Hi. Please help! I have 2 single video cards in my computer. I'm running Win 2000. I'm trying to set up my monitors so it will be one big desktop, and so the taskbar on the bottom of windows will stretch accross both monitors, however so far it is only on one monitor. I can not find anything that will let me have one large desktop on both monitors, instead right now I have one primary monitor and for the other monitor I have checked "extend desktop" but it is not extended, however the second monitor works ok. I'm not able to save any open windows on the 2nd monitor in redi plus. When I open it, all windows saved on primary monitor anyway around this? Thanks so much for you help
I have a similar setup as you except I have three video cards with three monitors and run win2000. I don't think you can extend the taskbar across both monitors, but you can move it from one monitor to another. As far as the problem you are having with redi plus, that might be a problem with the program itself and not with win2000. There is a freeware program called "Reloader" that saves and then recalls the position of all your programs on your monitors, you might want to try that. Alex
Your problem sounds EXACTLY like the one I had and it cost me hours and hours of brain damage. IN the end it was the simple, but frustrating issue of having a 2nd video card that was incompatible with Win 2000 AS A SECONDARY MONITOR. That is, the card would work with 2000 if the monitor was set as the primary, just not as the secondary. It was an ATI video card (PCI) in this case. Try using the other original monitor as the secondary and the new one as the primary and see what happens. Good luck. Finally, there was a thread a few weeks ago with a similar question only this guy was using Realtick, and apparently these was a setting in RealTick that needed to be changed for the multi monitor to work. Maybe Redi has a similar issue.
Thanks guys, will have to work some more on it. So far no luck, switched the primary monitor from original to secondary monitor, but doesn't work. I do have an ATI Radeon PCI card, you think this is the problem? Where do you get that software that automatically saves everything in all its locations. Thanks
For Windows 2000... Even in an extended desktop the task bar only lives in one monitor. You can choose which monitor it lives in but it doesn't extend to the other monitors. As for windows opening up in both monitors, closing them and reopening them again and having them open in the monitor they were last running in ... that capability seems to be dependent on the software you are using so long as you've got your system set up ok. Most of my windows will remember where they were when they are closed and when I restart the application they open in that monitor again. Windows Internet Explorer seems to be very consistent with this and would be a good test to see if your system is set up ok. Open IE it in one monitor, move the window to either monitor and then close the window. When you start IE again it should open right where it was last closed. Try it in both monitors. If that works then your system is probably fine and you need to look other places for your problem. Specifically - call the vendor of the application that isn't behaving for their help. RealTick had (and may still have) a bug where the 'primary' monitor must be assigned as the monitor to the furthest position to the right (and if you have multiple rows of monitors, the upper row). Most people are able to get RealTick to cover all monitors without doing the workaround I'm about to mention but the drawing tools don't always work in all monitors if you don't have the primary monitor assigned to be the upper leftmost monitor. For anyone that discovers they have this problem you can do the following: First tell windows 2000 that the primary monitor is your upper leftmost monitor (Display Properties in the Display control panel). Once you've done that you restart RealTick and shrink it to fit one monitor, move the window to the primary monitor to it's furthest upper left position and close RealTick. Finally you open RealTick and stretch the lower right corner of the window across the monitors and close RealTick. Now every time RealTick starts it covers all monitors. As long as you don't rearrange your monitors often you shouldn't have to ever do this again! I have some other less capable shareware tools (and actually a commercial and popular set of virus protection / system tools) that are very good at some tasks but their multi-monitor windowing code isn't very smart. They continue to open up in the primary monitor all the time or just plan work best there. This is rare however. Most of my applications I've been able to get to open where I want them and for them to remember to reopen there. There are shareware and commercial software packages to help force applications and windows to 'do the right thing' about opening where you want them to. I use a commercial package that came with my video cards that helps out in this regard. It's HydraVision - Appian's Desktop Manager. I think they sell it separately but there are various solution providers for such things. I can't vouch for how well that would work for you or not. www.appian.com or use a search engine to look up 'multi monitor desktop manger' or similar for other options. All my experiences are based on Windows 2000. Hope this helps. Good luck! - David
http://www.zdnet.com/pcmag/pctech/content/18/06/ut1806.001.html If your secondary monitor displays windows clearly, there is nothing wrong with your PCI card. Alex
I'm not concerned about IE, which opens where I close it. That is not the problem. My biggest concern and still a problem is Redi Plus. I have about 20 windows open for it, and half are in 2nd monitor, so every morning I will have move 10 windows from one monitor to the other. I knew that Windows NT did not have anyway of remembering where the windows were, but I upgraded to WIn 2000 just for this purpose, so it would remember, but still no luck. Any new suggestions appreciated. THanks again
Someone suggested to me to get an Appian Hurricane dual monitor card. This should solve all problems, and will need to disable the main video card on board.
FWIW,I have a AGP Appian Hurricane and a Hurricane PCI installed and have been working without 1 problem since I purchased when they first came out last year...... I plan on getting another PCI for a total of 6 monitors. They are expensive but worth it in the long run.......they have DVI output for my next purchase, Samsung 170 LCD....
I have mentioned this a number of times before- There is a site which is devoted to multimonitor displays. It is http://www.realtimesoft.com/ Here you will find a database of just about every video card combination that others have used along with descriptions of the problems they have with them. Also here, is a piece of software called UltraMon, which allows you to control multimonitor display characteristics, including saving the position of your icons on the various monitors.