Dual Monitor, kinda pointless with gaming?

Sgt.Slug

Just looking for opinions. I got a few 21" monitors at home and I thought, hell I got a dual monitor video card so I enabled it for the first time. In terms of games, it seems pointless to have. Is this really just for business use? Reason I am asking is I thought I would be able to run a game on my main monitor and monitor MSN or a webpage at same time on other screen, thus being able to use my mouse across both monitors.. I know there is Ultramon or something, but am I looking for something not possible? It'd be nice to hit F12 or something and it switches to my other monitor. At work I use it a lot because I work in various applications etc so it makes sense, but as I am not allowed to play games at work I wanted to see what real benefit there was of dual monitors.. Doesn't seem like anything useful outside of business applications. Hope this makes sense. Heh.

No_Style

You are correct, sir. Aside from a few select games in windowed mode, gaming and dual monitors is extremely limited.

Sgt.Slug

Ya. I take it from lack of response you are correct. Wanted to ensure I wasn't missing something. Thanks

Zardon

For gaming dual monitor is useless. Of course not everyone uses their pc for just gaming

Sgt.Slug

Yes, but I am talking gaming and business. That's my desire with dual monitor. I like to have a game running on one monitor and applications on another. At work I use it extensive because of a unix/windows environment.

CaptinSxb

alt-tab

Zardon

The only way this will work is if you run a game in a windowed environment, a game takes over your mouse.

Think logically if you loaded a game on monitor 1 and had applications running on monitor 2, would you really want the mouse to move from monitor 1 to monitor 2 and how would this work? Example you are playing a FPS on monitor 1 and have a business app loaded on monitor 2, you move the mouse to the right in the FPS, but what happened if you wanted to move the mouse right to actually move control from monitor 1 to monitor 2 to get at the business application? Its fraut with so many issues, you would need some kind of software in which you could hit a hotkey to "freeze" the game and reliquish control of the mouse to the windows environment.

The way I handle this is simple but does not in fact mirror in any way the scenario above. I use ultramonitor 2 on my system, with this software I set up enabling and disabling monitor 2 via a hotkey "control 5" in my case. When im working I have dual monitor up with for example photoshop on screen 1 and word on monitor 2. If I want to game. I hit control 5 which moves everything to monitor 1 and turns off monitor 2, then I fire up the game. With 2 gig of ram everything runs fine, when im done gaming I quit the game then hit control 5 again. For moving those windows back to monitor 2, I have other hotkeys set in ultramonitor2, such as control 2 for moving a window immediately to the second screen or control 1 for moving it to the primary if need be.

Its suffice.

Zardon

This doesnt always work with games, just as the windows key also doesnt always work.

Sgt.Slug

actually. alt tab is a good idea, unfortunately that's not what i need. there was a program that included f12 to switch, only problem was that the game would minimize or hang when i switched monitor. I want both monitors active and press a key and my game sits there(unaffected) and i am working on another screen. Press key again and i am back to my game without issue. That functionality doesn't work. It's too bad. So I have a feature on my card that is essentially useless but I am sure contributed to the cost of my card. Sure it's for business, but isn't a 9700 or x800 more designed for games? so what's the point of dual monitor? anyhow...

Here's a example idea that I'd like the ability to have. I am playing HL2. I get a MSN, oh, see it on other monitor. Press F12, oh look I'm on my second monitor while i am standing still in my game. I send messages back and press f12 back to my game and instantly resume. This is functionality I thought I could do.

Zardon

just buy a laptop

bug77

Useless advice: game on your monitor of choice, then exit the game and connect your other monitor. Voila!

sireric

The games have to be aware of multi-mon and take advantage. The two that come to mind are FS2004 and X2:The threat (there should some driving ones too). Otherwise, it's great for desktop work, but it's not always a win for gaming.

Sgt.Slug

Yup, it's too bad. You see my logic behind using 2 monitors though? Play a game on one and then be able to hit a hotkey, unaffecting your current game and mouse appears on other monitor.

Are you indicating that FS2004 and X2 allow this? I just see little sense in dual monitor functionality if it can't be used totally. I didn't buy a Radeon 9700 for Office work, I bought it for gaming..Had I bought a video card simply for business, I would have bought a cheap video card with dual monitor support such as what I have in my Dell work laptop. I just don't understand the logic of defaulting dual monitor support on video cards.

sireric

Yes, I believe that FS2004 and X2:the threat both support multi-mon natively. I haven't tried it, but I remember reading it in the X2 book and reading about it somewhere for FS2004. I think that there are more games that support multi-mon than that, but it's not a huge number, at this time.

Sgt.Slug

so why bother including on most of your line of cards? Considering support is lacking, the use is more for business, seems a little pointless having the feature on the cards. (this is not a gripe, i'm trying to raise a logic point) I just want to know the logic. It's like TV out? Why bother? who uses TV out? Ya I did once when I had a 3dfx card.. lol.

Skanks

Until I got my new LCD I had my normal monitor on one, and my plasma tv on the DVI. Great for watching movies etc. Now I just need a dual dvi card.

Geminiwave

I personally use Ultra-mon. When I want to play a game I hit crtl-Alt-S and it disables the second monitor. Great for CS and CS:Source because those games DONT take over your mouse(your mouse can move freely between monitors in those games which REALLy messes you up). Otherwise I just have a game running in one monitor and work on the other. OR THE BEST PART is when I have a research paper. WORD on one monitor, and webpages or another instance of WORD on the other to compare info. Its WONDERFUL for such things.

inet

Does current drivers for ATI work for X2: The Threat natively for multi-monitor? I tried this about 9 months ago and there was no supprot for it by drivers.

Robert McClelland

I have dual monitor video card I wish I can watch tv on my 17inch cart monitor then play games on my 17 FPD LCD screen. It said I can't watch tv on my second monitor at all which sucks for video in lol

Sgt.Slug

..but see, i 'want' to have the access to the other monitor. I'd rather hit CTRL S and switch from my game to my other monitor. Say I am playing and meanwhile editing a Word document. Say I have a conversation going in the other monitor, I want to maintain some sort of access between the monitors. I currently use it only for business reasons, no problem there. It's just too bad it isn't more flexible I guess.

..that's another cool way you 'could' use the dual monitor, have tv in one screen and a game in the other. You could press a key and you could toggle access between the monitors.

Geminiwave

you can watch TV on the other monitor. it just takes a bit of work. Sadly I cannot tell you what you need to do, as it has been different for every ATI card I've messed with.