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Forums -> Multiple monitors -> Cannot get dual monitors working - help please :-)
Quentin   2007-01-11 09:22
Greetings all,

I am having a problem getting dual-view monitors to work on my PC. I've used two monitors before and know how it works, but cannot get it to work here, so after several hours of wasted time, I hope someone here can help me.
I suspect it's the PC, maybe a Chipset issue?

The basic fault:
===========
Both monitors show the SAME, always, regardless of whether I set DualView or Span (i.e. twin monitors are detected, nVidia Wizard detects two and allows me to setup DualView or Span as normal, but I never see anything apart from CLONE.)

The system:
=========
CPU: P4 3GHz mPGA-478
MB: Epox EP-4PDA5+ (Springdale-PE)
Chipset: Intel i865P/PE/G/i848P
SouthB: Intel 82801DB(ICH4)
BIOS: Phoenix Vers 6.00PG 3/30/2004
AGP: Vers3 8x, aperture 128MB, Sideband enabled
RAM: 1GB DDR 200MHz (800MHz)
Initdisplay: AGP first

The Video cards :
=============
I have tried 3 different cards:
1. Old GeForce3 Ti200
2. Old FX5700LE
3. New FX5200
No joy with any of them.

The Monitors
==========
1. BenQ FP737s 17" LCD 1280x1024 VGA
2. Acer 77c 17" CRT (detects as Acer77c Plug and Play monitor)
3. Diamond View 17" 1772ie CRT (detects as Analog monitor)
I have tried using the two CRTs, and the BenQ with each CRT - no joy.

Drivers
=====
I have tried several methods :
1. Plain windows auto detect allow online - no drivers found.
2. The CD that came with the FX5200 on auto-detect - drivers found, installed - fault as above.
3. The CD that came with the FX5200 using Install Drivers option - fault as above.
4. Latest nVidia drivers 93.71

Issues :
======
Along the way, I have found several odd issues that may be relevant :
1. Plugging in the 2nd monitor makes the 1st go DARKER ? (I don't recall that was normal)
2. The nVidia drivers kept having a "Cannot find the file XXX.dl_" (e.g. nvcpl.dl_) yet it's right there on the disk - a retry or 5 will eventually succeed. This happened on both the CD drivers and the HD downloaded from nVidia !? The PC does not appear to have any faults apart from that single odd issue (been using it for months, no problems, HW scans all OK.) After I put back the original MX440, and ran the downloaded drivers again, I got that fault again, but then after downloading 93.71 again to a different drive, it worked without that issue.

One of the oddest problems I have seen ...
Any help appreciated.

Quentin
Quentin   2007-01-11 14:01
Also :
Windows XP Professional Version 2002 SP2 fully updated.

Q.
David DeRolph   2007-01-15 05:22
All the cards you're talking about are AGP, right? My hunch is, if you want to use one of them as your primary card, you're going to have better luck running two monitors in non-clone fashion by getting a PCI card for the second monitor.

Or, get an AGP card known to support two monitors. I have a nVidia GeForce4 Ti4200 AGP card with VGA and DVI outputs. By using a DVI-to-VGA adapter, I can run two CRT monitors with it with full separate desktop functionality, not cloning.
David DeRolph   2007-01-15 05:38
Some additional info, from http://realtimesoft.com/multimon/faq.asp#MaxMon:

"Nvidia dualhead cards:

Dualhead is only supported by some GeForce2 MX, GeForce4 MX and GeForce4 Ti cards. Other Nvidia cards (for example GeForce3) do not support dualhead.

Additional points to consider when looking for an Nvidia card that supports 2 monitors/LCD flat panels:

* some cards are advertised as nView or TwinView capable, but only support a TV as secondary display. These cards usually have a single VGA port and TV-out
* some cards have both a VGA and a DVI connector, but don't support use of both connectors at the same time
* some cards have a DVI-D (digital only) connector instead of DVI-I (digital/analog), which means that a DVI-to-VGA converter will not work"
Forums -> Multiple monitors -> Cannot get dual monitors working - help please :-)

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