Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Gene Heskett 
On Saturday 26 March 2016 01:55:53 Felix Miata wrote:

> Gene Heskett composed on 2016-03-25 20:52 (UTC-0400):
> > Felix Miata wrote:
>
> ...
>
> >> Looks like a 3-wire cord to me, and $14.99 in the current sale
> >> catalog.
> >
> > By golly gee, I do believe you are correct, so they've "fixed" that
> > problem. And 15 bucks is less than I paid for one 25 years ago when
> > smd stuff was just coming on the scene.  But I'm not on their spam
> > list so I don't get the pdf version of the catalog...
>
> MCM catalogs seem to show up in snail mail here every 3-6 weeks or so.
> I usually have at least 3 that haven't expired yet. I can't imagine
> how anyone who's ever ordered from them could not have catalogs
> around, unless they're being moved straight from mailbox to trash or
> recycle bin. :-p

I get one of those from time to time, not that often though, it gets 
scanned while I'm eating dinner and unless there is something I need, it 
goes into the out bin.  The midden heap is deep enough as it is.

There ought to be a law that two packrats can't marry...

> > Thanks for the tickle to make me go look at it again.
> >
> :-)


Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page 
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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Felix Miata 

Gene Heskett composed on 2016-03-25 20:52 (UTC-0400):


Felix Miata wrote:

...

Looks like a 3-wire cord to me, and $14.99 in the current sale
catalog.



By golly gee, I do believe you are correct, so they've "fixed" that
problem. And 15 bucks is less than I paid for one 25 years ago when smd
stuff was just coming on the scene.  But I'm not on their spam list so I
don't get the pdf version of the catalog...


MCM catalogs seem to show up in snail mail here every 3-6 weeks or so. I 
usually have at least 3 that haven't expired yet. I can't imagine how anyone 
who's ever ordered from them could not have catalogs around, unless they're 
being moved straight from mailbox to trash or recycle bin. :-p



Thanks for the tickle to make me go look at it again.


:-)
--
"The wise are known for their understanding, and pleasant
words are persuasive." Proverbs 16:21 (New Living Translation)

 Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata  ***  http://fm.no-ip.com/
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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Gene Heskett 
On Friday 25 March 2016 17:47:48 Felix Miata wrote:

> Gene Heskett composed on 2016-03-25 15:55 (UTC-0400):
> >> http://www.mcmelectronics.com/product/TENMA-21-8230-/21-8230
> >> wouldn't do it?
> >
> > Possibly, that looks a lot like the one I used (handles are
> > identical) back in the later 90's but with different tips.
>
> Looks like a 3-wire cord to me, and $14.99 in the current sale
> catalog.

By golly gee, I do believe you are correct, so they've "fixed" that 
problem. And 15 bucks is less than I paid for one 25 years ago when smd 
stuff was just coming on the scene.  But I'm not on their spam list so I 
don't get the pdf version of the catalog.  Which is odd, because I have 
bought stuff from them in the last year, a bag of slot interruptor 
opto's to make a quadrature encoder for a milling machine spindle.  
Specifically the spindle in a Grizzly G0704 milling machine.

Thanks for the tickle to make me go look at it again.

Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page 
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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Felix Miata 

Gene Heskett composed on 2016-03-25 15:55 (UTC-0400):


http://www.mcmelectronics.com/product/TENMA-21-8230-/21-8230 wouldn't
do it?



Possibly, that looks a lot like the one I used (handles are identical)
back in the later 90's but with different tips.


Looks like a 3-wire cord to me, and $14.99 in the current sale catalog.
--
"The wise are known for their understanding, and pleasant
words are persuasive." Proverbs 16:21 (New Living Translation)

 Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata  ***  http://fm.no-ip.com/
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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Gene Heskett 
On Friday 25 March 2016 13:23:52 Felix Miata wrote:

> Gene Heskett composed on 2016-03-25 09:29 (UTC-0400):
> > the U.S. industry, since General Cement is gone, cannot sell me a
> > tweezer-like soldering iron needed to remove them so fresh ones can
> > be put in their place.  And even the GC iron sold 20+ years ago had
> > to be run on a powerstat set for as low as 60 volts else it ran so
> > hot it destroyed the board.
>
> http://www.mcmelectronics.com/product/TENMA-21-8230-/21-8230 wouldn't
> do it?

Possibly, that looks a lot like the one I used (handles are identical) 
back in the later 90's but with different tips.  Two problems, the major 
one being that it STILL has a 2 wire line cord, so no static grounding 
and the heater barrels are some sort of metal that isn't conducive to 
making a good electrical ground connection to, and it needs to be run on 
a small powerstat so you can turn the voltage down to the 60-65 range 
otherwise its way the hell and gone too hot 4 or 5 minutes after you 
turn it on, and when doing the caps in a DVC-pro vcr, it will be on for 
at least 6 hours of the working day.  Even then, I found it hot enough 
to cause the pencil eraser sized caps to explode as I was removing them.  
The copper tips are always annealed and very easily bend as you compress 
that spring to bring the tips to a spacing suitable for warming both 
side contacts, and that 20 thousandths of bend puts the tips in full 
contact with the sides of the caps & they pop about like Orville 
Redenbauchers finest.

But as usual, it was the best we had at the time, so when in Rome...

Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page 
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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Felix Miata 

Gene Heskett composed on 2016-03-25 09:29 (UTC-0400):


the U.S. industry, since General Cement is gone, cannot sell me a
tweezer-like soldering iron needed to remove them so fresh ones can be
put in their place.  And even the GC iron sold 20+ years ago had to be
run on a powerstat set for as low as 60 volts else it ran so hot it
destroyed the board.



http://www.mcmelectronics.com/product/TENMA-21-8230-/21-8230 wouldn't do it?
--
"The wise are known for their understanding, and pleasant
words are persuasive." Proverbs 16:21 (New Living Translation)

 Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata  ***  http://fm.no-ip.com/
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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Gene Heskett 
On Friday 25 March 2016 07:19:44 Andreas Mohr wrote:

> Hi,
>
> On Fri, Mar 25, 2016 at 11:03:36AM +0100, martin f krafft wrote:
> > Hi Andreas,
> >
> > Thank you for taking your time to reply. I've since followed up
> > having found the problem, and I think it must be one of the DP ports
> > on the graphics card.
>
> Ooook.
>
> > Now, you write:
> > > Perhaps unthinkable, but the connectors of the card might be
> > > implemented / wired up asymmetrically, e.g. due to an ickily
> > > varying length of traces, or EMI issues.
> >
> > This leads me to believe that the connector hardware itself could be
> > at fault. Seriously, is DP *that* finicky and subject to connection
> > failures? I'd have thought that it being 2016, the industry would
> > have finally gotten the hang of it, especially after screwing up
> > HDMI so badly.
>
> Hmm, I was writing that focussing on PCB-side implementation etc.,
> but of course mechanical connection issues (including soldering
> issues) likely are more dominant (when doing failure diagnosis,
> one likely should focus on more "mechanical" / electro-physical parts
> such as connectors, fuses, capacitors, transformers, ... initially,
> since these are much more prone to failure
> due to their inherent wear and tear - movement, thermo-related etc.).
>
>
> Nice to hear that this seems nailed now.
>
> Andreas Mohr

Speaking as a Certified Electronics Technician, which I am, I can often 
refine the mechanical part, not to a flaky connector, although its 
possible, but far more often it will be found to be a surface mounted 
low voltage electrolytic capacitor that has failed by loss of an 
internal connection.  Overall, the failure rate of those is 100x that of 
any other part on the average PCB. The failure mechanism is a high 
Equivalent Series Resistance, and it takes a meter designed to read this 
ESR, to find the problem, something 99.9% of the digital meters today do 
not have as its a completely different circuit that measures it.  
Special meters that do measure it can be had even as a kit you build, 
but the best of the lot is the Capacitor Wizard, at about $200 USD a 
copy.

Worse, the U.S. industry, since General Cement is gone, cannot sell me a 
tweezer-like soldering iron needed to remove them so fresh ones can be 
put in their place.  And even the GC iron sold 20+ years ago had to be 
run on a powerstat set for as low as 60 volts else it ran so hot it 
destroyed the board.

That is why so much of our electronics is now a one shot deal, plug it in 
and use it till it fails, and when it fails, go to the store and get 
another to plug into that function/position.  No repair is possible at a 
cost that makes repairing it feasable.  Toss in that such people are a 
dying breed and are not being replaced by the younger generation. I did 
do that, since 1949 for a living, but now at 81, my hands are losing the 
steadiness needed.

Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page 
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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Andreas Mohr 
Hi,

On Fri, Mar 25, 2016 at 11:03:36AM +0100, martin f krafft wrote:
> Hi Andreas,
> 
> Thank you for taking your time to reply. I've since followed up
> having found the problem, and I think it must be one of the DP ports
> on the graphics card.

Ooook.

> Now, you write:
> 
> > Perhaps unthinkable, but the connectors of the card might be
> > implemented / wired up asymmetrically, e.g. due to an ickily
> > varying length of traces, or EMI issues.
> 
> This leads me to believe that the connector hardware itself could be
> at fault. Seriously, is DP *that* finicky and subject to connection
> failures? I'd have thought that it being 2016, the industry would
> have finally gotten the hang of it, especially after screwing up
> HDMI so badly.

Hmm, I was writing that focussing on PCB-side implementation etc.,
but of course mechanical connection issues (including soldering issues)
likely are more dominant (when doing failure diagnosis,
one likely should focus on more "mechanical" / electro-physical parts
such as connectors, fuses, capacitors, transformers, ... initially,
since these are much more prone to failure
due to their inherent wear and tear - movement, thermo-related etc.).


Nice to hear that this seems nailed now.

Andreas Mohr
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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread martin f krafft 
Hi Andreas,

Thank you for taking your time to reply. I've since followed up
having found the problem, and I think it must be one of the DP ports
on the graphics card.

Now, you write:

> Perhaps unthinkable, but the connectors of the card might be
> implemented / wired up asymmetrically, e.g. due to an ickily
> varying length of traces, or EMI issues.

This leads me to believe that the connector hardware itself could be
at fault. Seriously, is DP *that* finicky and subject to connection
failures? I'd have thought that it being 2016, the industry would
have finally gotten the hang of it, especially after screwing up
HDMI so badly.

Thanks,

-- 
@martinkrafft | http://madduck.net/ | http://two.sentenc.es/
 
"never eat more than you can lift."
   -- miss piggy
 
spamtraps: madduck.bo...@madduck.net


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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Łukasz Maśko 
Dnia piątek, 25 marca 2016 10:22:41 Andreas Mohr pisze:
> On Thu, Mar 24, 2016 at 11:18:01AM +, xorg-requ...@lists.x.org wrote:
> > Date: Thu, 24 Mar 2016 12:12:34 +0100
> > From: martin f krafft 
> > There is something very weird going on, which you may witness in the
> > video downloadable here:
> > http://scratch.madduck.net/xorg-display-flicker.mp4 (8Mb)
> > 
> > The left-most display (DP0) keeps turning off and on (or resets
> > itself), and generally, it flickers and the pixels jiggle around.
> > The other two displays are perfectly fine. The monitor on DP1 is of
> > exactly the same make as that on DP0.
> 
> While it wasn't explicitly written,
> let me just assume that you did try
> actively connector/cable-swapping those "exactly the same make" monitors,
> with identical results.

I don't know how about Martin, but in my case it is the internal laptop screen 
which is flickering (very rarely, but it does). So it is not the matter of 
cables. In both cases (mine and Martin's) it affects the first, main screen 
(DP0 / eDP1).
-- 
Łukasz Maśko_o)
Lukasz.Masko(at)ipipan.waw.pl   /\\
Registered Linux User #61028   _\_V
Ubuntu: staroafrykańskie słowo oznaczające "Nie umiem zainstalować Debiana"

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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-25 Thread Andreas Mohr 
On Thu, Mar 24, 2016 at 11:18:01AM +, xorg-requ...@lists.x.org wrote:
> Date: Thu, 24 Mar 2016 12:12:34 +0100
> From: martin f krafft 
> There is something very weird going on, which you may witness in the
> video downloadable here:
> http://scratch.madduck.net/xorg-display-flicker.mp4 (8Mb)
> 
> The left-most display (DP0) keeps turning off and on (or resets
> itself), and generally, it flickers and the pixels jiggle around.
> The other two displays are perfectly fine. The monitor on DP1 is of
> exactly the same make as that on DP0.

While it wasn't explicitly written,
let me just assume that you did try
actively connector/cable-swapping those "exactly the same make" monitors,
with identical results.


> Do you have any idea what might be going on? Why would the left-most
> display of three, all connected to the same card, act up, while the
> other two are just fine and stable?

Perhaps unthinkable, but the connectors of the card
might be implemented / wired up asymmetrically,
e.g. due to an ickily varying length of traces, or EMI issues.

(more esoteric option:) Try swapping plug (thus, wires) of power cord -
there are cases known
where having the live wire of the cord be the *other* one
will avoid/reduce EMI issues.




Another idea might be relocating completely
i.e. re-constructing the whole test set
at a sufficiently/entirely different location,
to see whether there is a weird location dependence.




So, I guess the actions I mentioned
mainly serve to figure out the separation of
whether it is a setup-/environment-related weirdness, or
whether it is a driver implementation/configuration issue in fact.

HTH,

Andreas Mohr
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Re: Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-24 Thread Łukasz Maśko 
Dnia czwartek, 24 marca 2016 12:12:34 martin f krafft pisze:
> Hello,
> 
> I have a new Radeon R9 390 card, driving three monitors, two on
> DisplayPort and one on DVI, in this order from left to right:
[...]

Wow! I mean, great - I'm not the only one to spot such weird behavior. In my 
case, I observed pretty weird screen flickers, also with the main screen. But 
in my case, it's about Intel HD graphics 5500. The main screen eDP1 is the 
FullHD interlan dislay, while external DP1 was FullHD Samsung SyncMaster 2270.
I oserved it twice. At the first time, it disapeared after I switched off the 
external display with xrandr (after restoring it, the flicker did not reappea. 
Second time was just today, but it just settled after few seconds and few 
mouse movements. I don't understand it.
-- 
Łukasz Maśko_o)
Lukasz.Masko(at)ipipan.waw.pl   /\\
Registered Linux User #61028   _\_V
Ubuntu: staroafrykańskie słowo oznaczające "Nie umiem zainstalować Debiana"

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Flickering single display in multi-head XRandR setup

2016-03-24 Thread martin f krafft 
Hello,

I have a new Radeon R9 390 card, driving three monitors, two on
DisplayPort and one on DVI, in this order from left to right:

  DP0 — DVI0 — DP1

Please find my xorg.conf attached, as well as the log file.

There is something very weird going on, which you may witness in the
video downloadable here:
http://scratch.madduck.net/xorg-display-flicker.mp4 (8Mb)

The left-most display (DP0) keeps turning off and on (or resets
itself), and generally, it flickers and the pixels jiggle around.
The other two displays are perfectly fine. The monitor on DP1 is of
exactly the same make as that on DP0.

Do you have any idea what might be going on? Why would the left-most
display of three, all connected to the same card, act up, while the
other two are just fine and stable?

What could be done to diagnose and fix this?

Here is the relevant xrandr output:

  % xrandr | grep -A2 '\http://madduck.net/ | http://two.sentenc.es/
 
perl -e 'print "The earth is a disk!\n" if ( "a" == "b" );'
   (dedicated to nori)
 
spamtraps: madduck.bo...@madduck.net
# /etc/X11/xorg.conf (xorg X Window System server configuration file)

Section "Files"
ModulePath  "/usr/local/lib/xorg/modules,/usr/lib/xorg/modules"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
  # Left monitor, DisplayPort-0
Identifier  "Samsung S22E650 [0]"
Option  "PreferredMode" "1920x1080"
Option  "Enable" "true"
Option  "LeftOf" "DVI-0"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
  # Middle monitor, DVI-0
Identifier  "Samsung SyncMaster 2343BW"
Option  "PreferredMode" "2048x1152"
Option  "Enable" "true"
Option  "Primary" "true"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
  # Right monitor, DisplayPort-1
Identifier  "Samsung S22E650 [1]"
Option  "PreferredMode" "1920x1080"
Option  "Enable" "true"
Option  "RightOf" "DVI-0"
EndSection

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier  "Triple-Head"
EndSection

Section "ServerFlags"
Option  "DontZap" "yes"
Option  "AllowDeactivateGrabs" "yes"
Option  "AllowClosedownGrabs" "yes"
EndSection

Section "Extensions"
Option  "Composite" "Enable"
Option  "RENDER" "true"
Option  "DAMAGE" "true"
EndSection
[  7417.378] 
X.Org X Server 1.18.2
Release Date: 2016-03-11
[  7417.378] X Protocol Version 11, Revision 0
[  7417.378] Build Operating System: Linux 3.16.0-4-amd64 x86_64 Debian
[  7417.378] Current Operating System: Linux albatross 4.4.0-1-amd64 #1 SMP 
Debian 4.4.6-1 (2016-03-17) x86_64
[  7417.378] Kernel command line: BOOT_IMAGE=/vmlinuz-4.4.0-1-amd64 
root=/dev/mapper/albatross_ssd-root ro quiet
[  7417.378] Build Date: 22 March 2016  08:14:16AM
[  7417.378] xorg-server 2:1.18.2-2 (http://www.debian.org/support) 
[  7417.378] Current version of pixman: 0.33.6
[  7417.378]Before reporting problems, check http://wiki.x.org
to make sure that you have the latest version.
[  7417.378] Markers: (--) probed, (**) from config file, (==) default setting,
(++) from command line, (!!) notice, (II) informational,
(WW) warning, (EE) error, (NI) not implemented, (??) unknown.
[  7417.378] (==) Log file: "/var/log/Xorg.0.log", Time: Thu Mar 24 12:00:04 
2016
[  7417.378] (==) Using config file: "/etc/X11/xorg.conf"
[  7417.378] (==) Using system config directory "/usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d"
[  7417.379] (==) ServerLayout "Triple-Head"
[  7417.379] (==) No screen section available. Using defaults.
[  7417.379] (**) |-->Screen "Default Screen Section" (0)
[  7417.379] (**) |   |-->Monitor ""
[  7417.379] (==) No device specified for screen "Default Screen Section".
Using the first device section listed.
[  7417.379] (**) |   |-->Device "Radeon R9 290 [DP0]"
[  7417.379] (==) No monitor specified for screen "Default Screen Section".
Using a default monitor configuration.
[  7417.379] (**) Option "DontZap" "yes"
[  7417.379] (==) Automatically adding devices
[  7417.379] (==) Automatically enabling devices
[  7417.379] (==) Automatically adding GPU devices
[  7417.379] (==) Max clients allowed: 256, resource mask: 0x1f
[  7417.379] (WW) The directory "/usr/share/fonts/X11/cyrillic" does not exist.
[  7417.379]Entry deleted from font path.
[  7417.379] (==) FontPath set to:
/usr/share/fonts/X11/misc,
/usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi/:unscaled,
/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi/:unscaled,
/usr/share/fonts/X11/Type1,
/usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi,
/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi,
built-ins
[  7417.379] (**) ModulePath set to 
"/usr/local/lib/xorg/modules,/usr/lib/xorg/modules"
[  7417.379] (**) Extension "Composite" is enabled
[  7417.379] (**) Extension "RENDER" is enabled
[  7417.379] (**) Extension "DAMAGE" is enabled
[  7417.379] (II) The server relies on udev to provide the list of input 
devices.
If no devices become available, reco