Running MythTV on independent X-server

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Incomplete.png Incomplete, needs to be expanded. Please help to fill the gaps or discuss the issue on the talk page

I'm still working on this one...please be patient for a few days as my time is limited.

This HOWTO will guide you in setting up your ordinary desktop system with an extra, 100% independent and separate, X-server for MythTV. Thus you will have one PC serving you with both desktop services by keyboard and mouse simultaneously with HTPC/PVR services by IR-remote on your television/flatscreen/projector (from now on refered to as TV).

Requirements

This HOWTO only focuses on the special steps in setting up this "dual screen" scenario. For all other aspects of configuring MythTV or X you should search the Internet for other ressources.

You will need:

  • Running Linux/MythTV desktop system on primary graphics adapter
  • An additional secondary graphics adapter


I will not cover:

  • Configuring Xorg device settings for additional graphics adapter
  • Configuring LIRC
  • Configuring multiplce sound devices

Secondary graphics adapter

First make sure you have both graphics adapters and monitors configured in your Xorg.conf. This includes two pairs of Device and Monitor sections. Your primary pair should be included in your Default Screen and working with your desktop. The secondary pair should be configured working with correct module and modelines, but should be left unused. To check if the secondary pair is working well, edit the following in the Screen section:

  • Comment out the existing Device line
  • Add a new line with the Identifier of your secondary card
  • Restart X and confirm your desktop is running on your TV.
  • Change things back and restart X once more

Make sure Xinerame is disabled:

Section "ServerFlags"
       Option          "Xinerama" "false"
EndSection


Dummy input

The additional X-server will have no keyboard and mouse available and we want to keep our existing keyboard and mouse on the desktop. To achieve this we will need to configure the additional X-server with a set of dummy devices by utilizing the Xorg "void input driver".

First, check if you have the driver available:

# ls /usr/lib/xorg/modules/input/void_drv.so

If it's not available, you should install the driver, preferably through your distributions package system. On my Kubuntu:

# apt-get install xserver-xorg-input-void

Add the dummy devices to your Xorg.conf:

Section "InputDevice"
       Identifier      "Dummy Keyboard"
       Driver          "void"
       Option          "CoreKeyboard"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
       Identifier      "Dummy Mouse"
       Driver          "void"
       Option          "CorePointer"
EndSection