looking to upgrade to dual monitors...

[Codeman0013]

Hey all....
I'm looking at this point to upgrade to dual monitors i have a 17inch flatpanel right now and could get my hands on another one my question right now has to be what video card is reccomended as i do gaming as well and also how hard is it to set up 2 monitors do i need like a converter or anything??

Remember free things are fun but they can come with an emotional price tags..

 

[franklin97355]

You will need a second video card to get any benefit from a second monitor. Check the games for their recommendations and make sure your computer has a slot for whichever card you are thinking of buying.

The answer is "42"

 

[kmcferrin]

Most video cards produced in the last 3-4 years already have dual video outputs on them, and you can usually hook up a second monitor to such a card with no problems. In the worst case scenario, a dual-output video card might have one VGA and one DVI connector, but most such cards usually come with a DVI to VGA adapter in case you do not have a monitor that supports DVI. If you don't have an adapter, you can usually purchase them for cheap.

With both ATI and nVidia cards that I have used in dual-monitor mode, all of the necessary software functionality is included in the driver to either clone the desktop (both monitors show the same image) or span the desktop (stretch your desktop across both monitors for a really wide display). My old ATI card even handled spanning the desktop when the each of the monitors ran at different resolutions (1024x768 and 1152x864).

As far as gaming goes, there may be some difficulties there. I always ran two displays for the Windows desktop, which made a lot of development and image editing work much easier, but every game that I played would only display on the primary monitor (the OS considers one monitor primary and the other as secondary). The primary monitor would display the game in full screen mode, while the second monitor would display the windows desktop while I played the game. I didn't see a noticeable decrease in gaming performance in this case, and for those games where I ran helper applications (mapping and chat tools for MMOGs, etc) I would have them running in the secondary screen while playing on the primary.

 

[Codeman0013]

i have a raedon card and its not got 2 spots on it for a video imput would i need to spend a bunch more money on another vard that has 2 and also another monitor i have to buy that ne way

Remember free things are fun but they can come with an emotional price tags..

 

[kmcferrin]

What particular radeon card do you have? I had a Radeon 9700 Pro 3 years ago that had dual outputs. Even the cheap $50 cards have dual outputs these days, and depending on what you're currently using they might even be faster too.

 

[Codeman0013]

i believe its a 9200 i'm not home so i'm not sure

Remember free things are fun but they can come with an emotional price tags..

 

[Nohjekim]

My Nvidia Grforce 7800 GTX will run two monitors and really screems when it comes to gaming.

I can run pretty much anything maxed out.

Right now I am running Oblivion at 1920 by 1600 with everything maxed and it is smooth as silk.

As far as I know it will only display the game on the primary monitor.

Mike

 

[kmcferrin]

Based on what I've heard about Oblivion, I find it hard to believe that it runs smooth as silk at 1920x1600 with everything maxed on ANY video card, let alone a 7800GTX.