Dual Screen

ant2221 · 25 Jan 2009 at 23:20

ive been thinking about getting a second screen, im not worried bout the fps for the moment as im sure my rig can handle it (8800gtx) although i may be wrong on this.

what ive been thinking is that in full screen games, where would the new center be, eg in a first person shooter, where would i be looking.

through the wonders of technology you'd never guess i had only the 1 screen

would the center be at the yellow, green or red arrow. if it is the green arrow, is it worth getting a 3rd screen so that where your looking is in the center of a screen? whilst im here i may ask, how hard is it to get 3 screens? i would defo need another graphics card but is it as simple as to just plug all 3 in?

thanks
Ant

radderfire · 25 Jan 2009 at 23:32

ant2221 said:
would the center be at the yellow, green or red arrow. if it is the green arrow, is it worth getting a 3rd screen so that where your looking is in the center of a screen? whilst im here i may ask, how hard is it to get 3 screens? i would defo need another graphics card but is it as simple as to just plug all 3 in?

thanks
Ant

Green arrow I think. When you add another screen you either specify a dual monitor setup and set resolution for each monitor individually, or you specify that it's one monitor (i.e. the two are merged) and specify the resolution of the merged entity.

I think going to three monitors would be best and it's easily done by just adding another graphics card (or you can buy external solutions such as the Matrox Graphics Triple Head To Go), but graphics cards are probably the best solution.

Rgds

ant2221 · 25 Jan 2009 at 23:56

cheers, then it looks like ill be holding off on that upgrade until the day i smile when i look at pay cheque

Strife212 · 26 Jan 2009 at 00:18

You can do whatever you want, no one with dual screens has it set up so you look at the green arrow.

You CAN have it like that but it would be the worst thing of all time. What people do is just make it so the game plays on one screen and your desktop shows on the other.

Amnesia · 26 Jan 2009 at 02:38

the centre would be the centre of the primary monitor...unless u had it set in clone mode then u would see the same image on both screens.

some games do support dual screen setups so u see a different image on both or more screens.

but like above already pointed out...nobody would really set in the middle for a fps game...even though it can be done

Phil2008 · 26 Jan 2009 at 03:38

What games support dual monitor?

Amnesia · 26 Jan 2009 at 03:47

couple from the top of my head

flight sim
supcom

Phil2008 · 26 Jan 2009 at 03:54

I tried flight sim 2004 when I first got my 2nd monitor, but I couldnt figger out how you got the both screens working in it..

Pulse · 26 Jan 2009 at 05:29

If you have 2 screens and just have the second monitor set to extended desktop then it would only play the game on the primary screen, say the left one or which ever has the taskbar on.

Only if it was set to span the desktop (ie. Even the taskbar covers both screens) would you then end up with the scross hair at the middle edge of both monitors.

ScarySquirrel · 26 Jan 2009 at 12:20

If you have a game playing on one monitor what is on the second monitor? Is it just the desktop?

Do you just ALT TAB to get your mouse on the second screen, or will that minimise the game as well?

Pulse · 26 Jan 2009 at 12:30

yeah the 2nd monitor will display the desktop, i have my 2nd one showing winamp and msn convos.

And yes alt tab gets you back to desktop but will minimise the game.

Bones · 26 Jan 2009 at 12:46

unless you run the game in windowed mode, in which case the game wont minimise

LukeTW · 26 Jan 2009 at 21:41

Pulse said:
yeah the 2nd monitor will display the desktop, i have my 2nd one showing winamp and msn convos.

And yes alt tab gets you back to desktop but will minimise the game.

Same here.

You can run the game in a window as he^ said and strech it across both screens but it looks a bit daft

ant2221 · 27 Jan 2009 at 15:24

thanks for the help, why is ive seen many gaming rigs with dual screen if there is no real advantage to it (other than those games which support the extra bits on screen 2),

where would i find out which games have this second screen capability? either none of my current games can do it (i did only bring a couple 2 uni) or it doesn't display that info on the box.

Flossie · 27 Jan 2009 at 16:42

hardly any games support multiple monitors - there are only a few rare exceptions such as flight simulators. As Windows Vista removed the "spanning" that you can do with XP, so don't expect any games to support multiple monitors any time soon, as no one will put development resources into it as a result...!

What you can do with multiple monitors for gameing is have the game on one screen (usually windowed but maximised to full screen) and the second monitor with Ventrillo / Chat / Web / TV / Whatever - it can be helpful to know who's talking, or to see maps, or just something to do whilst waiting. And don't forget epeen, very important part of gameing