Dual monitors

Lord Nikon

Can someone tell me, is it possible to run dual monitors. One running a game, and the other for using everything else? Would they have dual startbars with same icons, or how does it work exactly?

ED E

Yes, all the streamers do that for example.

You can set where the taskbar is (Left, right, both).

timmyntc

Lord Nikon wrote: »

Can someone tell me, is it possible to run dual monitors. One running a game, and the other for using everything else? Would they have dual startbars with same icons, or how does it work exactly?

Set up so your desktop stretches across two monitors, and play the game in windowed mode, with the window taking up one monitor.

IRAC War

Dual monitor setups are not without their own - fairly minor - annoyances.

stimpson

I run dual monitors at home and in work. I find working on a single monitor setup to be very limiting asyou have to task switch all the time.

There is no problem for gaming - I just run the game full screen on one monitor. If you want to control an app on the second monitor you do need to alt-tab from the game though. I've seen my son runnig minecraft on one and youtube of someone minecrafting on the other. Go figure.

I have given consideration to a third monitor for flight sim but 3 x 24" monitors will be a squeeze on my desk. And my wife may leave me.

ShadowHearth

I ran dual or triple monitor setups for almost 10 years.
I am down to one monitor right now since I got new gpu as there is no vga on it. Will be getting second monitor in a week or two, because o just can't stand having! It's killing me!

All you need to do op is connect both of them. Right click amd go to resolutions or display monitor settings amd there you will see window with both displays marked one or two. You choose which one is your primary and which one is extenction. Main display will be your usual display what you would see on your single monitor setup, the extended one will be, well extenction of your desktop. Keep in mind to put it in that window correctly. If your second monitor on the right, then just drag that monitor to the right in that window.
So when it's done, you can throw what ever you want on second monitor. Just drag it there. Windows, browser, media player. Anything you need there and off your main screen. If you want for example play game and have movie on second monitor, then just setup in-game the be played in borderless window mode or window mode.

That's it, you will never go back to normal one monitor peasant setup.

Serephucus

Short answer: Yes, absolutely.

Longer answer: You can, but you'll find that some games really don't take being alt-tabbed too well* so it can be a little annoying.

The ideal solution is to run games in borderless-windowed mode. This lets the OS treat is a any other application within a window - When you move the mouse outside the bounds of the application, anything else you click on is immediately executed as if you'd had that window in focus from the start - but not all games support this.

Just Cause 3 and (I think) the original Crysis are examples of this. When you alt-tab, you'll find the game has jumped to a windowed mode of whatever the resolution you had it set at, with the start menu at the bottom, and the ability for your mouse to click stuff there, making it a pain whenever you look down and fire in the game.

I ran dual monitors for a while, and loved the extra space, but ergonomically it didn't suit me too well.

* which is an absolute disgrace in 2016, especially when you consider most of the devs would be running dual monitors, and if I were one of them, I'd have found a way to make it work simply so it didn't piss me off when I had to jump into a build to test something.

jem

could you use for exam[ple excel on one and have word or another program on the second screen,
Also could you have different size display on each?

Digital Solitude

Yeah, set the desktop to be extended as above, drag Excel to the top of one screen to full screen it and drag word to the top of the other for the same thing.

Not sure how to work around different resolutions and stuff though

jem

IMG_3637.JPG
Where do i connect the second monitor too.
the main one is attached to the normal port.
the connection is too small for the white one.
Please see picture of back of computer attached

stimpson

You need a DVI cable for the white port. The monitor must have a DVI port also.

If the monitor only has HDMI or VGA, you can get an adapter to make it work.