Dual Display...

youcancallmeal

Well I was thinkin of getting another lcd monitor to go with my current 19".
just wondering if many people have this kind of setup and if so what are its practical uses. I've been reading up a bit about it and so far I gather that you cant be playing a game like halflife2 on one monitor and surf the net on the other. What I havent been able to find out is how hard it hits a single graphics card for a dual display.
So anyone doing this?

SolarNexus

yeah, thats a bit of a bitch -- I've had dual setups for a while, and I can see the advantage for myself but its a real níche market:

You have to 'extend' your desktop, meaning you cant actually stretch it accross two screens (that I know of... hmm thread about that comming soon). Think of it like having two deskops, when you leave one, you enter the other -- but they're clones, so its really the same. I would love to be able to stretch the screen across both -- for games n' movies.

In games, the game locks the mouse to prevent it leaving focus of the games' window - so you cant use stuff on the other screen. You can have stuff like videos going etc (so long as the games resolution doesnt mess it all up) - just you cant interact with it.

I use it for a multitude of purposes, personally. As I've mentioned here more times than I can count, I recently bought two 'puters -one a server, the other a desktop. With a dual display, I can instantly turn the other on (after disabling the monitor in windows) to check how things are goin'.

The main use I have is research -while-programmin' I usually have the MSDN help library or a programming forum or tutorial or something open in one window while I've got my programming environment on the other (very very useful). Additionally, I occasionally attach the second monitor the the laptop to play a game.

I think unless you've got some sort of 'production' environment going like myself, its really really hard to warrent the investment. I'm trying to think of the reasons a 'normal' person would want or need one and I'm seriously comming up short.

youcancallmeal

SolarNexus wrote:

I think unless you've got some sort of 'production' environment going like myself, its really really hard to warrent the investment. I'm trying to think of the reasons a 'normal' person would want or need one and I'm seriously comming up short.

Well for one it looks cool

These are few of things I had in mind for a dual display
- Watching movies while surfing the web.
- Playing games and having diagnostic tools open on the other screen, this way I can monitor system performance(cpu/gpu temp, fan speeds etc)
- Like you said yourself programming in one window and looking at online research material in the other.
- Maybe in the future getting a Tv tuner card so that I can watch tv on one monitor and work on the other

Thats all I can think of for now, but I not even sure if half the stuff I mentioned is possible?
Whats your setup anyway?

SolarNexus

I've got x2 AG Neovo 19" TFT's attached via dual DVI to a Club 3D X800RX 256MB. Really beatiful screens, actually -- great value for money.

you might have problems with getting tv on the secondary monitor (at least with hauppauge -- just shows a pink screen IIRC). everything else is fine, just so long as you dont expect to be able to use the mouse while in a game (alt-tab works fine, though... usually)

youcancallmeal

SolarNexus wrote:

I've got x2 AG Neovo 19" TFT's attached via dual DVI to a Club 3D X800RX 256MB. Really beatiful screens, actually -- great value for money.

you might have problems with getting tv on the secondary monitor (at least with hauppauge -- just shows a pink screen IIRC). everything else is fine, just so long as you dont expect to be able to use the mouse while in a game (alt-tab works fine, though... usually)

Sounds like a nice setup you've got, any pics.
The tv tuner idea is just a vague ambition on my behalf so I wouldnt be to worried about that anyway.
Are you using any software like ultramon?

masteroftherealm

youcancallme>al wrote:

Well for one it looks cool

These are few of things I had in mind for a dual display
- Watching movies while surfing the web.
- Playing games and having diagnostic tools open on the other screen, this way I can monitor system performance(cpu/gpu temp, fan speeds etc)
- Like you said yourself programming in one window and looking at online research material in the other.
- Maybe in the future getting a Tv tuner card so that I can watch tv on one monitor and work on the other

Thats all I can think of for now, but I not even sure if half the stuff I mentioned is possible?
Whats your setup anyway?

Exactly what I used to use my olf dualys for. Tis a huge difference. Cant wai till I get the cash for my second 19" BenQ.

SolarNexus

youcancallme>al wrote:

Sounds like a nice setup you've got, any pics.
The tv tuner idea is just a vague ambition on my behalf so I wouldnt be to worried about that anyway.
Are you using any software like ultramon?

I'm still busy configuring the system/network - when everything is done, and I've polished the glass desk I'll be posting pics (and a link in my sig).

just about an hour ago I installed ultramon -- just so I can fiddle about with the wallpaper, probably will uninstall before the trial is over :rolleyes: 'tis good but not worth the price tag.

stevenmu

SolarNexus wrote:

you might have problems with getting tv on the secondary monitor (at least with hauppauge -- just shows a pink screen IIRC). everything else is fine, just so long as you dont expect to be able to use the mouse while in a game (alt-tab works fine, though... usually)

That's probably something to do with it using 'overlay' to display video. I've had similar problems, altough not with hauppage so I'm not sure if it's the same. I can't remember exactly how I solved it, but it just took a few minutes of fiddling with the overlay and screen settings in the nVidia drivers.

melekalikimaka

i have duel monitors, great lil thing, media player in one window, everything else in the other, i use a 21"crt as my second, i find it better quality for video than lcd, they're too blocky for my liking

SolarNexus

melekalikimaka wrote:

i have duel monitors, great lil thing, media player in one window, everything else in the other, i use a 21"crt as my second, i find it better quality for video than lcd, they're too blocky for my liking

quality wise, CRT is miles ahead of TFT... but my god are they big. I have a 19" CRT and its about two feet deep; I'd worry about where to put something THAT big now.

ShiverinEskimo

hehe - try two 22" CRTs: www.shiverineskimo.com/images/NewDualScreenComputer.JPG

I love having dual desktop. You can have it cloned, spanning both or dual desktop (I use the latter). I love it. Web on one and all my messaging on the other or Civ 4 on one and my desktop on the other. Any nVidia dual output card will be ideal - nView handles every type of dual setup you can think of.

youcancallmeal

ShiverinEskimo wrote:

hehe - try two 22" CRTs: www.shiverineskimo.com/images/NewDualScreenComputer.JPG

I love having dual desktop. You can have it cloned, spanning both or dual desktop (I use the latter). I love it. Web on one and all my messaging on the other or Civ 4 on one and my desktop on the other. Any nVidia dual output card will be ideal - nView handles every type of dual setup you can think of.

Nice, hope that desk is reinforced to take the weight of two crt's
Yea I'm getting a Dual Dvi 7800gt so I should be well sorted.

ShiverinEskimo

Thats exactly what I have. Bugger all slow down when running a game without turning dual view off - except maybe for games like fear.

maidhc

If you are actually planning on doing work a dual setup is ideal for

HTML/PHP/PERL etc - code one screen, browser the other

Research - MS Word etc one screen, browser the other

Normal "Work" - Outlook in one screen, "work" on the other

I use a FX5200 driving 2 19" CRTs. It works perfect for what I do.

DemonOfTheFall

Haha, good luck with getting a dual display setup to work nicely with an ATI card. Absolute nightmare.

Not saying it's that much easier to get everything working exactly like you want on an nvidia card, but it's sure as hell easier than doing it on an ati card.

masteroftherealm

DemonOfTheFall wrote:

Haha, good luck with getting a dual display setup to work nicely with an ATI card. Absolute nightmare.

Not saying it's that much easier to get everything working exactly like you want on an nvidia card, but it's sure as hell easier than doing it on an ati card.

scairly enough. real easy on the low end cards, a mess on the high end!

DemonOfTheFall

I had an awful time with TV-out on a PCI 8500, also terrible with 2x VGA on an x800XT.

I use VGA and DVI on my 6800GT with very little problems, other than having to change which is the primary display to get games to fullscreen on the chosen display. No big deal though really.

TempestSabre

I use Dual screens a lot at work. Never had any problems extending my desktop or applications across both screens. I use Ultramon. I never had a problem with ATI or Nvidia or Matrox cards. Never tried TV on it though.

For work use dual screen is brilliant, I find it hard to go back to a single screen at home.

thetourist

i use 2 screens for audio recording and mixing - the main program window in one screen and the plugins etc in the other - or else i can have an audio editor open while i can see whats going on in the main program - gives a sense of not loosing focus - which is important for recording - you need to be concentrating on the main job and even have it in the background when you are doing other work

i also use it for web programing - have the ftp program open in one monitor and the editor in another

it's also handy for graphics like photoshop or quark where you're moving stuff between programs

didnt have any hassle setting it up - ati raedon ( cheap one - €55 )

i turn it on with desktop properties - extend my desktop to this monitor