2 monitors

[Saber]

Just curious here - my setup is :
Main machine: athelon 850, 192mg, voodoo 3/300 pci, Win 98se.

I have a LG 17" monitor on the main machine, and a HP LCD 15" on a backup machine. I have a spare 15" standard monitor doing nothing, and was contemplating getting another video card and putting the LCD screen on my main machine as a second monitor.

How does this actually work - in that I mean, do you see an extended desktop, or two desktop's??? I play games now and again, and would like to use the standard 17" for games - what happens to the LCD screen while I play games on the 17".

Any advise would be appreciated as I know nothing about setting 2 monitors on a single machine, but am 'wasting' a £800 monitor on one of my backup machines. I dont even look at the monitors on the rest of the network - I use PC Anywhere to control all of them.

Regards,

Saber

[ShadowKing]

You plug in the secondary monitor, and you can move your mouse off of the "edge" of the first one, directly onto the second one. When you maximize a window it grows to fill one whole screen. You only have one taskbar, on the primary display. If the game does not support dual monitors, then it just shows up on the primary one, and the other one goes blank. Some games support dual monitors; I know MS Flight Sim 2000 does, but I can't remember any others right now.

[Saber]

Sounds good so far - how do I go about setting this up - do I need a similar video card as the voodoo, or can I put a lower spec one in; how do I set the 2 monitors once I put a second video card in ???

[shadow1]

Doesn't matter about brands or specs. Once installed go into display andconfigure your dual setup.

[Archer]

There is a list on the microsoft site of compatable graphics cards,not all work.
as I`ve mentioned in another post there is a new dual monitor card coming on the market that has its own configuration software.This system overcomes the present limitations of dual monitors at present which only work on games or apps that are written specifically for this,unless you do a lot of reconfiguring yourself.

[Sowulo]

I haven't tried for a while but most of the games I ever tried to load would not run on my dual monitor setup.

[Saber]

When you say the games wouldnt run on a duel monitor setup, does that mean they wouldnt run at all, or would display on only your primary monitor ????

[Sowulo]

Originally posted by Saber:
When you say the games wouldnt run on a duel monitor setup, does that mean they wouldnt run at all, or would display on only your primary monitor ????

Several were games my son brought over to try after I had problems so I don't remember what they were. Two that I do remember trying were a South Park Game, and MS Baseball 2000. They each only came up on the primary (I expected that) but they both came up about 1/3 off center and wouldn't adjust. Some components of their screens and menus wouldn't display at all or were corrupt. I contacted both manufacturers and was informed by each that their programs would not run unless I removed one of my video cards/monitors.

[Knucklehead]

Dual monitors are great for photo work, spreadsheets, and generally as a place to move tools and applications out of the way. According to MS, it does not support multimedia, and that is my experience. You need one AGP and one PCI video card, and as Andi suggested, they should be on the MS compatibility list, although others may work. Get your primary card working correctly with the latest drivers and install the second card. Windows should detect it and install the appropriate drivers. You can enable the second monitor in Display, Settings and make all the approprate adjustments independently of the other monitor, plus set up the location so your mouse actions run smoothly between them. Run all the DirectX tests on both cards. I had to disable AGP Fast Write in the BIOS to get everything to work (cheap second card). I simply disable the second display in Setting when the kids are gaming as it wasn't compatible with some games, but it is very useful and the best thing one can do with an old monitor.

[Damned Angel]

Here is another post about games that run across 2 monitors.

[Saber]

Thanks for the help and advise - looks like I need to go shopping for a new AGP card on Monday (Jetway Ge-Force MX 32mb). I wanted to get a new card anyway, so at least I will still have a use for the voodoo.

Does the AGP card always boot as the primary adapter ???

Again, thanks for all the help.

Saber

[Sowulo]

Originally posted by Saber:
Does the AGP card always boot as the primary adapter ???

Although it doesn't always work right, most motherboards have a BIOS setting which lets you decide whether AGP or PCI will be the primary video. Note: An ATI All-in-Wonder card must be the primary device in order for the TV tuner to work.

Now if only I could have a different background shot on each monitor....sigh...

[Archer]

Found the article I was reffering to its in the English version of PCPLUS and refers to the dual monitor ATI RADEON VE at £100 sterling.Look up the specs to see if its anything like what your looking for.

[Saber]

Ok - I've looked into this a bit, and was planning to buy a JETWAY GE-FORCE MX 32MB SDR AGP on monday as my primary adapter, and use my PCI VOODOO 3/300 as my secondary adapter.

I cannot find any reference to this combination being ok or not - any idea's ????

Saber