Comments on: How do I setup dual monitors in Windows Vista?

By: Mikey

Mikey — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 14:02:59 +0000

Hi, This may be a dumb question, but with a dual screen configuration, is there a way to stop dialog boxes popping up in the centre of the virtual desktop, ie half on one screen & half on the other?

By: Joey

Joey — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 20:19:58 +0000

I have a laptop that the screen does not work, and I have to do a wipe and reload. I have plugged in my secondary monitor and am unable to start the process. Could someone please help me figure this out asap?

By: Karen

Karen — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 03:32:57 +0000

I’ve never done this before, so maybe, this isn’t the correct forum. My grandson was trying to get dual monitoring going, and went into setup. He clicked synchronize, before noticing that he should have loaded something from the Samsung disk. Now, neither monitor will show anything. He has Vista, a gift system, and we don’t have the Vista discs. Some of the guys at work said to start the system and hit f2 or f11. The system is just not responding. I told him to disconnect the new monitor and try again. Still nothing. Any ideas? I didn’t witness what he did, I was rebuilding my system which had a hard drive die. I’m sick to death of computers!

By: Kevin Souter

Kevin Souter — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 05:22:26 +0000

It should work.. Kinda. If you use a Y splitter then the output will be identical on both screens, which means that both screens would also be at the same resolution. Because of this, you'd have to use a resolution that both your TV and your monitor support. There'd be no way to configure each individually. I'd just go purchase a cheap video card somewhere and install that if your computer doesn't already have another DVI or DSub output available. You can pick on up for around $35, and a lot of nVidia cards have multiple outputs on them already. Be sure to check whether you'd need to get an old PCI or AGP card, or a PCI-E x1/PCI-E x16. Amazon has them for pretty cheap: PCI Video Cards AGP Video Cards PCI-E Video Cards

By: Brian

Brian — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 23:15:55 +0000

Hi, I currently have my pc hooked up to my 35″ lcd tv. I have found that while it is great for gaming (the two games I do play that is,) it’s a little difficult for reading blogs and casual surfing. I am wondering if I can get a vga y splitter and hook up the regular 17″ monitor that came with the computer for the close up stuff and keep the tv for the game or anything else I may want to move to the bigger monitor. Will this work? Oh, yes my compter is using vista

By: Richet

Richet — Fri, 28 Jan 2011 01:55:45 +0000

i have two diff monitors setup on Vista, using a splitter and endup updating ATI graphics drivers as well, no luck. can seem to figure what is wrong or am i missing something. what do you recommend?

By: John

John — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 13:16:39 +0000

I have Vista Business SP2 with latest patches installed. When I try to setup dual monitor with two Acer G195HHQL monitors , My system does not recognise both as Acer G195H, It recognises one as ACER and the other as Generic Non PnP monitor. ( I have nvidia GEForce 7300 LE card with quadcore, 2GB as hardware).

what should I do to make the system recognise both as Acer monitors?

By: Sootah

Sootah — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 21:27:39 +0000

@Mike – You may be able to use you nVidia 9400 to drive one display and then your motherboard’s integrated graphics controller to drive the other.

The biggest IF in the statement is whether or not your BIOS insists on the integrated graphics being disabled when a third-party graphics card is installed. I personally have set up many dual head systems this way (Many MANY times while as a network admin at an internet marketing coaching company).

The easiest way to tell if you can do this is to simply go into your device manager and see if more than one graphics adapter enabled. Here is an example of this in my setup on Windows 7:

If this is the case, then just plug another monitor into your integrated graphics DSUB or DVI port and then see if you can extend the desktop onto that display in the Windows display settings.

By: Sootah

Sootah — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 21:06:32 +0000

Here is a better lit picture of my previous triple head display – showing the dual Samsung 216BW displays, as well as the Samsung 46″ LN46A750 Television.

I used this setup for quite some time, including after I upgraded to Windows 7 (which I am a big fan of, by the way). At the moment we are looking at having Vizio send us one of their XVT472SV 42″ TrueLED dynamic back-lit televisions to review. After figuring out which displays we get in have the best display quality then it will get used as my third head again. I miss having triple displays.. :)

You’d be surprised at just how helpful it is to have that when you’re doing web application programming. You can have Visual Studio, Adobe Dreamweaver, Eclipse, or whatever open on one monitor; some coding references or a web browser open on your secondary monitor; and then the various FTP and other misc. tools up on the third. For some reason I utterly loath having to tab through open applications. I’d MUCH rather have them all visible and accessible that way.

By: James

James — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 15:53:42 +0000

I recently upgraded from XP media Center to Vista Ultimate, my dual monitor setup worked fine on XP but for some reason Vista Ultimate will not rgister two monitors and every time i do updates it switches my monitors, lol conspiracy??? HELP!!!