I actually got some
gain.


Sound (ALSA) Configuration

Following this:

  http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/alsa-guide.xml

emerge alsa-utils

Seemed like in /etc/modules.d/alsa things were already set up, so I
just tried firing up xmms with an mp3.  At first it did not work, but
only because by default everythoing was muted.  Just doing these two
commands and it all worked.

 amixer set Master 100 unmute
 amixer set PCM 100 unmute

How to get 5.1 sound?  How to test it? (I think I don't)

Do I need anything in these packages?

emerge -p alsa-tools alsa-firmware

------------------------------------------------------------
More emerges:

emerge app-emacs/python-mode

emerge aumix net-im/gaim 

emerge gimp xsane tk madplay sox normalize aumix

emerge \
app-text/a2ps \
app-text/acroread \
app-text/dos2unix \
app-text/enscript \
app-text/ghostview \
app-text/rcs \
app-text/xpdf

emerge \
app-misc/mime-types \
media-video/mpeg-tools \
media-video/xanim \
media-video/mpeg2vidcodec

emerge \
net-ftp/ncftp \
app-cdr/cdrtools \
lsof \
media-gfx/sane-backends \
media-gfx/sane-frontends \
dev-libs/libusb \
app-admin/usbview \
x11-plugins/wmmaiload \
x11-plugins/wmCalClock

emerge gkrellm

emerge mail-client/mailx

emerge net-analyzer/ethereal net-analyzer/ettercap net-analyzer/nmap net-analyzer/traceroute net-analyzer/tcpdump net-analyzer/tcpstat

emerge metamail gnucash

GNUCash would not run. I neede to add:

CFLAGS="-L/usr/X11R6/lib" 
LDFLAGS="-L/usr/X11R6/lib"

to the global section (outside {}) of:
  /usr/portage/app-office/gnucash/gnucash-1.8.9.ebuild

------------------------------------------------------------
NIS setup

emerge ypserv


Set YP_DOMAIN to 'cassandra' in /etc/conf.d/ypbind
set 'domain cassandra broadcast' in /etc/yp.conf
echo "cassandra" > /etc/nisdomainname
rc-update add ypbind default
Add ypserv '+' to /etc/passwd and '/etc/group'
/etc/init.d/ypbind start

Add 'nis' in /etc/nsdswitch.conf to hosts, networks, automount,
aliases, netgroup

I think I am bailing on using NIS...I'll just copy the admin files.

-----------------------------x-------------------------------
NFS setup

mkdir /export0/home

Add dirs to /etc/exports

  /export0/home         192.168.1.0/255.255.255.0(rw,no_root_squash,sync)

exportfs -a

mkdir /import /mirror /u /misc

emerge autofs

rc-update add autofs default
/etc/init.d/autofs start

Edit /etc/autofs/auto.misc to allow /misc/cd to mount.

modprobe nfs

Had trouble starting nfsd...there are two nfs options: kernel and
user-space.  I had the kernel one as a module, so I recompiled the
kernel making it right in the kernel.  After compiling, rebooting.

Also trying to figure out what is up with nvnet going to eth2 and
exactly what is the deal with eth0 which sort of shows up.  I suspect
that my forcedeth module might be kind of detecting the thing.

I also seem to have a routing table problem with the two NICs now.
Two default gateway paths.

I see this too:

  "(For the nvidia ethernet driver to work, you also have to disable
    the reverse-engineered "forcedeth" driver.)

So here's what I did:

  in /lib/modules/

------------------------------------------------------------
Mail setup

Edit /etc/ssmtp/ssmtp.com, adding:

  mailhub=smtp.earthlink.net
  rewriteDomain=cassandra.net
  hostname=princess.cassandra.net


------------------------------------------------------------
NTP setup

emerge ntp
Edit /etc/conf.d/ntp
Create /etc/ntp.conf from: /usr/share/ntp/ntp.conf
rc-update add ntpd default
/etc/init.d/ntpd start


------------------------------------------------------------
Palm setup

emerge jpilot

Finding the device (serial port) it was connected to was the first
trick. There is no /dev/ttyS?.

pilot-link emerge failed.  Needed to hide the blackdown java since it
was failing on making the java bindings.



>>>>> HERE





jpilot
abiword

xpaint
gimp

gnucash

------------------------------------------------------------

To fix libwww compilation/emerging bug:

  cd /usr/include
  ln -s openssl/ssl.h ssl.h
  ln -s openssl/rand.h rand.h

Set up daily cron job to backup /etc/cron.daily/mirror-daily:

Add /etc/hosts.allow and /etc/hosts.equiv

Change 'only_from' to 192.168.1.0 in /etc/xinetd.conf
rexec, rlogin, rsh, telnetd
rc-update add xinetd default

------------------------------------------------------------
Dual Monitor Setup

Followed the NVidia instructions for setting up Twinview.  Some
confusion about device numbers and not working with using them, but
using the "SecondMonitor" settings did the trick.

-- paste xorg.conf here --

------------------------------------------------------------
Printer Setup

HP LaserJet 1220 USB

emerge cups foomatic

Needed to rebuild kernel module for usblp (devices->usb)

I manually ran make menuconfig, make modules and copies the driver to
the /lib/modules area.

Then "modules update", then "modprobe usblp"

I then see this in dmesg:

drivers/usb/class/usblp.c: usblp0: USB Bidirectional printer dev 2 if 0 alt 1 proto 2 vid 0x03F0 pid 0x0317

Now following instructions at:

  http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/printing-howto.xml

# /etc/init.d/cupsd start

grep "HP LaserJet 1200" /usr/share/foomatic/db/source/printer/*

printer_id=HP-LaserJet_1200

grep  /usr/share/foomatic/db/source/driver/*

This gave me choices, so I checked:

  http://www.linuxprinting.org/show_printer.cgi?recnum=HP-LaserJet_1200

driver=Postscript

# foomatic-configure -s cups -p HP-LaserJet_1200 -c file:/dev/usb/lp0 -n ps -d Postscript

This gave an error, but it might have worked anyway as I see the printe in cups:

  http://localhost:631

and I can print a test page.

emerge gimp-print

printing from enscript seems top think there is A4 paper.
In /etc/enscript.cfg I changed this:

  DefaultMedia: A4

to

  DefaultMedia: Letter



** Mon Sep 27 22:59:59 CDT 2004 **

CURRENT: /etc/make.conf


CFLAGS="-O2"
CHOST="x86_64-pc-linux-gnu"
CXXFLAGS=""
USE="f77 X gtk gnome alsa emacs gif java jpeg tkinter mozilla mpeg perl plotutils png python quicktime samba sse ssl svga tetex tiff X xmms xv avi wmv mov cups foomaticdb ppds usb gimpprint"

ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="~amd64"



------------------------------------------------------------
ToDo

Still need to get eth0 working.  Seems that nvnet was coming up on
eth2, so it was working, I just was looking at the wrong device.
However, I do want to pull the 3COM card and get the on board GigE
card showing up as eth0.

Redo dotfile/environment setup including CVS module and organization.

Copy critical system files:

  /etc
  /usr/src/linux/.config


More emerges:





emerge net-mail/mailx net-mail/mailutils


emerge net-wireless/airsnort net-wireless/airtraf net-wireless/kismet net-wireless/wavemon


emerge net-im/everybuddy net-im/ymessenger


net-mail/sendmail

sun-jdk

app-emacs/matlab
app-emacs/mailcrypt


app-text/latex2html \



media-video/realplayer \
media-video/mpeg-movie \






>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Things that were masked or nonexistent:

emerge app-office/gnucash
dev-perl/Mail-SpamAssassin
metamail
autofs
net-misc/x11-ssh-askpass
icewm 
app-emacs/vm
xpaint
jlex


Things I might get later:

 app-emacs/gnuserv


------------------------------------------------------------

Make mouse scroll button work.




Modules needed:

  USB printer
  OSS sound (for using nvidia audio drivers)
  Serial Ports

------------------------------------------------------------

Dual Monitor Setup


If you have an nvidia card, don't use xinerama - the nvidia twinview stuff works very well.. basically you add this to your "Device" section:

Code:

        Option "TwinView" "True"
        Option "TwinViewOrientation" "LeftOf"
        Option "MetaModes" "1600x1200,1600x1200"


(replacing your resolutions of each monitor of course)

and for Modes of your Screen you set it as the combined size of both monitors (twinview makes X treat 2 monitors as one really wide monitor).. for example with the above config, I have :

Modes "1600x1200"


Do that, and it should just work. The only thing I have had to compile with xinerama support is GDM (if you don't, it takes both screens and sticks the login box dead center.. recompile with xinerama and it only uses one screen and avoids the problem)


The only problem I've seen with TwinView is "maximize" goes across both screens.. however I don't have maximize buttons (took them out (fvwm), these monitors are too big to maximize :O)