For the last 2 years when running a DVI 60Hz monitor with a radeon HD4890 and a (native 50Hz) HDMI TV I've been able to boot/startx with the TV off and then turn TV on and -
xrandr --output DVI-0 --auto
to bring up the the TV and get a clone of monitor.
This still works with drm-core-next but not with drm-fixes (todays or from a few days ago).
With df I now loose the monitor with signal out of range when doing above, the TV output is OK. To get the monitor back I need to turn off TV, then off/auto the monitor.
xrandr --output DVI-0 --off xrandr --output DVI-1 --off xrandr --output DVI-1 --auto
The output from xrandr while the monitor is showing signal out of range looks normal.
If I boot with the TV on it works OK.