[CZ Eddie]

Both of my eVga 8600GT's are not working out here. So I'm looking to stay away from nVidia right now.


I have a 24" widescreen CRT monitor (Sony GDM-FW9010) with VGA and DVI-I inputs.


I also have a digital projector with HDMI inputs.


I'd like to have both displays show the same thing at the same time. "Clone View", basically. So two desktops, two taskbars, etc etc.


BUT.... I need to be able to configure each display independently from each other. Because I want the Sony CRT at an oddball resolution/refresh rate and the digital projector at a solid 1280x720/60.


The nVidia 8XXX series won't do this for me. It won't even display 1280x720/60 on my AE700 (known issue, see the forums).


What do you guys recommend? Is it time to buy ATI again? I haven't had ATI in about seven years.


BUDGET: $80 to $140.

 

[Billped]

I didn't think any card could clone at different resolutions.

 

[CZ Eddie]



Quote:
Originally Posted by Billped /forum/post/12942294


I didn't think any card could clone at different resolutions.

Found one!!

Well I found it locally. I just need to see if the guy still has it for sale or not. It's an ATI Radeon X1900 XT 512MB PCIe x16. And this quote below is from the details of it:

Quote:
Drive two displays simultaneously with independent resolutions and refresh rates

 

[walford]

Your quote does not include the statment that it can be done in clone mode. Of course it can be done in extended desktop mode, and if it does you need to make sure one of the displays is not an 480i S-Video display since then the claim may be misleading.

 

[CZ Eddie]



Quote:
Originally Posted by walford /forum/post/12942852


Your quote does not include the statment that it can be done in clone mode. Of course it can be done in extended desktop mode, and if it does you need to make sure one of the displays is not an 480i S-Video display since then the claim may be misleading.

You were right. It does it in extended desktop mode only. Not in Clone mode.

At least I'm now able to view 1280x720 on my projector via HDMI now. The nVidia 8600GT wouldn't do that for me.


But I'm not overly happy yet. The ATI driver installation wasn't that great. The first install crashed so I had to re-install all over again. Also, the Catalyst software isn't anymore user-friendly than nVidia's was.


And I had MASSIVE combing right out of the box. I had to do some searching on the net to figure out how to get rid of it. There are still some odd artifacts though. And the image just isn't as clean as it was on the 8600GT. Not a huge difference though. Just slightly noticeable.


Maybe I'll look into whether I can run two video cards at the same time. One for each display.

 

[walford]

AFAIK with MCE if you have 2 video cards they must use the same driver so 2 Nvidia cards or 2 ATI cards.

 

[CZ Eddie]

walford, you were right. Though I assumed as much from the start, after reading your post I decided to at least try it. The Operating System did in fact disable the 2nd video card. Oh, it installed drivers for it on bootup for the first time, but the control panel never showed up nor would I get any video no matter the resolution.


So I then took my two nVidia 8600GT cards and put them both in. And sure enough it worked. But NOT like I'd hoped. In this configuration, the ability to "clone" your desktop is removed. You can only extend your desktop.

So I said the heck with it all and I formatted & re-installed the OS and I am using only the ATI right now. I'm unable to get different resolutions in cloning still, but this time it came up without any tearing at all and the video looks a bit better than last time when I installed it on top of the nVidia drivers.


I'll keep an eye out for another solution though. One that gives me cloning AND the ability for seperate resolutions!

 

[jvincent]



Quote:
Originally Posted by CZ Eddie /forum/post/12995667


I'll keep an eye out for another solution though. One that gives me cloning AND the ability for seperate resolutions!

I think you'll be looking for a long time.


By definition clone means that all of the parameters of the two displays must be the same, i.e. same resolution and refresh rate.

 

[Favelle]

What's the difference between extended desktop and clone??

 

[CZ Eddie]



Quote:
Originally Posted by jvincent /forum/post/12995756


I think you'll be looking for a long time.


By definition clone means that all of the parameters of the two displays must be the same, i.e. same resolution and refresh rate.

That may be your definition, but as far as I'm concerned it's the industry's definition only because they have not put out the effort to provide cloning with the abilities it should be offered with.


The cloning we are given now is not much better than having a VGA or other video "splitter", IMO.

 

[SpiderScout]

Cloning means indentical replication...you are looking for "your version" not his. His is the universal meaning. The correct diction of what you are referring to would be something like sub-cloning. Biology aside, I have no idea about how to accomplish the task at hand. Maybe try 2 seperate cards. Iunno.

 

[jvincent]



Quote:
Originally Posted by Favelle /forum/post/12995820


What's the difference between extended desktop and clone??

Extended desktop has a primary monitor which includes the taskbar and a secondary desktop which allows you to place applications but has no taskbar.


The two desktops can run different resolutions.

 

[Steve Ruddy]



Quote:
Extended desktop has a primary monitor which includes the taskbar and a secondary desktop which allows you to place applications but has no taskbar.


The two desktops can run different resolutions.

How do you get your applications to the extended display and can you use your curser over there? All I see is my desktop photo when I extend.

 

[steven975]

move the window over to the second display with your mouse.


Maximizing after that it will put it on the other screen permanently.

 

[walford]



Quote:
Originally Posted by Steve Ruddy /forum/post/15823100


How do you get your applications to the extended display and can you use your curser over there? All I see is my desktop photo when I extend.

Another option is drag and drop the ICON for any application you want from the primary display and copy it to the secondary display using a right click so you can start the application from either display/

 

[Steve Ruddy]



Another option is drag and drop the ICON for any application you want from the primary display and copy it to the secondary display using a right click so you can start the application from either display//

I tried copying a short cut to the extended display but when opening it opens on the main display. My displays are in different rooms so copying a shortcut doesn't work or am I doing something wrong?