Multi-Display Graphics Suites Compared

Bender writes "There's an interesting comparison at TR between the major graphics players' multi-desktop software/hardware suites, like NVIDIA's nView and Matrox DualHead. These suites provide monitor positioning, application-level window memory, multiple virtual desktops, and the like. This is necessarily a Windows-centric comparison, but it's interesting to consider how Linux, X, and various desktop managers would match up with these solutions in terms of features and abilities."

Comments

my boss

[raindrop#1]

solved the problem by commandeering two different PCs and sitting them side by side on his desk. Now, we're short one PC in goods-in :o(

Macs?

[tadheckaman]

Macintoshes have supported multimonitors and extended desktops for nearly 10 years... why not compair macs along with them too?

Re:Macs?

[Anonymous Coward]

Methinks you mean more than 10 years.

Re:Macs?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm all for bashing Apple, but come on.

Free operating systems (Linux / FreeBSD, etc) are used *LESS* on the desktop than Apple Macs. (3.5% vs 2.5% if I remember).

By your reasoning - if they drop Mac support, they shouldn't care about the less popular Linux either. You'd be using Windows XP within a week (if you don't already - if you do already, consider yourself punished for your stupid comment).

Re:Macs?

[athakur999]

First of all, if you've read previous stories on TR you'll find they're pretty apathetic towards Macs.

Secondly, this article is comparing the multimonitor abilities of these various graphic cards against each other. It doesn't really make sense to throw a Mac in the mix, since you're changing more than one variable.

Re:Macs?

[LoudMusic]

In addition to that, most video cards lack Mac drivers.

So pththththththth on your multi-display Mac.

Re:Macs?

[singularity]

I have a picure of my set-up online.

I am running three monitors off my G4/933 - a 17" Studio Display off a Radeon 7500, and a 15" NEC LCD and 14" crap CRT screen both running off a Radeon 7000 card.

I went with dual displays back when I had two 15" VGAs. They work seamlessly under MacOS (I started with them under 7.6.1, and now run them under 10.2.1) and I find that I am significantly more productive as a result.

The tird monitor was largely because I had an exta monitor and an extra VGA out to run it off of. Right now I just keep iTunes on that monitor.

I highly recommend multiple monitors to anyone that can run them. A lot of times, a second monitor can be added for a lot less money than a larger monitor (since the second monitor can be relegated to non-accelerated tasks and can use a cheap video card, especially sicne it will be stuck in a PCI slot).

Re:Macs?

[dwater]

Mac? Pa. It sucks because of the single menu thing - you have to keep moving the mouse back to the other screen in order to access the menu. I mean, how brain dead is that? Any more than 2 screens and you'd be pulling your hair out.

Now SGI systems, on the other hand, can have upto 128 monitors on a single system. Now *thats* what I call multi-monitor support!

And 16 people can use them all at the same time.

<http://www.sgi.com/visualization/onyx/3000/ir3/ co nfigs.html#3800>

Re:Macs?

[UberLame]

If they included Macs, there were would they stop? Linux has supported multiple heads for quite some time (not as long as the mac did, but only because it isn't as old). And lets not forget Sun. They've supported multiple monitors at least as long as Apple did. And SGI. They've had multiple monitors for quite some time (but perhaps not as long as Apple). And IBM, and HP, and Compaq's Alpha lines under both VMS and Tru64 and Linux and FreeBSD (and the vax line before that). I mean, if you don't keep it really limited, there are far too many possibilities.

Heck, they didn't even include all the MS Windows options out there.

Multi-monitor in Linux...

[No inspiration]

or rather the apparent lack of it, was one of the reasons that put me off from keeping Redhat on my main box. I have a very nice configuration of two monitors at home, with the secondary monitor mainly for watching videos and checking the email while doing (ahem) serious work, and I could not find an _EASY_ way of doing it. I am sure that a lot of you will give me pointers to where I could have gone to download the relevant software but you would think that a distribution as complete as Redhat would find some space in those five cds to put the drivers / programs needed.

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[cs668]

X will do this without any extra drivers.

The Xinerama extention ships with every current distribution that I know of. You just need to configure it.

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'M A MULTITASKER. Typically, I'll have at least a dozen windows open at once, all of which I'm interacting with, or at least watching, on a pretty regular basis. To some, it may look like a cluttered mess of application windows, but it works for me. It's sort of like a messy desk; I have a system. I guess I just like doing a lot of things at once, everything from chatting on Trillian to keeping an eye on my inbox, from recording benchmark scores in Excel to surfing TR, and, of course, managing my ever-changing Winamp playlist.
I suppose it's only natural that, with PCs growing ever more powerful and capable of performing multiple tasks at once, we'd put them to use doing just that. And the more tasks you have going on at once, the more constrained you'll be by the limited desktop area provided by even a screen capable of resolutions as high as 1600x1200. The next logical step is adding a second monitor, or perhaps a third, but what's going to drive those extra monitors? You could go with an AGP card plus an additional PCI card to drive that auxiliary display, but PCI graphics cards aren't easy to find, especially if you want something with good video signal quality. Why not just run two or more displays with a single graphics card?
If you're ready to take the multimonitor plunge, you have a few choices. There's ATI's HydraVision, Matrox's Dual and TripleHead, and NVIDIA's nView. Each multimonitor system juggles hardware compatibility with software features in an attempt to make the most of an multimonitor desktop. Which one is right for you? Let's find out.

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Multimonitor setups explored
For some time, Windows has been able to recognize multiple graphics cards in a single system. Years ago, it was quite convenient simply to add a PCI video card in addition to a primary AGP card to support a secondary display. In time, graphics companies caught on to the multimonitor idea and started supporting multiple monitors on a single graphics card. It's a good thing they did, since good PCI graphics cards are so hard to find these days--just ask anyone with one of Shuttle's non-AGP-equipped cubes.
Windows XP allows multiple-output graphics cards to drive multiple displays to create a single, unified Windows desktop in an expanded workspace. WinXP will also allow a secondary display to mirror the contents of a primary screen. Really, it's up to you how you make the most of a couple of monitors.
That's all there is to multimonitor graphics, at least on the surface. However, there are at least a few compatibility problem areas to keep an eye on, and a lot of feature differentiation between offerings from various companies. I've highlighted some particular areas of concern below.

Some of the above terms and categories may not be clear for those unfamiliar with multimonitor setups, so I'll go over them one by one. Incidentally, I'll try to keep track of functionality in both Win2K and WinXP through the course of this article, but the various multi-display implemantions vary in quirky ways between Win2K and XP. My primary focus will be Windows XP, since it's the newer OS.

Independent monitor settings - When running an extended desktop on a multimonitor graphics card across multiple displays, Windows XP sees each monitor individually. This means that you can manipulate each display's resolution, refresh rate, and color depth independent of other displays in the multimonitor setup.
Here, compatibility issues arise with Matrox's TripleHead three-screen configuration, which we'll cover more a little later. Additional incompatibilities also arise with Windows 2000, where only Matrox's DualHead is capable of adjusting the resolution, refresh rate, and color depth of multiple monitors independently.
XP desktop support - There are two primary ways to display a Windows XP desktop on multiple monitors, you can stretch it or extend it. A stretched desktop treats a multimonitor configuration as a single, widescreen display and requires that each monitor's settings (refresh rate, screen resolution, and color depth) be the same. Though you are limited to equal monitor settings, a stretched desktop lets the Windows taskbar extend across all the screens in a multimonitor setup.
If you don't need your taskbar stretching across multiple monitors, or if you want to run independent monitor settings, you'll need to run an extended Windows desktop. Here, only the actual desktop area (not including the taskbar) extends to auxiliary monitors, and Windows sees the configuration as a series of individual displays. With an extended desktop, you can adjust the orientation of auxiliary displays to be above or below your primary display rather than locked down beside it in a widescreen stretched desktop.
3D acceleration spanning - Just because you can stretch or extend your desktop area over multiple monitors doesn't mean that a multimonitor graphics card's 3D acceleration will necessarily have the same flexibility. This category is particularly important for 3D professionals looking to extend their effective workspace, but it's also important to gamers looking for a widescreen gaming across multiple monitors.
Virtual desktop limit - All the multimonitor graphics cards we're looking at today support multiple virtual desktops that further extend Windows' desktop real estate. The implementations are actually quite similar, with the primary difference being exactly how many virtual desktops are supported. Despite theoretical limits, though, the number of virtual desktops that a machine can handle, and that your brain can realistically manage, is likely to be well within the capacity of even HydraVision's nine-desktop limit.
Intelligent monitor detection - Having a multimonitor setup is great, but what happens when your buddy's over for some LAN gaming action and wants to borrow one of those monitors? If you unplug a monitor and reboot, HydraVision and nView automatically turn off any multimonitor settings and reduce your desktop to a single display. Dual and TripleHead, however, retain an extended desktop even after a reboot with only a single screen. This might not seem like a big deal, but if you have applications set to open on the missing display, you're going to have a hard time getting at them until you plug that auxiliary monitor back in.
Application position memory and preferences - While all the multimonitor products we're looking at today will remember an application's window size, monitor, and desktop position, Matrox and NVIDIA offer further controls that can be bound to individual applications. Matrox's settings pertain only to 3D applications and their preferences for things like antialiasing, but nView is capable of manipulating various multimonitor window properties on an application-by-application basis.
I've only touched on differences between these implementations here, and I've omitted a number of areas where there's no meaningful differences between the different multimonitor products. Let's take a closer look at each one for a little more detail.

The Radeon 9700 Pro made a huge splash when it was released this summer, but there's more to ATI than just 3D graphics performance. HydraVision is ATI's flavor of multimonitor graphics. ATI has been developing HydraVision for years now. While ATI's 3D graphics drivers have been problematic in the past, their software, particularly MultiMedia Center, has been excellent.

To test HydraVision, we're using ATI's Radeon 9000 Pro. It's not as flashy or expensive as the other graphics cards we're using to evaluate multimonitor support, but it'll do. For a more complete look at the Radeon 9000 Pro, see our comprehensive review.
Like the 9700 Pro, the Radeon 9000 Pro has two 400MHz RAMDACs integrated right on the chip to power analog displays. The Radeon 9000 Pro chip also incorporates the TMDS transmitter necessary for a DVI output and a video encoding unit. Integrating all the necessary display logic on-chip is a neat way to do things, and it makes for a pretty sparse board layout.

Since LCD monitors are becoming more popular, I'd like to see dual DVI outputs on more graphics cards. Of course, the Radeon 9000 Pro isn't exactly a high-end part, so I'm not sure I can fault ATI for not going with a dual DVI setup here. However, I have yet to see any of ATI's Radeon 9700 Pro cards equipped with dual DVI outputs, and I want dual DVI outputs if I'm going to be dropping that much money on a graphics card.

As we saw in our comparison chart, although independent refresh rates, resolutions, and color depths are supported by HydraVision in Windows XP, they don't work in Windows 2000. These limitations also extend back to Windows NT 4.0, but curiously, not to Windows 9x. For businesses on the NT platform that haven't migrated to Windows XP, this limitation may be especially crippling. (Incidentally, ATI's official stance on independent resolutions and refresh rates in Windows 2000 is that it doesn't work, but I've heard reports of people getting it working with the 2.2 CATALYST drivers on the Radeon 9700 Pro.)
Also worth noting:t HydraVision doesn't seem to support stretched desktops in Windows XP. You can still extend your desktop to a second monitor, but your Windows taskbar won't follow.

From within ATI's CATALYST driver, you can only get at some simple display calibration tools. Full HydraVision functionality requires a separate download from ATI's web site, which is a little annoying. ATI seems to prefer splitting up its driver components into separate downloads, and you've got to reboot after installing each component. Ugh.
What's particularly interesting about ATI's multimonitor support, at least with the Radeon 9000 Pro, is that it runs in clone mode while booting. It does the same in Windows until you install the HydraVision software. The fact the secondary display is activated during the boot sequence may be particularly useful in special cases where you want screens displaying the same thing in multiple locations.

Once you've downloaded and installed the latest HydraVision release, ATI gives you a few tools to play around with--"few" being the operative word here. There's support for multiple desktops (up to nine), a "move to monitor" feature, an Internet Explorer extension that lets you open a hyperlink to a specific monitor, and some transparency and fading effects. All in all, nothing particularly earth-shattering, though the ability to scroll through multiple desktops with the mouse wheel is a nice touch. HydraVision also supports application position memory and the ability to intelligently position dialog boxes, but these features are shared by Dual/TripleHead and nView so they're not unique to HydraVision.

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[Anonymous Coward]

Xinerama "ships with every distribution" seems a little inaccurate, it is a part of XFree86. Multi monitor support is there even without Xinerama, and I don't know of any way to remove it or Xinerama.

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[Trevelyan]

IMHO my monitor support w/ XF4 is better then windows. Not only do you have xinerama that lets you spread your desktop accross multiple displays like windows does. But you can also have it, so that you can use the displays (almost*) as if you had two seperate computers, even have different WM on each
(*still shares mouse and keyboard, ie which ever screen you got the (core) mouse on has focus)

an advantage to windows is that you dont loose HW acceleration when ur spreading desktop. While w/ xinerama you do. but not with the multi WM setup. (which is what I use)

And setting up either aint that difficult, I remember when I was still using mdk (2 years ago) that the CD installer could even do it (I think it was 8.0)

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[Trevelyan]

I previewed it twice but hey its late.
*IMHO multi monitor sup.....
*...desktop. While w/ xinerama you don't get HW accel, with the multi WM setup you do....

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[MWelchUK]

Question - Can you copy and paste stuff between the two windows if they are running as differnet X sessions (I'm guessing not, but it would be tres sweet!)

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[Jim the Bad]

Yes!

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[cs668]

So how is my statement inacurate? If XFree86 ships with almost every distribution and Multi-head/Xinerama support comes with XF86 then my statement is still correct.

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[SmallFurryCreature]

I know for a fact that Matrox does (for G450 at least) even have a utitlity not unlike that for windows. You can do the same things. Also the windowsmanager I used seemed a lot more inclined to not do stupid things, like popup every confirmation window in the center meaning it is cut in half across the monitors. (I use enlightenment.)

Also what the orginal story seems to forget that it is not neccasary to have special cards to have dual monitors. I had it under 98 with two pci vid cards. Not as nice perhaps but pretty cool for the time. It should still be possible to do this with 1 agp and 1 pci although it may not be possible if the main card is a built in since these tend to presume you either want them or an external card.

I also seem dimly to recall that I had this config with linux but I might be confusing that with my other matrox.

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[MWelchUK]

Next Question! Can you drag apps between them (Threre must be some limitation why else would Xinerama exist?)

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[fyonn]

Can you drag apps between them

no, alas you can't, for exactly the same reason that I can't repoint an app displaying on box one to an X server on box 2 while the app is running. it's a bugger though, that would be very cool. still, I'm sure it's coming via some enteprising hacker.

dave

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[Trevelyan]

unless its xemacs, which can open multiple clones of it self on multiple X.
so that several ppl can type into a doc at same time

plz note you can drag windows around with xinerama

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[Jim the Bad]

This is #1 on my Linux wishlist, too. I submited a wishlist-level bug report to the KDE team about this, and they replied that it was a limitation of X.

Sadly, I think it's a major job: you would have to detach a client from the current X server and reattach it to a different one. Not easy at all.

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[fyonn]

well, it's been done in other X setup's.

as I understand it, with a system of sunray thin clients and a big sunserver. you put your ID card into the reader on the sunray and log in etc. then if you pull the card out it all disappears. go to another term and your old session reappears there.

can anyone comfirm this? and is there any chance we could see this kind of functionality in XF86? (which I would love, then I could transfer from desktop to laptop seamlessly).

a method of repointing single X clients from one server to another would also be a pretty cool thing.

dave

Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[fyonn]

plz note you can drag windows around with xinerama

yeah, the problem with that is that it's suddenly one big display, and not 2 (or more) independant displays. when it's one big display then you're talking one wm for the pair, ie windows maximising across a monitor bezel etc, which just seems kind of hideous to me.

with 2 independant displays then you can have different wm's on each, when you maximise a window there is no danger that it will span monitors (and what happens in xinerama if you have three screen's in an L arrangement?)

dave

Change X resolution and Virtual Res on the fly?

[JosefWells]

This wasn't possible years ago in the 3x xservers, but maybe it happened in 4 and I just don't know.

Can you change the resolution of X while it is running AND the "virtual resolution"

You can do the Ctrl-Alt-"+" or "-" to change the res, but you just scroll around on the largest resolution in your XF86Config.

Example: I am running in 1024x768, want to let me mom use the computer and she likes 640x480 because it is easy to read. What to do?

Re:Change X resolution and Virtual Res on the fly?

[wvengen]

This is part of the RandR extension, wait for XFree86 4.3. This was mentioned some time ago.

Re:Change X resolution and Virtual Res on the fly?

[tadheckaman]

mandrake even pops up a window asking you how you want to set it up... very easy to set up

Re:Change X resolution and Virtual Res on the fly?

[Anonymous Coward]

but isn't there some kind of hackish way to implement it in the current stable XFree86?

Re:Change X resolution and Virtual Res on the fly?

[rm -f DMCA]

I believe that this should work, but haven't tested it yet:

In you're XF86Config file, add (or uncomment) the line:

Option "Dont Zoom"

Hope this works

Re:Change X resolution and Virtual Res on the fly?

[rm -f DMCA]

Never mind...

Re:DOG FOOD QWZX

[Anonymous Coward]

You can afford dog food? Man, you're doin' pretty damn well. Being a former Chief Web Engineer/Technologist for a major dot-com, I have to dig through Larry Ellison's trash cans.

Lucky stiff.

ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[jpm242]

I'd be really interested in finding out how the dual monitor configuration works out.

Do both screens need to have the same resolutions/refresh rates? What about Quartz acceleration, is it on both displays simultaneously, or just one at the time? Do the popups show up in the middle of one screen or split between the displays like on the Matrox/PC...

Gimme your rants and raves about that card.

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[Anonymous Coward]

On macs, popup dialogs have generally either appeared in the center of the main monitor ( the one with the menubar) or the center of the one that the application window is on.

Since the mac has been able to do this since the first video cards for the platform (1988?) it's pretty well supported in software.

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[vought]

Do both screens need to have the same resolutions/refresh rates?

No.

What about Quartz acceleration, is it on both displays simultaneously, or just one at the time?

Both displays at once, given sufficient (64MB) VRAM.

Do the popups show up in the middle of one screen or split between the displays like on the Matrox/PC.

Dialog boxes and other messages are typically centered on the display containing the menu bar.

Apple did multiple screens first, and it shows up in the more elegant handling of interface elements across displays and the general flexibility of those multi-monitor options compared to the "divided" dialog boxes and hardware constraints of Windows.

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[Nipsy356]

Screens are independent. Popups appear in the middle of the menubar window. QE is enabled on both displays. I run a triple headed Dual 867, with 3 1280x1024 panels, and it is a dream come true (2 on a Radeon 9000 AGP, and one on a Radeon 7500 PCI). The Mac OS has had a great handle on multiheaded operation forever, and these dual display AGP cards are nice!

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[scot4875]

Apple did multiple screens first, and it shows up in the more elegant handling of interface elements across displays and the general flexibility of those multi-monitor options compared to the "divided" dialog boxes and hardware constraints of Windows.

This is just completely untrue. Apple did do multi-display first, but Windows is every bit as good at handling multiple displays. If you put two ore more video cards in a box (which is what I've done since Win'98 originally came out), Windows handles multimon beautifully. Dialog boxes centered on active display, windows maximized to single display, etc.

The problem is that most dual-head video card makers, up until recently, have provided drivers that tell Windows "Hey, this is one big, wide display!", and Windows has no way of knowing that it's centering a dialog box across 2 monitors. Matrox has fixed this (finally) in their drivers, and ATI has as well with the drivers for the 9000 and 9700 -- the 8500 and earlier still haven't been fixed. (I don't know about nVidia, tho').

Get a real multimon solution for Windows and you won't be disappointed. I'm running a 3 19" displays at work -- 4800x1200 resolution is great.

--Jeremy

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[slamb]

What about refresh rate? I've got a dual-monitor card in my PC (GeForce4 Ti4400). I use a second video card instead of the second port because the refresh rate drops when I add a second display. Does the same happen with the Radeon 9000 on a Mac? Does it have separate RAMDACs for the two displays?

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[llin]

Note that while what you're saying is true for XP, earlier NT-based Windows systems (including 2000) don't allow true multi-display. Well, except if you're using a Matrox card. They're the only ones to have worked around this at the driver-level.

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[Anonymous Coward]

"Do the popups show up in the middle of one screen or split between the displays like on the Matrox/PC..."

Popups only split the screen on Windows NT. Any other flavor of Windows (including 2000) that supports dual monitors has a dominant monitor and a submissive monitor.

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[jred]

Not necessarily true. I have a Geforce2 MX DH Pro, and it worked great w/ Win98 (as great as win98 can be). When I moved to win2k is when I started having problems w/ dialog boxes between the two monitors, etc. Win2k is more consistent w/ Linux, though, so I get used to the same irritations...

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Note that while what you're saying is true for XP, earlier NT-based Windows systems (including 2000) don't allow true multi-display. Well, except if you're using a Matrox card. They're the only ones to have worked around this at the driver-level.

I think it is also a hardware level issue, as there is something about their protocols that made handling multiple cards easier, where the boards can interoperate, features that didn't seem to show up in competing cards for a while.

I do have some Permedia 2 cards where the DEC-made drivers allowed three identical cards to run as a multi-monitor arrangement in NT4.0.

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Not necessarily true. I have a Geforce2 MX DH Pro, and it worked great w/ Win98 (as great as win98 can be).

Actually, his comment is somewhat correct as Win98 isn't an NT-based Windows system:

"Note that while what you're saying is true for XP, earlier NT-based Windows systems (including 2000)"

A fact or two of that post you responded to did have some issues, I have a dual-head ATI card that works as multi-monitor, pretty nicely in Windows 2000.

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[scot4875]

Note that while what you're saying is true for XP, earlier NT-based Windows systems (including 2000) don't allow true multi-display. Well, except if you're using a Matrox card. They're the only ones to have worked around this at the driver-level.

Oh, really? I must have my Win2k setup screwed up somehow, then, because I've been getting true multi-display since I first installed it a few years ago. Either that, or I don't know what you mean by "true multi-display"

For the curious: I've used the following combinations:
STB Velocity TNT/STB Velocity 128
Voodoo5/Velocity 128
Voodoo5/Matrox Mistique 220
Radeon 8500/Matrox Mistique 220
Matrox Millennium G550/Matrox Millennium 2
Matrox Mystique G200/some ATI Rage 3 somethin' or other.
All have worked flawlessly as true multimon solutions. At work I'm currently using the G550/Millennium 2 (granted, all Matrox cards) combo for 3 monitors and it works great.

--Jeremy

Re:ATI Radeon 9000 in new Mac G4s

[Anonymous Coward]

Rubbish.
I've been using a W2K-based dual-monitor setup for over 2 years without any problems at all.

Originally an AGP ATI Rage 128 with a PCI Matrox Millennium2, but with other cards since.

What you say is true for NT4 but not for W2K.

I cast my vote for Matrox

[snowcold]

After watching how someone "surround gaming" with 3 monitors and a Matrox parhelia I said Wow!, but when I learnt that 3d Studio Max supported this feature I bought one immediately.

Just a very satisfied customer.

Its /.ed

[Anonymous Coward]

Heres a mirror!

Comparison on WinXP and Win2k only...

[PissingInTheWind]

anyone got something similar for Linux?

Re:Comparison on WinXP and Win2k only...

[BrookHarty]

I've had to upgrade to the CVS version of xfree to get ATI 9700 drivers. Im sure the ATI 9000 is in the same boat. Xfree 4.3 will need to be released first.

Re:Comparison on WinXP and Win2k only...

[battjt]

I'm sitting in front of two monitors hooked to a Radeon VE with the testing version of Debian.
---
chip:battjt > X -version

XFree86 Version 4.2.1 (Debian 4.2.1-3 20021016191246 branden@deadbeast.net) / X Window System
---

Re:Comparison on WinXP and Win2k only...

[BrookHarty]

Isnt the VE the 7000 chipset? I was talking about the 9000/9700.

Re:Comparison on WinXP and Win2k only...

[Anonvmous Coward]

"...anyone got something similar for Linux?"

Using a CLI on a dual monitor setup is pretty hard core dude. Heh.

Re:Comparison on WinXP and Win2k only...

[bartmank]

Im running it right now. Ive got a screen shot of my current desktop up on this web site.

Major Overstatement

[First_In_Hell]

Matrox as a major player in the graphics card market?? That is the funniest thing I have read all day. If I wanted to hear outdated statements like that I'd take a time machine and go back to 1997.

Re:Major Overstatement

[Anonymous Coward]

Battle of the graphics cards:

TSENG vs Cirrus Logic vs OAK vs Hercules

Re:Major Overstatement

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, when it comes to a good quality 2-D with support for multiple monitors... well, that is Matrox's one strong point. But, since this isn't some gamer highest frames per second review, but rather a discussion of their one good point, they're definitely worth mentioning...

Re:Major Overstatement

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm go to a the nearest financial firm and see what card they are running to support those dual displays on their desk that have the streaming quotes,bloomberg system and the huge excel spreadsheets. OMG it's a Matrox! There is more to the world then games my friend.

Re:Major Overstatement

[DigitalAdrenaline]

Our Shop uses exclusively Matrox on high end machines.

In the trading industry, some users have as many as 10 Monitors all running from 1 PC, and I've heard of more. Most traders have at least 4. There are a few companies besides Matrox that can provide that, and of the ones that do, none do it as well as Matrox.

It's worth the $1200 (CAD) to purchase a G200 MMS (quad) over anything else we've ever tried. Even on dual screens, unless you need 3D, Matrox is the way to go.

One nice benefit is that all 4 monitors can run different resolutions and color depths at the same time.

Do I have/want a G200 at home on my desktop? No.

But I don't have/want a s/390 as my desktop either. That doesn't mean an s/390 is crap. It just isn't suited to that particular role. Same with Nvidia. It's great for games, but it's crap apart from games.

Ok, Maybe I want to have an s/390 at home... Still... You get the idea...

Re:Major Overstatement

[anonymous cupboard]

In the trading industry, some users have as many as 10 Monitors all running from 1 PC, and I've heard of more. Most traders have at least 4.

At 4 displays or above, I start to get nervous, particularly if the trader is running Win2K or XP. It slowly becomes better to have two separate PCs in case one goes down. I don't even mind having the extra keyboard rather than a KVM because the trader is less likely to get confused and type the wrong thing into the wrong PC. So I prefer a max of 2-3 screens per PC.

In any case, the real cost issue is licensing and the big flat screens. The PC itself costs almost nothing in comparison.

Fun

[denisonbigred]

If you are ever in desperate need of something fun to do (as I often am), or maybe self torture, try going to alienware and building yourself the most crazy pimped out 3 screen DV Machine you can.

Then look at the price. Over 19000. One can only dream.

Re:Fun

[Ian Wolf]

Damn, I thought I was the only one who did that. A $50,000USD shopping cart is a piece of cake.

No

[gowen]

And the more tasks you have going on at once, the more constrained you'll be by the limited desktop area provided by even a screen capable of resolutions as high as 1600x1200. The next logical step is adding a second monitor, or perhaps a third

No. The next logical step is virtual desktops. One monitor, many desktops. You need lots of windows, but no-one is smart enough to want to look at them all at the same time. And Alt-F1/Alt-F2/Alt-F3 is much less likely to give you a serious crick in your neck.

Re:No

[sweetooth]

I dunno, I like the width of having multiple monitors. I have two monitors on both my workstation at the office and on my computer at home. I use a combination of multiple monitors and multiple desktops. I get the amount of room per desktop I want and I get as many desktops as necessary to organize what I'm working on. What I would rather have is one widescreen monitor with multiple desktops so that space wasn't wasted by the CRT's bezels in the middle. I've looked into monitors like that but the cost seems to be a bit too high compared to the price of two high quality standard width monitors.

Re:No

[Cap'n Canuck]

If you're worried about getting a crick in your neck, multi-screen is probably the least of your worries. That kind of activity level suggests that maybe you should be net-shopping for catheter tubes.

Re:No

[DigitalAdrenaline]

This doesn't work when you need to see all of this information more or less simultaneously.

For example. I work in Oil and Gas. I'm not a trader, but I support several of them.

They spend their day watching several different markets at the same time. If there are (say) 4 markets open, each takes basically a full screen to watch. (1200x1024) Add to that 2-3 different instant messanger packages (they are trading with other companies with different standards). When a trade occurs, that particular line changes color for a few seconds, and then fades out. With multiple monitors, I notice the color change. On multiple virtual desktops, I don't.

Our Internet connection is internally valued at several million dollars per minuite. (It's crap, that's a worst case scenario, generally, it doesn't matter for a few minuites here or there.) But anyways, the reason is because that is the value of missing that information which SHOULD appear on screen. Virtual desktops are even worse than a lost network connection, because by design it limits the visual input to a single screen.

A few thousand dollars for video cards, and flat screen monitors, properly arranged is far more productive.

If it's static documents on a few different screens, then there is no problem with virtual terminals. On the other hand, if each screen is displaying valuable dynamic data, then virtual terminals are the wrong solution.

Virtual terminals are the computer equivilent of an old telephone party line. It's better to share 1 phone line between 20 houses than not to have one at all, but it's far better each have your own line.

Re:No

[Rand Race]

Lots of Photoshop users (and Quark, Illo, etc... anything with bunches of palletes) like to have their artwork on one monitor and everything else - toolbars, pallettes, iTunes, whatnot - on a second monitor.

Re:No

[Anonymous Coward]

I do a lot of sound work, and being able to have Cubase open across two monitors is absolutely necessary. I never felt the need for two monitors until I started using Cubase, and let me tell you...having the tracker, the mixer, and 2 or 3 VST plugins open at the same time even eats up both monitors pretty quick. 3 would be really nice.

Re:No

[JaredOfEuropa]

"no-one is smart enough to want to look at them all at the same time."

A while back I set up dual monitors on my computers. There are tons of things that I do on that setup, that are not possible, or at least not as convenient by far on multiple virtual desktops. A few examples:

- The most important one: when writing documents, one often uses reference material. What people tend to do on a single monitor machine, even with multiple desktops, is print out the reference material and keep it next to their computer. I bring up all reference material on the second monitor... yes! I have done away with paper.
- I play games one one screen, and have a browser, Southpark episode or helper program running in the second monitor (for example: Ultima Online on the 1st screen and UO Automap on the second). None of this is very convenient on a multi-desktop configuration, since you need to hide the desktop with game on it to see the other application. While you are looking at the second desktop, something in the game comes along and creams you.
- When doing web design and web scripting, I like having the editing software on one screen and the browser pointed to the scripts under development in the other. I daresay the productivity increase is notable, and again I seriously doubt that a multi-desktop setup with a single monitor will achieve the same convenience.
- Video editing is wonderful on dual head. Video output on one screen, script and controls on the other. Multiple desktops? Forget it.

No... I do not need dual head. But I'll be damned if I ever give it up.

Re:No

[Bishop]

Er. No.

When codeing it is great to have the documents on one screen and the IDE on another. When debugging a third monitor is even better. You can put your program and debugging info on the third monitor leaving lots of room on the main monitor to view your code.

A crick in your neck is nothing compared to carpel tunnel from hitting alt-F1, alt-F2, multiple times just to check if you have the syntax correct. Besides with the second monitor setup just to the left and angled towards me I don't even move my head. I just have to move my eyes.

Re:No

[Anonymous Coward]

Virtual Desktops are all very well, but I like being able to see everything at once. Yes, it really is better than virtual desktops, and yes, I have used them - extensively.

Yes, I can see multiple monitors at once. I guess I just don't have tunnel-vision or something.

As for a crick in my neck... well, I can move my eyeballs left and right to focus on specific things. Maybe it's just one of those evolutionary things...

I use Dualhead in X

[Anonymous DWord]

Two 19" screens on a Matrox G400. Yum! I didn't have any problems getting everything working, and Matrox has decent Linux support, although I wish they'd put out driver updates more than once a year. Kicker dies a lot after I moved to X 4.2, and quite a few people are having similar problems. New drivers are promised Real Soon Now, so we'll see what happens.

I dread having to use computers with just one screen now; I don't think I could ever go back. I'm thinking about hooking up a third monitor, actually. Need a reinforced desk and a small nuclear generator to power all this crap though.

Re:I use Dualhead in X

[Svenne]

My desktop. What more is there to say? ;) Right now, I can't understand how I could ever live without it :)

Re:I use Dualhead in X

[Aardvark99]

Think about all the radiation you're sucking in!

I have 2 21" monitors (ViewSonic p810s) on a Matrox G450... I've been using this setup for maybe 4 years (at work, so I'm in front of them all day)... I'm still waiting to develop some cool super powers...

Re:I use Dualhead in X

[NeoSkandranon]

Is "Funny looking kids" a superpower?

Re:I use Dualhead in X

[Anonymous Coward]

The g400 sucks under Linux. None of the hardware based accelerations are available. Upgrade to the 450 or 5XX models for actual hardware assisted X.

I have both and know.

BTW I have dual monitors for several years now thanks to Matrox and XI software.

Re:I use Dualhead in X

[Anonymous Coward]

I bought a G450 to use with Linux in Dual head with a TV using the TV-OUT dongle supplied.

I knew the G400 worked so didn't think it would be a problem, knowing Matrox's decent linux support all the way back to Redhat 4 and moriginal Millenium and Mystique 2meg cards.

Boy was I disappointed when I found that.
A) TVout didn't work on the G450 in Linux.
B) Matrox weren't planning it.
C) they weren't willing to listen to requests(lots on their support forums).

In the end, what was mean't to be my Media box ended up running XP pro, because the TV-Out worked fantastically with drivers that were kept upto date. Shame really, because the G450 was the one card that I found easy to build 3D support for in Mandrake.

Might have changed now of course, but I doubt it.

Re:I use Dualhead in X

[runderwo]

The g400 sucks under Linux. None of the hardware based accelerations are available.

Um, no offense, but WTF are you talking about? I play hardware-accelerated games all the time with my G400. I'd like you to name a better open-source driver set than Matrox's.

desktop enhancement

[SexyKellyOsbourne]

It's good that all these fancy graphics cards are going to better use than trying to achieve a "constant 60 (fps)" in Doom III. No more will people be able to claim that they achieve optimal desktop usage with a 1MB Cirrus Logic 7440 graphics card.

There's a lot more that could be done for Linux desktops and especially Windows XP, though MacOS leads the way. Everything is like a pdf file, rendered quickly and seamlessly through OpenGL.

It's a shame, however, that third parties have to hack in extended desktop support externally for Windows, as its GUI integration was a truly pitiful idea. With Linux, the source can be modified, but unfortunately companies have little reason to do so.

Re:desktop enhancement

[sfe_software]

It's a shame, however, that third parties have to hack in extended desktop support externally for Windows...

I've run multiple monitors since Win98. In those days the support was pretty poor, but mostly due to applications being unaware of the new situation. Some apps today have issues, but it's becoming rare.

Under Win2k, the multiple-monitor support is great. I have never used third-party software to do this, nor was I aware that any existed (or was necessary).

I used to have issues with certain games and full-screen video, but this seems to have worked itself out over a couple service packs/driver updates/whatever.

I run 3 Voodoo3 cards (all PCI) and an S3 Savage4 (AGP but absolute junk), on 2 17" and two 14" monitors (just because I could... I hate extra unused hardware ;) I run different resolutions and refresh rates.

I can do full-screen video on any of the screens, and games work great on whichever monitor I designated as my "primary monitor" (no longer bound by what BIOS says as was the case w/Win98).

I ran xinerama on RedHat 7.2 a while back, and if setup correctly it does work well. You can't change anything (resolution, placement) without editing XF86Config and restarting X, but I rarely felt the need to do that. Still, even more X11 apps have issues than Windows apps...

I guess I'll go read the article and see what I'm missing with third party software...

Re:desktop enhancement

[be-fan]

Actually, MacOS X renders very little through OpenGL. Quartz 2D software renders onto textures, and those textures are drawn using OpenGL. OpenGL is thus relegated to nothing more than supporting fancy window effects like transparency, shadow, and genie. And the PDF thing has major downsides. I'm guessing the fact that Quartz is tied to PDF is one of the major reasons why they couldn't use OpenGL to accelerate actual drawing.

Going back to one display might suck...

[Sodakar]

...not because of the desktop space that you lose, but because applications will still remember your desktop space as being double, and will leave some of your apps stranded off-screen. Maybe I was just unlucky, but neither software package fixed this for me.

Of course, you can still move main windows via keyboard shortcuts, but certain detachable, child windows of applications (eg, Winamp's Playlist) could not be accessed via keyboard shortcut to move, and were stuck off-screen. The only fix was to re-attach the second display, or uninstall/reinstall Winamp so that it would forget all of its screen positions.

I'm sure there's another way to fix window position memory configs (via registry and what-not), but really -- shouldn't the software take care of this for me? Neither software did much to help me once the second display was removed, and the screen resolution adjusted down to one display. Somewhat thoughtless, IMHO.

Re:Going back to one display might suck...

[NorthWoodsman]

nVidia's nView software should do it; Make sure nView extensions are enabled, then select "Send Application to Monitor 1". That should move the parent as well as all its child windows

Re:Going back to one display might suck...

[Anonymous Coward]

I had exactly the same thing happen to me when dropping back down to two displays, lost windows.

Here's what helps:
-For most apps, hitting that minimize icon on the toolbox which reduces all open windows, then maximimimizing them one-by one, for some reason, fixes the problem.

-For Winamp: Uninstalling and reinstalling didn't fix the problem. I think I installed winamp, searched the drive for the string "Winamp", and the only remaining file on the drive was some winamp config file. Then I deleted that file and reinstalled. Once you know the name of the file though, which I forget, there's no need to unintal winamp, you can just delete that file and winamp regenerates one with sane window position settings.

Too much real estate?...

[dubious9]

Needless to say a lot of people here will complain that nobody will use more than a monitor of screen space, or that two would be over kill.

<rant>Seriously though, developers will take as much space as you can throw at them, and they will be more productive. Really, when will managers and procurement people realize that programmers need bigger screens and faster/better boxen? I'm tired of watching our department clerk get the newest machine simply because she's been here 20 years.</rant>

Re:Three Screens...

[Blimey85]

Yes, three times as many annoying popups while trying to find some decent pr0n! Just what I've been wanting. Thanks for the suggestion!!!

Please answer if you know!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like to know the answer to this too. And I hope that the answer is to my liking. Someone knowledgeable please answer!

New business-model?

[Anonymous Coward]

1) Write free software.
2) ?
3) Get dual monitors.
4) Profit!

Hear, Hear!

[AltGrendel]

I agree, I have a very hard time using a single monitor. I love the Matrox G550 Dual(under Win2k). And yes, under Linux it does lock up for no apparent reason, usually when I'm trying to log out. Very annoying.

Re:Hear, Hear!

[mauryisland]

Not so, from my experiance. Red Hat 7.3 and 8.0 and dual head G550's have never locked up for me.

YMMV, I suppose.

"Cranky Old Guy" and the Mac

[nweaver]

Hell, I remember running a dual head/dual monitor setup back on an old, dusty Mac II with 2 video cards.

Why has it taken >15 years for the Windows world to finally catch up?

Re:"Cranky Old Guy" and the Mac

[asv108]

Why has it taken >15 years for the Windows world to finally catch up?

Where do you get 15 years? Dual Displays was available with NT 4.0.

Re:"Cranky Old Guy" and the Mac

[swfranklin]

Dual Displays was available with NT 4.0

And Win98, for what it was worth.

Re:"Cranky Old Guy" and the Mac

[sheldon]

Hmm, I supported a homebrew GIS solution developed back in the 1980's that utilized a Hercules graphics card for the text interface and a EGA card for graphics.

There's been multi-monitor cards and drivers available since at least Windows 3.1.

I think the point here, is just that now this is not all that rare and it's incredibly easy to setup without buying expensive custom cards.

Re:"Cranky Old Guy" and the Mac

[Anonymous Coward]

BTW, the Commodore 128 supported dual monitors with different aps displayed on each screen. Apple did not invent this...not even close.

Re:"Cranky Old Guy" and the Mac

[Anonymous Coward]

That's nothing new. I remember the days of having a CGA and Hercules adapter in the same machine.

Two heads!?!?!

[Vaulter]

Hpmh. I knew those windows users were freaks...Freaks I say!

Colorgraphic's Predator

[ras_b]

I am currently at work using 4 monitors all run by the Colorgraphic Predator video card. I don't know the technical details of the card (IANAT - i am not a techie) but i must say the setup i have kicks ass. the card is described here

Re:Colorgraphic's Predator

[DigitalAdrenaline]

We tried them. The price can't be beat.

But You haven't tried a Matrox, have you...

You wouldn't go back. The powercolor had OK NT drivers, but they were pretty unfriendly and limited cards compared to the Matrox cards.

And no, I don't work for Matrox.

Re:Colorgraphic's Predator

[easyfrag]

Just wondering, If you're not a techie what do you use your 4 monitors for?

Re:Colorgraphic's Predator

[ras_b]

i use them to look at multiple market charts. these multi-displays are necessary for day traders.

All but Windows?

[Hyped01]

It seems all OS's but Windows allow for positioning storage. OS/2 and eComStation allow it in OS/2's extended attributes, which allows for GUI windows to open in whatever state and/or position as when closed (or in some cases as when the program was instructed to save window positions). From what I understand of some of the virtual desktop implementations of various Linux GUIs and desktop extensions, it is capable of a similar "feat" - and should thus easily be capable of the "massive" jump to storing and reusing desktop/monitor positions.

OS/2 (and thus eCS) also allow via REXX, for window positions to be monitored, restored, moved, etc when apps are opened or closed... takes a little REXX knowledge (litterally a little) and some competent (but minimal... maybe a couple hundred lines if that much) programming and object positioning and state (which is what it really is under OS/2 & eCS) can be enhanced above it's current capabilities.

Looks like once again companies had to spend time writing around a MS deficiency.

Oh well...

-Rob

Re:All but Windows?

[Gilgaron]

nView allows Windows to remember where they were... not all applications support this, however.

Re:Because michael said "no"(OT, surprisesurprise)

[SirSlud]

[rant]
I personally suspect the "-1, Redundant" mod point was made specifically to deal with posts that link to "mod abuse" journal entries or threads.

Not that I neccessarily deny the existance of the abuse, but c'mon, who're you englightening here?

Some might sympathize to the cause, but certainly not the methods used by /. users who feel they've been abused. (hint: most people stop caring once the personal insults start flying)
[/rant]

Extra New Business Model For You!

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Read about this cool operating system Leenux
2. Install it on your Mom's new PC which worked perfectly fine with Windows XP.
3. Stop Showering
4. ????
5. Wake up one morning and realize you are a fag.
6. Suicide!

Your post is extremely unoriginal homo - come up with something on your own.

Windows 98 supported this if you had

[Anonymous Coward]

a second PCI card.

Plus, there's the little-known fact that michael, is a flamebaiting twat.

In case ol' mikey gets it into his head to delete cetan's educational journal entry, here it is:

I'm writing this entry to point my new sig to effectively. This link will take you to a thread in a seemingly small article. What's important to understand is that the /. editor, michael, decided to yet again abuse the moderation system by modding every single one of my posts to -1. He removed 30 karma points in one article because I did not like his extra "comment" at the end of the article he posted. It's sad how pathetic michael is.

Here's the link: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=40037&threshol d=-1&commentsort=0&tid=134&mode=nested&cid=4267381

Personal review: They all suck.

[Cecil]

Why do all the graphics card companies feel a need to come up with their own monitor spanning software, which is without exception, garbage. I mean, Windows sucks, but there is one thing they did *absolutely fucking right*, and that's their multi-monitor support.

It's beautiful. It works extremely well. It's flexible and well-supported.

Why must each of the graphics card companies reinvent the wheel, and make their wheel square, and connect in a different way?

I did IT with my current employer before moving up to my current programming job, and I remember how many types of graphics cards and versions of graphics drivers we went through before we found one that was even remotely acceptable. A particular version of the Matrox drivers for the Millenium G450 have a little checkbox hidden away during the install (and only during the install) that will let you install the "extra" support for Windows' multi-display.

Note to multi-display driver writers: No one (that I know at least) wants windows that maximize across monitors. No one wants toolbars that span across monitors. No one wants resize-handles on their maximized windows if you are kind enough to provide the option to NOT maximize across monitors. Not everyone wants both their monitors at the same resolution (GRR! that one really frustrates me). Not everyone can run both monitors at the same refresh rate, either. And NOT EVERYONE puts their second monitor to the right of the first one.

All of these things are handled flawlessly by Windows' multi-monitor support. The same multi-monitor support that's been there since Windows 98SE. (or was it Windows 98?) Let it do what it does best, and focus your energy somewhere less counter-productive, thanks.

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[debilo]

I did IT with my current employer...

I hope you used some kind of protection?

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[BrookHarty]

I mean, Windows sucks...

The NT line of windows has been great workstations with multimonitor support. I'm not sure why you think it sucks for a desktop, but for a plain desktop (not games) there are hardly any features you want that these new gfx cards dont supply. Plus there are tweaks and registry edits to fix most of the little forgotten problems out.

And NOT EVERYONE puts their second monitor to the right of the first one.

All 3 cards show will let you arrange your monitor to the left/right/top, you just need to select the dual monitor and select orientation.

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[Phosphor3k]

NVIDIA didnt reinvent it. They basically threw a few options on top of the built in windows multi-monitor support. What did they add, you ask? How about virtual desktop support. And...err, well, that's all they really added, but they did it well. All of the options to move windows around from virtual dekstop to virtual desktop are there, including moving just a particualr window, or all the windows associated to a particular app. Additionally, there is a task/desktop switcher that one can configure, which gives the user a windows-like alt-tab, with which to scroll through the various virtual desktops AND the individual applications in any given desktop. All of the hotkeys are completely user configurable. You can have at least 32 virtual desktops (highest I tried). Best of all, all of the virtual desktop options work correctly when using multiple monitors.

Granted, I didnt read the article, but at least have some idea of what you are talking about before you go spouting off about it. BTW, the features I describe apply to the latest non-WHQL drivers from NVIDIA. I have tested all of the above features with both two-headed NVIDIA cards, and one single headed Nvidia in combonation with a single headed non-NVIDIA card.

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[Aardvark99]

> No one (that I know at least) wants windows that maximize across monitors

Ummm, I guy I work with leaves his IDE (Visual Studio) maximized across both screens... and manages his MDI windows among the two screens. (he uses a track ball too... geesh!)

Actually where I work most developers use dual monitors. Since I've been here I've used at least three different setups (including an expensive Appian Jeronimo card). By far the Matrox G450 has been the best... mainly for the fact it was the first single card solution with true WINDOWS multi-monitor support. Amen to Cecil's rant on the subject!

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[Cecil]

Yes, in fact, I used partitioning of my mind (Mmm, Sword of Truth series) to protect it from the MSCE who runs the place. ... And yes, I know that's not what you meant.

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[poot_rootbeer]

The same multi-monitor support that's been there since Windows 98SE. (or was it Windows 98?)

It was 98 first edition. I've been running a dual-head on a Win98 box for years -- the primary display is an ATI All-In-Wonder Pro AGP driving a 17" KDS Avitron. The secondary is a cheap ATI Charger PCI card I got for $15, driving an old fixed-frequency 18" HP Workstation display that I found in a dumpster (with the aid of a sync-on-green adaptor and a VGA-to-RGB-coax cable).

The drawbacks are that 3D acceleration only works on the primary display, as do the TV- and Video-in features. And the PCI video card obviously doesn't perform as well as the AGP, even at lower color depths (the two displays are independently variable, which is nice).

But having a big secondary desktop to shuffle less complex windows to, like IM Buddy Lists or telnet sessions, is definitely useful. I only wish I could use the larger display as my primary, but given that PCs aren't even supposed to be able to drive this particular piece of hardware, I guess I can't complain.

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[nathanh]

No one (that I know at least) wants windows that maximize across monitors.

Sure they do, for video walls.

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[Screaming Lunatic]

All of these things are handled flawlessly by Windows' multi-monitor support. The same multi-monitor support that's been there since Windows 98SE. (or was it Windows 98?) Let it do what it does best, and focus your energy somewhere less counter-productive, thanks.

OpenGL is not accelerated with Win dual-monitor support. It falls back to software rendering. I'm not sure if it is the same case with D3D. That's what nVidia, ATI, Matrox, etc are trying to provide.

When debugging games, graphics apps, etc. It is nice to have your game running fullscreen in one monitor, while your debugger spews stuff into the second monitor.

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[Anonymous Coward]

And if you're a Mac user, the Mac has had multiple monitor support since System 7.0 way back in the early 90s.

Re:Personal review: They all suck.

[Cecil]

Actually, that's entirely untrue. There are a couple tricks you have to do to, but it's OpenGL that does not (by default) support multi-monitor configurations seamlessly, not the other way around.

It was an important discussion around here before we moved some of our drawing code into OpenGL. Once we solved that little problem though, and wrote a class to get it all initialized properly, all was good, and writing dual-monitor friendly OpenGL apps is easy.

Don't ask "Well then, explain how?" because I'm not obliged or willing to say. The code is not GPL. But it can be done.

As for your comment about debugging software using two monitors, I wholeheartedly agree, and couldn't live without it anymore.

A recent study

[jukal]

concludes, that in the future the gene base of an average software developer will combine genes from the predatory spider. A representative from a major graphics card vendor stated: "cool".

Appendix:
On Predatory spider's vision: The predatory spider has eight simple eyes of various sizes that respond to key aspects of the visual field. Tactile sensations derived from the web are more important to spiders than vision is

I don't understand...

[TheSHAD0W]

I'm running a nVidia-based dual-headed system and have been greatly disappointed with its performance. I used to run an ATI system which was completely awful; the drivers were so badly kludged they disrupted my system's operation. nVidia's drivers are much more stable, thankfully, but ATI's were able to do so much more...

When I read the review, however, they showed a snapshot of nVidia's nView Desktop Manager control panel, and it has a LOT more options than mine, including playing with individual application settings... All the features I've been missing. Wow, I figured, I must be using an old driver package. Updated it... And the window hasn't changed.

Is there a separate upgrade package for the nView drivers?

Re:I don't understand...

[TheAwfulTruth]

That's probably the beta 40.xx drivers. Look around the web for them. I've installed them on one machine at home with 2 nvidia cards in it and they seems stable enough (no problems so far)

Re:I don't understand...

[BrookHarty]

The biggest things that ATI doesnt have in its control panel that Nvidia does.

1. Color Brilliance enhancer, I just turn up the RGB on the ATI, but the NVIDIA control panel makes it easier.

2. 16bit AA modes, the ATI decided to turn off AntiAliasing in 16 bit modes, bad for some flight sims and multiplayer games. CounterStrike can run in 32 bit mode (+32bpp) so you can get the AA goodness.

But the TV/monitor selector is very easy to use and is laid out correctly. They beat Nvidia on this point. And with the dual 400mhz RAMDAC's expect some execellent output from the ATIs.

Re:I don't understand...

[jpdbest]

You might want to check out nVidia's Detonator 40 download page ( XP/2000, 95/98/ME ). Here's a blurb on Detonator 40:

Detonator 40 is the beta graphics driver for all NVIDIA Graphics Processing Units (GPUs). Detonator 40 supports 2D graphics, DirectX 8.1, OpenGL 1.4, nView Desktop Management software version 2.0, NVRotate. NVKeystone, Digital Vibrance Control and includes a new control panel and the CineFX emulator. Through NVIDIA's Unified Driver Architecture, Detonator software supports all GPUs below in a single driver.

Note the nView _2.0_ in that description. Perhaps it has what you're looking for.

Re:I don't understand...

[jpdbest]

Oops, forgot the obligatory link to the nView page: nView Multi-display Technology

This page outlines some of the improvements made for nView 2.0 over nView v1.0.

Thanks for the public service announcement

[Anonymous Coward]

You're precisely the kind of person that needs to spend less time here. GET OUT MORE.

WHAT"S UP REGISTERED TROLL? FUCKING PYZOWNED.

[Anonymous Coward]

lolorz.

Doom III will be sooo sweet

[DonniKatz]

Can you imagine the possibilities. 3 Plasma TV Screens that are compatible with a PC. Some crazy 4K Alienware PC AND DOOM III. Oh, that's right, I'm poor...

Re:Doom III will be sooo sweet

[Anonymous Coward]

Alienware? Pfft. Not that hot, those boxen, regardless of their ads. Roll your own and watercool it.

Now Doom III, that's something to wait for :-)

Re:Doom III will be sooo sweet

[DonniKatz]

yeah man, that water cool stuff looks sweeeeet. Of course, if there is a leak, your fucked.

Dual-display cards suck. Use TWO cards

[Brother52]

I'm writing this from a machine with two displays and TWO cards: Matrox G400 AGP and Matrox Millenium II PCI. This is what I came to after a long quest for a dualhead setup.

Just a few points:

1. There're still very few dualhead cards on the marked, thus much less chance to find one with the features you need.
2. They're generally overpriced, probably because they're percieved as a high-end product.
3. If you go for one, READ THE FINE PRINT. For example, the dualhead Matrox G450 has a DEGRADED DAC, compared to G400, which isn't noted anywhere but in the raw specs (and NOT in pretty side-by-side comparisons on the Matrox's site)

And while with the dual card setup one card has to be PCI, you can still build a way more powerful combination, compared to any dualhead card.

Re:Dual-display cards suck. Use TWO cards

[swb]

I run a dual-head setup at work on a Matrox G450 (21" @ 1600x1200) and don't have any gripes about it, and I do like the fact that its one video card, not two.

There's also the problem these days of *finding* a PCI based video card that doesn't totally suck goat testes.

I've been looking for a GeForce 4 card that supported dual displays on one card. Most have two connectors (DVI & VGA) but the "experts" in the computer stores have said that they *don't* drive dual monitors, it's multiple connectors/same signal.

Re:Dual-display cards suck. Use TWO cards

[Anonymous Coward]

works like a charm. I have a ti-4600 and, up until one of the monitors packed it in, have been using it for several months in a dual monitor setup. The only real requirement is to make sure the DVI port is DVI-I if you intend to connect a VGA monitor to it (adapter required.).

DVI-D is usefull only if you have a flat-panel that supports digital in. (which is probably what I will buy to replace the dead CRT)

Re:Dual-display cards suck. Use TWO cards

[JaredOfEuropa]

There are quite a few GForce4 cards out there that support Dual Head... Check Tom's hardware, and don't trust the people in the computer stores. Clerks in most stores know dick about such technical details.

Re:Dual-display cards suck. Use TWO cards

[JaredOfEuropa]

With all due respect: nonsense! What you said may have been true 1,5 years ago, but it certainly isn't true anymore.

There are plenty of dual head cards that meet the needs of most users, including good 2d or 3d performance, or both. Gainward made a very decent one based on the Geforce 2 400; I had one and it worked perfectly. When it blew up (don't ask...) I replaced it with a Radeon 8500 dual head card, which is what I am using now. Good performance all round.

I am looking to build a new box and I'll probably end up using one of the many dual-head Geforce 4 cards. Check them out: you may like what you see. It seems that many of these cards that are built for top performance on a single monitor, will support a second one as well. They are reasonably priced as well.

Re:Dual-display cards suck. Use TWO cards

[Brother52]

there are plenty of dual head cards that meet the needs of most users

Most users are absolutely happy with one monitor. The point is that dual-head is used by pros and geeks who tend to have very elaborate feature needs. One wants top-notch 3D performance, another wants Linux compatibility, third can't live without good video capture, etc.

For the hardware-savvy, there's no need for dual-head cards as long as you can get a decent PCI (think Matrox) card to put in as second and choose ANY available on Earth to run as first. It's just plain common sense: not to limit your choice to a very small portion of the market.

Someone provide a link please?!?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd buy that for a dollar!

ATI Hydravision Xfree86 Xinerama Enlightenment.

[Neon Spiral Injector]

I just got my ATI Radeon 7500 working in X. Here are some things I found.

First my biggest problem was the card will only see monitors that are connected when last reset. I spent 2 days trying to get the card to see a monitor I connected after Linux had booted. It was just dumb luck that we had an extended power outage that drained my UPS. When I powered back up, I still had the monitor turned on, and it got initiliaed by the card.

Second the DVI port is the primary display, if you have both connected. I guess that makes sense, but I had them backwards in my head cause I have 2 VGA CRTs, and had to use an adaptor on the DVI port to hook up my (second) monitor.

I like to configure my XFree86 by just typing `X -configure`. That doesn't detect the second monitor (and due to a bug I'll get to in a second configures the primary monitor incorrectly). The configuration file created by X was a good starting point, but I would have to manually add the settings for the second monitor.

What was odd, is X was being displayed on my primary monitor, but the settings in the file were from my secondary. Looking at the log file created, it seems that the Radeon was reading the DCC information from the second monitor (and after I got both displays initilizing both monitors were being seen with the same DCC info even though they are very different displays).

What I ended up doing was searching the Internet for some sample XF86Config files that had Xinerama enabled. I found a few some even for the Radeon 7500. To get the correct monitor info. I just plugged one monitor into the real VGA port, started X and looked in the log for the timings. I then hard coded the values for my primay display to override the falsely detected DCC infomation (X gives you big warnings when you manual specify timings higher than the monitor reports, which normally would be a good thing, but in this case I was right, so I'll have to live with the warnings).

After I plugged in the right values, and added the approate lines to my "-configure" generated file I had X running on two different sized displays with my desktop being stretched across them.

Also note that DRI is disabled in X on the ATI Radeon 7500 when using Xinerama, which means no hardware accelorated OpenGL (just like in Windows on this card).

As for my window manager Enlightenment 0.16.5 it is somewhat Xinerama aware. There are a few little bugs. First it likes to put things were I don't have a desktop due to me running two different resolutions on the displays. That probally won't effect most people. The biggest pain is it doesn't maximize windows correctly when they are on the second head. I don't maximize much, so I have just learned to expand the windows to size by hand.

The virtual desktops and multiple desktops of Enlightenment work just as before, they are just twice as large now. I'm sure I could have as many as I wanted, only limited by memory. The pager display shows everything correctly, include the black hole where there is no desktop.

Applications tend to pop up menus half on one screen, half on the other, Enlightenment also suffers from this, but not as much as I usually am clicking in the middle of the screen, but around the shared edge things get annonying.

All in all I can live with it. I don't play games so OpenGL isn't a big deal. I have my webbrower and mail on one screen and an Eterm or two on my other where I'm doing work. What ever I'm focused on most I'll put on the main display. If I'm just compiling something big I it is nice to put it over on the second head so I can keep an eye on it, but focus on /. until the build is finished.

Re:ATI Hydravision Xfree86 Xinerama Enlightenment.

[Neon Spiral Injector]

Oh yeah, my dream setup is to have a Matrox Parhelia and a 9X Media 3 pane display.

Re:ATI Hydravision Xfree86 Xinerama Enlightenment.

[hypnotik]

Which drivers are you using? The stock 4.2 or the Gatos experimental drivers? Does the XVidio extension work for you?

The reasons for these questions is that a client of mine has an ATI Radeon 8500 that he wants to use Xinerama with. He plays alot of movies on his computer, and would like to be able to watch them and work at the same time. The problem I found is that the Radeon drivers that ship with XFree 4.2 don't support the XVideo extensions cleanly (a black box hanging about in the middle of the primary display while the Xine window is in the other) and the Gatos drivers segfault whenever X11 is started (works fine on either monitor singularly).

Anyone have any clues on how to fix this?

Re:ATI Hydravision Xfree86 Xinerama Enlightenment.

[heatmzr]

I set up a dual-head display this morning using Xinerama.

X -config worked well. In my case the configuration was RH 8.0 with an i815e chipset internal AGP video and a C&T 69000 on a PMC site.
The only problem I had was a V_BIOS error with the 815. I'm not sure what that was all about, but I changed the bios to us the 815 AGP card as default and everthing was cool.

you don't need special hardware

[g4dget]

On Linux, and I believe under Windows as well, the window system itself can make any collection of graphics cards appear as a single desktop. You don't need hardware support or special vendor software--just plug in a bunch of PCI graphics cards. If you do have get hardware for multiple screens, you get a few advantages, like being able to have certain hardware features work across split screens.

On the whole, I found that, as usual, configuring multiple monitors (I use nVidia cards, although I don't recommend you buy them) was a little more work under Linux than under Windows, but that it ended up working better. X11 seems to provide a better abstraction layer, insulating applications from the idiosyncracies of the underlying hardware. Furthermore, on X11, window placement and management has been factored into a separate application, so you aren't tied to vendor-supplied hacks in order to make things work with multiple screens--you just use any window manager that supports Xinerama.

Linux compatibility

[tjw]

I've been using a multimonitor XFree86 setup since the release of XFree86 4.0.

First I used two 3dfx Voodoo3's to power my 3200x1200 resolution. I was constantly annoyed by the lack of 3D hardware acceleration, so I disabled Xinerama mode, and ran X in DualHead mode. The only differnce in doing this was that I could no longer move windows from one screen to the other. The mouse cursor traveled freely between screens. Granted this was annoying too, but at least I could play quake2 again.

Then I happened upon a nice tidbit on the Xpert mailing list. That is, you can run Xinerama mode with NVidia cards and get hardware accelerated 3D on one of the heads. I replaced one of the voodoo3's with a TNT2 and I've been happy ever since.

I'm always thinking about upgrading my video card, and these one card solutions seem like the way to go. With NVidia's nView and Matrox's Powerdesk? you can have both heads appear to XFree86 as one logical screen and therefore run hardware accelerated 3d on BOTH SCREENS. I read that this was suppored by both Matrox and NVidia XFree86 drivers, so I started shopping for my next video card. But the dilema that I've constantly run into, is one that is not even addressed in this article. That is, the Max Resolution of the second monitor is severly limited. I have yet to find a single card solution that will handle 3200x1200 in 24bpp (or even 16 for that matter).

Perhaps the new Parhelia's will do it, I'm not sure. I've had to do a fair amount of digging just to find out what I do know. It seems like the only place that has reliable information about the issue is the complaining that goes on in mailinglists from people dissatisfied with the products they have purchased.

Re:Linux compatibility

[SnarkDogma]

Parhelia can certainly do 3200x1200. In fact, it does it as 3200x1200 or 2x1600x1200, depending on your preferences. In dual-head mode, the two displays (DVI or DAC) have identical capabilities.

And.. that's 32bpp.. with full 3d accelleration going on. For multiheaded 3d, I don't think you can beat it. It isn't cheap, and it isn't the fastest beast by any means, but if you need multiheaded 3d, go with the Parhelia.

OMG dudes I just learned something new!

[Anonymous Coward]

SCORE +6 INFORMATIVE!

SCORE +20 COMMON SENSE

michael, is a flamebaiting twat.

In case ol' mikey gets it into his head to delete cetan's educational journal entry, here it is:

I'm writing this entry to point my new sig to effectively. This link will take you to a thread in a seemingly small article. What's important to understand is that the /. editor, michael, decided to yet again abuse the moderation system by modding every single one of my posts to -1. He removed 30 karma points in one article because I did not like his extra "comment" at the end of the article he posted. It's sad how pathetic michael is.

Here's the link: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=40037&threshol d=-1&commentsort=0&tid=134&mode=nested&cid=4267381

It isn't that bad.

[AltGrendel]

On the Matrox G550 in Win2k it puts the window in a close corner where I can grab it with the mouse.

And yes, you can usually right click on the program in the task bar and select move, then use the cursor keys to put it on the desktop. I don't use Winamp, so I can't comment on that.

WTF, get the real ATI 9700, not the 9000

[BrookHarty]

Graphics Cards Tested
NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4600
ATI Radeon 9000 Pro 64MB
Matrox Parhelia-512 128MB

WTF, why is he testing the 9000? They mention the 9700, but went with the 9000 for benchmarks. This is purely absurd.

The 9700 is 4x faster than the 9000, and 2x the 4600 in these fps benchmarks. The 9000 isnt even a replacement for the 8500 out. The 9500 is the replacement, and its not even out yet.

BTW, I run the 9700 dual, playing counterstrike on a 21 inch monitor and a 60inch projection at the same time (mirror mode). The tv output at 1024x768 (svhs) is crystal clear, and is truely amazing.

Re:WTF, get the real ATI 9700, not the 9000

[Anonymous Freak]

Because, as was mentioned multiple times, the point of the benchmarks wasn't to compare video cards (as had been done multiple times before in previous reviews) but to compare single versus dual monitors.

Re:WTF, get the real ATI 9700, not the 9000

[BrookHarty]

Because, as was mentioned multiple times, the point of the benchmarks wasn't to compare video cards (as had been done multiple times before in previous reviews) but to compare single versus dual monitors.

But he did compare benchmarks in many FPS's. The 9700 will have faster dual video gaming than the 9000.

Re:WTF, get the real ATI 9700, not the 9000

[Anonymous Freak]

Yes, he did compare benchmarks. But again, this was not meant to compare the gaming value of the various cards, but to compare the multiple-monitor setups of them. The benchmarks were done to show that there wasn't a significant slowdown going from one monitor to two, and that the various methods of multi-monitor setups do not slow the system down. You can extrapolate that to the 9700 if you want to, their results should translate to it just fine. They probably just didn't have a 9700 handy.

Why windows only?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why the hell is this "necessarily" a Windows comparison?

Multihead works out of the box for XFree86 (at least in 2D) with multiple graphics cards in Xinerama mode - I run FreeBSD with X and KDE on dual 17" monitors at 1024x768, giving me a nice 2048x768 desktop.

Last I heard, dual-head displays on single cards were a little hacky under X (possibly do not work) - anyone care to comment?

Actually, allow me to vent about NVIDIA OpenGL support under FreeBSD - 2D works fine, but 3D acceleration is not supported. I'm sick and tired of NVIDIA pissing around with their closed source drivers that barely work on Linux. A year ago rumour had it that NVIDIA would be doing something "real soon now" - and no luck.

I'm | | this close to going out and buying two ATI cards - with their open driver policy - suprise! Their hardware is well supported!

To NVIDIA: support the open source community - or go home and stop pretending that you do.

And to anyone who's still anchored to Windows and Microsoft: the sooner you jump, the less likely you are to go down with the ship.

Triple headed Linux beast of doom

[pergamon]

NOTE: With nView, the two displays have to be beside each other under X.

This caused me to look at using multiple cards instead of multiple headed cards.

I have one 21" and two 17" monitors, and I wanted the primary display (21", middle, AGP) to be able to be upgraded seperately from the secondaries (PCI, one on either side of the primary), as I have no interest in spanning 3D games across screens. Granted, I could have done three with the Matrox card, but then I'd always have to upgrade to another 3-monitor card. The solution I went with was to have one nVidia AGP card for the primary (currently a TNT2 Ultra, to be upgraded later) and two GForce 2 PCI cards for the secondaries. The GF2s are plenty fast for 2D, and fast enough to run small 3D accelerated toys/apps/screensavers too. The only downsides are the use of more expansion slots than using a dual-headed card and that 3D acceleration won't span. The upsides are that each one is running full speed, they're completely independant so multiple resolutions/frequencies is less of a problem, and the primary display can be upgraded seperately from the secondaries. I believe I could also run seperate X servers on each card if that ever became useful.

So if you want spanning 3D acceleration or are low on expansion slots, go with a multihead card. Otherwise, think about doing it this way.

OK, so there isn't a lot of real content in this post, but I thought I'd share a setup success story. When doing multi-card multi-head systems I'd *highly* recommend sticking with the same chip line/maker, and I'd just as highly recommend it be nVidia. Getting these three cards working together couldn't have been simpler...

Re:Triple headed Linux beast of doom

[slamb]

NOTE: With nView, the two displays have to be beside each other under X.

I really don't like nVidia's X11 driver's support for dual monitors. It does this stupid "TwinView"/"SecondMonitorHorizSync"/"MetaModes"/"T winViewOrientation" thing in the screen section rather than having two Monitor and Screen sections. It means you have to specify the settings for the second monitor in a non-standard way, Xinerama support doesn't work right, and you have fewer options for placement.

With the multiple card approach, yeah, it works better. You can use XFree86's native support for multiple monitors, which is superior.

Re:Triple headed Linux beast of doom

[pabs]

I have a GeForce 2 TwinView and a Geforce 4 Ti4600. Xinerama and Xinerama-aware applications -- Xine, E16, feh, etc -- work just fine with either of them.

RE: Triple headed Linux beast of doom

[altair1]

I also have a triple headed machine at home with a Geforce2 and older matrox cards. I agree with your advice about keeping the cards separate.

If you want a 3 head machine for cheap, I'd reccommend getting Matrox Millenium II PCI cards ($20 on ebay). You can stick up to 4 of them in one machine. I have an AGP Geforce2 as my center display, and use that for games. The Mellenium IIs are plenty enough for stuff like xterms and web browser windows, and the geforce card runs games well. It was all surprisingly easy to get working.

I dual boot linux and XP, both OSses support the display set up fine. XP acts kind of bizarre when you start a game on the center display and it changes resolutions though.

If anyone wants my XF86Config file I'd be happy to post it.

To confirm your belief about running separate X servers on each display: yes that is possible, I've done it before. Its a good way to get everything debugged as you're getting it all configured. The problem with separate X servers is that they would be conflicting for your input devices. A better way would be to use 1 X server, but configure it for multiple displays. Each display will be separate and will have its own minor display number (:0.0, :0.1, :0.2) and can be at separate resolutions/refresh rates. The mouse can be moved across displays and keyboard input will follow mouse focus. However with separate displays, you can't do things like drag windows across monitors. Its better to use Xinerama, which makes them all into one big display. Enlightenment works well with multi heads.

large monitor

[crow]

Dual monitors may be less expensive, but at work I have a 24" 16:10 ratio monitor. It's so wide that it feels like having two monitors, only there's no seam between them.

Yup; beta drivers.

[TheSHAD0W]

http://www.nvidia.com/view.asp?IO=winxp-2k_archive

Shows the latest signed driver (3.0.8.2) and the new drivers up to 4.0.7.2, with nView v.2.0.

Aye...

[Anonymous Coward]

There's the rub. Getting X to work with a single card can be virtually impossible. Especially with matrox cards and the way they upgrade their ID strings 5x faster than the X config files can keep up with them.

hmm..

[talks_to_birds]

"..but it's interesting to consider how Linux, X, and various desktop managers would match up with these solutions in terms of features and abilities.."

WTF?

I've felt for years that Window$ is ludicrously outdated in this regard.

Even on my Linux, CLI-based firewall box I've got six consoles running, and I can scroll through them in order, left-to-right or right-to-left, using the little "windows" key just out past the <alt> keys at each end of the space bar.

Every user-space Linux box I've got has at least eight full-sized desktops defined by default, under either KDE or Gnome.

Put this sort of a setup up on a 21" monitor, and you're good to go...

Hell, even Opera running under Linux has multiple distinct windows available; I typically have six to eight running at a time. (I understand IE finally is getting a clue about this, but I wouldn't know from personal experience..)

So, what's the BFD about having two monitors?

Whoa! There's Micro$oft innovation for you!

t_t_b

Re:hmm..

[Anonymous Coward]

So, what's the BFD about having two monitors?

Simple - much as I love virtual desktops, they're only virtual - you can only see one of them at a time.

As it is, they combine well with multi-head. Keep a couple of browser windows of documentation on one screen, while using multi-desktops on the other screen to do work.

Virtual Desktops on Windows...

[SlashChick]

"The next logical step is virtual desktops."

I absolutely agree. There is a program called VirtuaWin for Windows that does this, too. If you're using a Windows box and miss your virtual desktop goodness, now you can have it.

I set up VirtuaWin to use Ctrl-Left and Ctrl-Right to cycle around desktops, but it's pretty infinitely flexible -- you can assign key shortcuts to each desktop (like you're mentioning) as well.

This program is definitely worth checking out. It's even GPL -- how weird is that for a Windows program? ;)

Re:Virtual Desktops on Windows...

[BrookHarty]

For XP you can get Microsoft Powertoys Virtual Desktop manager for free also.

IF you turn on all the screen wipes and gfx goodies, you need a very fast cpu and gfx card thou. Its fairly quick if you turn all eye-candy off.

Excellent program for missing features

[Poppageorgio]

I run a dual monitor setup at home and work, using Windows XP. I found a program called UltraMon that added much needed features. You can run 2 different screen savers, different wallpaper on the monitors, and gives you a handy little button to quickly move and re-size windows between monitors with one click. .

quite simple

[Anonymous Coward]

Multimonitor has been supported by XFree86 since version 4. You don't need any extra drivers or software - it just works so long as you have supported hardware. Newer dual-head cards may have problems.

(1) Install Linux (or FreeBSD).
(2) Run xfreecfg (or similar) in graphical mode (wait a while - about 2 minutes - while it probes your hardware and sorts it all out).
(3) Marvel at the fact that it just found, detected and initialised all your graphics cards and monitors and you're staring at the configuration program in multimonitor mode.
(4) Click the 'Save' button, the click 'Quit'.
(5) Run 'startx' to enjoy multimonitor X.
(6) Tweak your /usr/X11/lib/X11/XF86Config (or similar location) file if the desktops are not arranged correctly (ie: swap 'leftof' for 'rightof'; edit the resolutions and bitdepth)

For more information about that configuration file 'man XF86Config' will help; as will a google.com search for 'multimonitor xfree86' or something similar.

Re:quite simple

[bumby]

(7) ???
(8) Profit?

ehmm.. Okey, maybe not. I couldn't resist. Sorry

Re:quite simple

[MWelchUK]

As long as you don't want to use an OpenGL card and a non-openGL card + Have GLX enabled for gaming on the OpenGL card.

Can't seem to get that sorted - not using both monitors as one X-session anyway.

Xinerama

[aphor]

It's called "Xinerama" and it's part of XFree86 4. Your window manager is probably capable of application/windowID/group position memory, etc. I know Gnome/E and Gnome/Sawfish are, and I suspect KDE is also. You can do a helluvalot in xrdb, which is all the windowmanagers do... and you can do that however you wanna.

Re:Xinerama

[donutz]

as a side note, you need to compile kdebase and qt both with xinerama support enabled (it's not by default). If you don't compile in xinerama support, KDE will work when you running Xinerama mode, but you'll get windows maximized across all screens, windows in dead areas (if you have different resolutions on each screen) and other annoyances. Fortunately recompiling the above two packages is pretty easy.

Works good for me!

[philibob]

I'm using dual and I'll never go back. It's great just being able to throw things on the second monitor that aren't worthy of running right in front of your face all the time, (eg. winamp, trillian, task manager, etc.)

Works GREAT in Photoshop (Window > Documents > New Window) so you have one preview full-size image and one that you can zoom/pan around in and work on.

Also a life saver in Director where my secondary has the Lingo Dictionary that I can scan through for all those "obscure" commands and references.

I started running dual in Win98 with a Voodoo Banshee and a PCI Matrox Millennium, then a GF2mx in win2k, currently using a Quadro4 700xgl in XP.

Re:Works good for me!

[GigsVT]

throw things on the second monitor that aren't worthy of running right in front of your face all the time, (eg. winamp, trillian, task manager, etc.

This is what everyone with virtual desktops does.

one preview full-size image and one that you can zoom/pan around in and work on.

Graphics work is a definite score for two monitors, I agree. Most of the original dual monitor workstations in the 80s were CAD stuff with one monochrome and one high res, so they could see what they were working on in almost real time.

It sounds like you have never used virtual desktops. You should try it if you haven't before.

Re:Works good for me!

[Diaspar]

virtual desktops is a real pain. not even close to the convenience of having dual monitors. i've tried both, and have dual monitor setup at the moment. with dual desktops, you still have to switch between the desktops, vs. just glancing over on a second monitor.
i'm not into gaming or graphics work, but there are a great number of advantages to a dual-monitor setup, most of which you don't even think of when you get it (got mine g400 dual as an experiment, now never going back).

Multi-head + multiple virtual desktops in X

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a serious problem with using multi-head cards in X (I don't know about Windows). Suppose you want to use multiple desktops on _each_ of the monitors (say, Window Maker's workspaces). Xinerama is not what you want in this case (as it will stretch each desktop across multiple monitors). Well, you can add multiple Screen sections to XF86Config and it works okay.. until you find out that you are really unable to move a window from screen 1 to screen 2 after it has been opened. Each started application is confined to its screen forever. It makes your multi-head setup not so cool, trust me. (And from experience, I can tell you that my second screen is not displaying anything useful 90% of the time; if you have to choose between a bigger display and 2 displays, pick the first option.)

NVIDIA Quadro4 200 NVS

[Anonymous Coward]

I run the above NVIDIA card and am quite impressed. I mostly do software development but I do occaisionally play 3D games. I have two 18" LCDs and dual DVI was a must. That severely limited my choices. This NVIDIA card was only about $125 and I am quite impressed with NVIDIA's new multimonitor drivers. So many wonderful features!

In the future I hope NVIDIA will release a higher end GeForce with dual DVI capabilities. The Quadro4 has "ok" 3D performance but it isn't that great.

I've got two big ones

[Anonymous Coward]

Size does matter ;-)

I've got the gainward Ti 4600 running two 22" monitors and it's great. I totally recommend it.

I did have to hack the registry to make it all work just great in win2k but a google groups search revealed the answer pretty quickly.

I look at a single 17" monitor and want to stick my ATM card in it.

Single monitor sucks just like a single CPU sucks.

For all you poor losers running one of each I have just one word for you; Upgrade.

Old hat for MacOS

[dremel]

My experience with Macintosh only goes back as far as System 7, but ven then, the "Monitors" control panel consisted of a picture of the monitors you had attached to your system and the ability to drag them around until the represented the physical arrangement of your monitors. Also, you dragged a picture of the menu bar from one monitor to another to represent where your menu bar should be.

Re:Old hat for MacOS

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows has done it natively for 5 years. Who gives a shit. You don't hear a bunch of Windows people saying: "What? Mac OS X is the first MacOS that has a decent kernel? Rock solid multitasking and memory protection? That's old hat for Windows... it's been doing it since NT 3.1."

Re:Three Screens...

[Metallic Matty]

Hrrm, I seemed to have forgotten to marked that anonymous coward... damn.

Yes

[Anonymous Coward]

no one is smart enough to want to look at them all the time

What the hell is wrong with you? :)

I personally find virtual desktops are insanely stupid ideas that are useless. Why would I want to partition my work space into areas? Maybe they're useful for people who never close programs (perhaps this is what you do), but if I'm done with something, I'll close it. Anything active (compiling, background process, etc) I want on screen and visible (and if I don't I'll minimise it) - and multiple monitors expand the working viewspace.

I frequently have the program I'm debugging running on one monitor, the debugger itself visible on the other (this is a godsend for graphical programs) - because I have plenty of screen space.

If you're running Windows, KDE, Gnome, OS/X or just about any sort of window manager - you have a task list somewhere on your screen. It's easy to switch between programs. I use the keystroke Alt-Tab (and it's companion Shift-Alt-Tab) all the time to quickly switch back and forth between the current and last used window.

In conclusion - multimonitor / multidesktop are both useful productivity enhancements, but your work style may vary.

nView on Windows 2000

[eric2hill]

I've got a VisionTek GeForce4 440 MX ($120, Insight) running two 19" Trinitron monitors at work. The newest drivers do support running a true dual-monitor mode (not stretched desktop) on Windows 2000. For any multi-monitor system worth its' salt, this is a must.

Now, about the 3 reboots it took to make it all work...

Something you can't do in windows..

[dr.vesen.api]

I have a tripleheaded X, with an old hercules monocrome display as my third monitor. I have to run two X server because the old hercules cards are not supported in X ver4, but everything links up fine with x2x. And the hercules monitor gives my just the 720x348 mono-pixles I needed so badly!!

AGP

[_ph1ux_]

Thats all well and fine... but what I want is a motherboard that has DUAL AGP slots. anyone know of any out there that have this.

When I worked at intel i wrote some departments requesting this, but didnt get very far...

here is an interesting concept for multi monitoring:

It would be interesting to have a single computer setup with different inputs and different monitor output. Each screen would have a privilage level, and all inputs would only be associated with their individual screen.

This would allow for a Kiosk to be setup in say a mall - with a single computer that has multiple screens, keyboards and mice attached. Each screen would have its own desktop - and could run a browser for example - but they would not interfere with eachother.

This would allow you to run all this off of one computer - thus saving costs.

Anything out there like this? Obviously it has many parallels to mainframe computering - network appliances etc... but I am specifically talking about running a standard PC with multiple monitors and mice and keyboards - not some crippled specially designed hardware.

Re:AGP

[phorm]

I once went looking for this, but never found anything other than dual-monitor single cards, or AGP-PCI combo-cards.

I even posted it as a question to slashdot (rejected, of course).

As far as I know, they still haven't got dual-AGP video yet. I've heard rumblings of using the AGP-style port for other peripherals though, so perhaps somebody will get smart and develop a board that supports dual-video too.

It really sucks when you either have to put all the load on a single AGP card, or mix with slower PCI (not to mention that as PCI becomes obsolete newer models do not get manufactured for the port).

Big Deal...

[Anonymous Coward]

My Commodore 128 could run true dual monitors in 1987, some people here act like Apple invented the idea or something...

Re:Big Deal...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, my VIC-20 could use dual TVs through its high quality RF modulator. Too bad my Omega Race cartridge only worked in single TV mode.

Re:Big Deal...

[Anonymous Coward]

Your ignorance is showing. The C-128 had for the time very good graphics and TRUE dual monitor support. That is: you could have different applications running on each monitor. You could have 40 column graphics on one screen and a 80 column text on the other.

Not some lame-ass RF splitter, numbnuts...

Re:B.G.A.T. ****TROLL ALERT****

[Anonymous Coward]

Troll busters are the biggest ass-hobbling faggots to ever set foot on Slashdot. You say you're "bringing serious discussions back to Slashdot," but you can't bring back something that never existed.

Without trolls, this site is nothing but a bunch of armchair programmers and wannabe libertarians posting conjecture-filled garbage about concepts they do not understand and will never understand.

I advise you to abandon your Cromwellian urge to Protect Slashdot against Trolls immediately. And while you're at it, how about bathing, leaving the house, and attempting to find a sexual partner? You can thank me for my bluntness and honesty later.

Kisses,

YourMissionForToday

RTFM -- Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[SetiAlphaOne]

There was a guy in my office in 1998 that was running dual displays on a RH box. It probably took him 10 minutes to set up. What ever happened to doing a little research? RTFM. Just because it isn't configurable with a checkbox doesn't mean you can't do it.

Re:RTFM -- Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[No inspiration]

How typical. I do NOT want to read the manual on a bazillion things that have to be "easily" configured when they could, as easily, be configured through a checkbox. If it's there, why the hell not make it more visible? I mean, if the detection routines are intelligent enough to find my dual head display card and my two monitors, why the hell can they not automatically configure the display?

Re:RTFM -- Re:Multi-monitor in Linux...

[tibman]

//why the hell can they not automatically configure the display?

Hey guy, read the little banner top left and just below "Slashdot", the part about news for Nerds. The best software is writen by Joe Smo programmer in his garage who felt like giving it to the world. If you can't take 2 minutes to RTFM, you need to stay out of threads dealing with Linux. Sorry, it's a rant, i know..

What about GAMMA?

[Yodalf]

I am currently using a G550 with two monitors. Neither in windows 2000 or Xfree86 can i adjust independent gamma on the monitors. Actually, it is even worse than that because i can adjust the gamma on only one monitor. The other monitor must be used without gamma correction.

IMHO, independent gamma correction on both monitors is necessary and i am surprised to see that the reviewer did not even hint about it.

Anybody with more experience/knowledge in this?

x2vnc?

[DrinkDr.Pepper]

Has anyone tried an app called x2vnc? It works very similar to a dual monitor setup, but you can use two different computers. It uses VNCserver so you can even have an X windows server running x2vnc connected to a pc running windows with only one mouse and keyboard.

Macs!

[SHEENmaster]

Mac OS 9 is crap, even if it lets me run bryce inside of Linux).

Mac OS X, as beautiful as it is, still isn't mature enough for exclusive use. Any OS X software I have either runs in OS 9(MacOnLinux, which now supports OS X) or has a supperior Linux equivalent. The latter comprises most of my mac software.

I do.

[Inoshiro]

" No one (that I know at least) wants windows that maximize across monitors. "

Maxtrox G550, ctrl+click on maximize, the entire screen is filled with a window. Why would I want this? Right-click, new vertical tab grouping in VS.net (hopefully Mozilla someday). Suddenly MDI makes serious sense when working within a particular application.

Yes, you may like SDI and one app per monitor, but MDI is something that mates so well with multiple monitors, you'll swear at every solution provider that doesn't support it. I find it's as useful as grouping application windows (like The Gimp) on a single virtual desktop in terms of productivity).

No really?

[Nexus7]

You mean the Linux program detects your graphics cards and configures them for multimonitor (same as Xinerama?) use, like, automatically? Even if you don't have a multihead card? Wow, I think there's just one Windows version (95, I think) that can do that. I mean, aren't things supposed to be hard to do in Linux? That's what the Windows and Mac people are saying on /.

Can you do multimonitor with multiple graphics cards on Macs?

Do the Linux and XFree people realize they're not supposed to make things easy and powerful?

*Back to serious mode*
All this hokey-pokey's been done by X, years ago. Multimonitor, portable sessions, remote clients, graphical sessions over slow links, you name it. People should give the X Consortium a lot more credit than M$oft or Apple. I didn't have the xfreecfg but it took me only some Googling (Dejanews, back then) and a couple of tries correcting typos to get dual head on cheapo ATI cards from EBay. And that was about 3 years ago, when XFree86 was released.

Re:No really?

[beerits]

Can you do multimonitor with multiple graphics cards on Macs?
Yes you can. Apple finally got around to adding this feature to the mac os around 1987.

Help for nView people

[Lethal_Geek]

When they were discussing the GF4 they said that no amount of work would get that series to work with independant mutlimonitor (different res, refresh, etc).

WRONG!

There is a simple registry tweak that will enable a checkbox to "Treat multiple outputs on an nView-capable board as seperate display devices". All that has to be done is disable nView in its control panel and apply this to the registry:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\NVIDIA Corporation\Global\NVTweak]
"NvCplExposeWin2kDualView"=dword:00000001

Reset the system and find the checkbox, I have it under advanced> Desktop utilites.

Doh!

[TheSHAD0W]

Okay, installed the beta drivers, and it STILL doesn't do what I need it to.

Why can't it save position properly? I want it to start up MIRC and ICQ on monitor 2; why won't it work? I could do it on that stupid ATI card... I assume it's because ATI treated my desktop like one big monitor.

4 monitor setup

[Anonymous Coward]

I have 2 21" CRTs and 2 12" LCDs, positioned 21-12-12-21 with 1 AGP nVIdia Asus 7200 card and 1 4 output PCI Matrox card. Works great under win2k.

I had similar experience with by 8500 Dualhead.

[Inoshiro]

First, do not, under any circumstances, but ATI's Radeon 8500 dualhead. They suck. As the poster mentioned, DRI is disabled when you use Xinerama. Plus the binary-only Radeon 8500 driver doesn't work with Xinerama, in addition to the opensource ATI driver which doesn't work with Xinerama! Only the older opensource Radeon driver in XF 4.2 does Xinerama in any way on the 8500, and it still has drawing issues (the Gnome logout box sure mangles the one display).

As you mentioned, the "primary" display is the DVI connector. This is horrid because any bus traffic causes that display to show ghosting and other lines everywhere on the 8500. The ATI Radeon 9000 doesn't have this problem, but it's another mark against the card.

For multihead under Linux, I recommend buying a G550 and skipping ATI, because their cards are not fun to setup and debug (I spent an entire day of my time trying to work with their broken drivers).

I found a "known-good" Xinerama config on GoogleGroups, and used it to debug the 8500.

While at it, WHERE IS ATI?

[cybercomm]

I dont know much about multi-display configs, but i am pretty sure that ATI does a better job of multi displaying things than NVidia, i especially like their hydravision (which NVidea stole from them and put in their GF4 cards, or am i mistaken about that one..toms had a review...somewhere)

Re:While at it, WHERE IS ATI?

[tadheckaman]

there is multimonitor/tv support in all geforce cards that support it. I have a geforce 2 mx and I could hook up a television and make it part of my desktop...

A commercial answer

[Therin]

is available from XI Graphics. This is a drop-in replacement for XFree86, and it includes (link points to) multimonitor support versions.

My pet peeve with the Matrox driver version is that it would not power down the second monitor, so it went to screen saver and never turned off, while the primary monitor did power off. This was indicated on the Matrox site as a known issue. From other comments here I gather there have been no releases lately of the Matrox XFree86 driver, so that's probably still true.

XI is faster than XFree86 in my subjective testing, and it works nicely. There's a free demo you can download to try it out.

Duel head on Linux

[nother_nix_hacker]

I've been using 2 19" monitors on a Matrox G450 for ages now without a hitch. I code an aweful lot and tend to have loads of terminals open and quite often references in the form of a web page or PDF (should that be xdoc now?) files.

I really couldn't live without it now!

Developer's and their toys...

[Dareth]

How bout the developer do some work on a machine at around the bottom supported machine specs. Then maybe the developer would consider optimizing his code to run nicer on a lower end machine. It is amazing to look at benchmarks on our gigahertz+ machines and how fast they are. Having knocked the dust off an old 486-25mhz machine running Win3.1 the scary part was how freakin responsive it seemed. Now that is so sad.

You lack vision.

[RatBastard]

So, I should but my network monitoring software on a virtual desktop? What the hell good is that? I need to know when my nodea are down ASAP, regardless of whatever else I'm doing. And I only run dual. The hardcore network guys I work with have six monitors, and want more. They've always got things going on that NEED to be seen the moment there is a problem.

And let's not even talk about the benefits you get when doing web developement having your editor on one screen and your browser on the other.

I find multi-monitor setups to be fantastically useful, and virtual desktop setups to be painfully useless.

Re:You lack vision.

[gowen]

So, I should but my network monitoring software on a virtual desktop? What the hell good is that?

But if its on a second monitor half the time, you're not looking at it

And let's not even talk about the benefits you get when doing web developement having your editor on one screen and your browser on the other.

But thats exactly the same as having them on two different virtual desktops. Instead of moving your eyes from one screen to the other, flip from one desktop to the other. Tie this to a shortcut key, and its second nature. Why is that different?

Re:You lack vision.

[ngoy]

But thats exactly the same as having them on two different virtual desktops. Instead of moving your eyes from one screen to the other, flip from one desktop to the other. Tie this to a shortcut key, and its second nature. Why is that different?

It is different in that having to hit a key is essentially interrupting your thought process. Yes, you have to hit refresh on your browser, but to SEE the screen change from one program to the next and then hit the refresh is much slower than just looking over. Uses less energy, and my ass can get bigger in my chair.

The other issue is that in my case, my dev screen is in 1280x1024 while my browser screen is in 800x600 or 1024x768. You still have to keep a certain minimum screen size in mind when designing pages. I do not know of a hotkey that will let you change the resolution while you switch to your other virtual desktop (of course I am using Windows so....). That would be even worse in the scenario you are showing, as now it is:

Save change in editor
Hit switch key
Watch as CRT changes resolution to new resolution, or LCD switch to a screen with a 1" to 2" black border or worse, an upsized to fit from lower resolution mess.
Now hit browser refresh.

If you are making several changes, keystrokes just to change your desktop back and forth take time. We live in a society which values how much work can get done in X amount of time, so more work in less time = more time to do more work.

--ngoy

While at it, WHERE IS APPIAN?

[Anonymous Coward]

This HydraVision tech was developed by Appian, which ATI bought lately. (Whereas TR reported that ATI's been developing multimonitor tech a long time -- tsk tsk.)

Actually Appian's last cards used Nvidia's chips exclusively, so I'd at least say that ATI doesn't automatically do a better job of multi-displaying things just because it's ATI... But the 9x00 series is very nice :-)

And Appian with their Nvidia based cards was ready to tank when ATI bought it, so there you go ;-)

Re:VirtualWin

[Anonymous Coward]

VirtuaWin doesn't work very well with high CPU load (or non-responsive programs), sometimes it can take a few seconds to switch desktops (you'll see each window disappear, one at a time, then the new windows appear slowly). Is there any program that handles this well? I tried JS Pager, but it wasn't any better.

I also haven't found a virtual desktop manager that can handle dual-monitor setups well. I'd like to have one desktop visible on each monitor, and control them independently (i.e. CTRL+1 switchs the left monitor to desktop 1, ALT+3 switches the right monitor to desktop 3, etc. - or it could check whether you used the left or right control key).

Dual head G400 VS Redhat 8.0 :(

[smartin]

I've been using a G400 with two 17" flat panels at work for the last year or two and things were working pretty good. Upgraded to Redhat 8.0 and things are not longer so good. Xinerama still works but characters from the left display get painted on the right randomly. The problem seems only to be related to kde apps mostly. The matrox support guy is aware of the problem (many people have it) but does not seem to be doing a whole lot to help solve it. The last beta release of the drivers was last february so i'm not to happy with Matrox's commitment to Linux. Time to pick up a new card. Suggestions anyone? It's gotta be cheap and it's gotta do dual heads.

NVidia's drivers support Xinerama Now

[brunes69]

They never used to, but the past two releases have done Xinerama beautifully, works perfect under KDE.

Re:NVidia's drivers support Xinerama Now

[meatspray]

The support Gnome perfectly as well, if you're into such things.

My experience with Linux + win2k

[HuguesT]

I've been running 99% linux dual head (except for the occasional game) for about 3 years now. I have used several different setups:

Nvidia TNT2 (AGP) + Matrox Mill-II(PCI)
ATI Radeon 7000 (AGP) + Mill-II
Nvidia Quadro (AGP) dual-heal
Nvidia GF4-MX dual head.

Here are a few comments:

- The combination of an AGP+PCI card is the most stable. Xinerama works fine, is well supported, and the display quality is great on both heads. At most you will get accelerated 3D on one of the heads though.

- Xinerama disables DRI, so you will not get accelerated OpenGL at the same time as having two working monitors. You need to revert to single-head for DRI to work.

- Nvidia is the only way (with their proprietary driver) if you want accelerated 3D on both heads.
With the current version of the driver everything works fine on reasonably current hardware. I found that the driver is more stable if I enable Nvidia's version of the AGP driver (not agpgart, but nvAGP, it's an option in the XF86Config-4 file).

- often the display quality on the second head on hardware that support it will be inferior. This was certainly the case with my Radeon 7000 (second head display was *awful*) and with my GF4-MX (second head is fuzzier, bearable). With the high-end Quadro (at work) both displays are fine.

- My guess for high-quality on both heads is to buy one of these cards with both a DVI and a VGA output, not the kind with two VGA output. My reasoning is that since the manufacturer cannot assume which adaptor will be used for single-head display, the quality must be good on both. I made the error of buying a GF4-MX with two VGAs, one clearly labelled `second display'.

- suprisingly or unsurprisingly, I find the dual-head experience much simpler to deal with in general under win2k (autodetection of everything,neat little GUI tools for everything, etc), *HOWEVER*, once everything was working to my content under Linux, I find that things are much more flexible under Linux. There are fewer limitations in practice. For example under Linux with Nvidia's drivers I can decide which monitor is the primary one and how the desktop is organized independently. Under win2k there is only one combination that works.

Cheers.

What to look at...

[jschmerge]

Speaking as someone who has an opinion that MacOS X is slower than Linux, I'd like to tell people why I think this and explain some of the underlying technical details of why it is...

But first, let me explain a couple of things...

Speed of Number-Crunching

This has nothing to do with the speed of the OS. Unless the data that is being recieved is coming from another program, or being read from disk (as opposed to already being resident in memory); the processor is the bottleneck and a P4 at 2ghz will probably inch-out a G4. Live with it; Intel throws an incredible ammount of money at research pushing the x86 architecture to the limits in terms of speed.

Graphics

MacOS X uses a very computationally intensive windowing system. Yes, things will be slow to draw, but X windows is also equally as slow if you use some of the transparency things that KDE/Gnome/Enlightenment use. Incidentally, This is why I don't use KDE/Gnome/Enlightenment. Let's throw the speed of graphics issues out the window, as they're also fairly subjective. We'll touch on a piece of this issue later.

OS Functions

If you strip out complaints about the speed of user-level processes and the complaints about speed of rendering eye-candy, what is left?

The answer to this question is: The Kernel!!! This is the piece of the OS that is at the heart of the debate about whether MacOS X is acceptable in terms of performance.

Without getting into an academic discussion about what a Kernel should do (people can get into lengthy arguments about this); I'll list the basic set of things that Unix-like kernels should do:

• Pre-emptively schedule tasks (i.e. Allow multiple programs to run concurrently).
• Provide memory protection for tasks (i.e. Isolate one programs memory space from another's).
• Provide for interprocess communication.
• Provide an abstracted interface for using hardware devices (i.e. provide a way for a program to write to a disk).

I believe MacOS X to be slow in all of the above categories. Why? Because it uses a microkernel.

Microkernels are inherently slow at the above tasks because they need to do many, many 'context swaps'. A context swap occurs when a the Operating System or a user-level process takes control of the processor...

Since microkernels are designed to put most device access methods into user-space processes, device access is slow.

Since Interprocess Communication is handled by a user-space process, IPC is slow.

The result is that MacOS X does not scale. You see this when running more than one computationally intensive program. You see this when you run a 'find' command while doing other stuff. You see this when you switch between open windows.

A benchmark that I would really like to see is how much Apache's throughput differ between MacOS X and Linux running on the same piece of hardware. I'll bet that linux wins by a 2-to-1 margin.

Just my $.02. Please ignore rationality.

Re:What to look at...

[noewun]

Dontcha hate it when you post a reply in the wrong thread and look like a idjut?

Yeah, I knew you did.

Matrox - Nvidia

[hansroy]

I've been a Matrox user for 3 years now, with my trusty G400 DualHead. When Windows 2000 couldn't support dual independent displays, Matrox got around that in their drivers. Nice job, guys. Too bad the Parhelia isn't what I need or can afford.

When shopping for a new video card recently, I decided to try out a Geforce, despite some rumblings that the 2D is terribly bad in comparison. I haven't noticed any problems, maybe since my monitors are only capable of 75 hz at the 1280 resolution I run, maybe because I wear glasses.

And now I want to trade my AGP G400 for a PCI one, and get a couple spare displays just for system stats...and to run pretty artwork nonstop to feel as cool as the guys in the Matrix.

I use ultramon

[Anonymous Coward]

and find it to be very useful for managing windows on multiple monitors.

Windows with multimon

[Anonymous Coward]

I think a crucial tool (misspelled?) for anybody with multi monitor setups under Windows is MultiMon (google it), it will take care of your dekstops, your popup windows, and saving the location of your icons, additionally, you can disable your secondary monitor with a simple click (good for gamers), and it takes up verylittle/no resources... Also, I've never had issues with windows and multimon, additionally XP has weird support for older cards: suggestion, if you have old cards that are supposedly not supported by windows for multimon, tell your bios to boot to pci first (not agp) (only works if you have 1 pci car)d, then go into windows, and after a little futzing around you shuold come up with your agp card as a secondary card, change the options in the settings-> display -> advanced (or something of the sort), and you change it so that windows uses your AGP as primary, and PCI as secondary. Neat little trick I found so that I coudl use my #9 as a secondary for my 15". I dunno, just felt like mentioning (another) succes story/min-tutorial

linux is slow

[vivek7006]

Linux plain sucks when it comes to graphics. I have a 1.3 GHz AMD Duron, 256 MB RAM and Riva TNT2 graphic card. I am running both mandrake linux 9.0 and win2k on this system. But linux pales in comparision, when I play DVD or mpeg in full screen mode.

Great Multi-monitor info site.

[ecarlson]

This site really helped me decide what I wanted to do for multi-monitor support. ANd they have info on stuff like multi-monitor KVM switches, and getting Nvidia and ATI cards to fully support Win2K.

www.realtimesoft.com/multimon/

- Eric, http://www.InvisibleRobot.com/

YHBT YHL HAND

[Anonymous Coward]

And that is all I have to say to you.

They missed the best one!

[jonbrewer]

The article failed to mention Matrox's staple of the stock-trading world, the G200 MMS. It's a quad-head card PCI card with ability to drive 4 DVI panels. I've been using one for about eighteen months now, and after using good DVI panels (I now have IBM 17" LCDs) I will never go back to an MM setup with analog panels. The difference in clarity and response is well worth it.

http://www.matrox.com/mga/products/g200_mms/home .c fm

multi-monitor

[crucini]

This would allow you to run all this off of one computer - thus saving costs. Anything out there like this? Obviously it has many parallels to mainframe computering - network appliances etc... but I am specifically talking about running a standard PC with multiple monitors and mice and keyboards - not some crippled specially designed hardware.

Maxspeed makes this terminal which extends keyboard, video, mouse and I/O from a base PC. You run CAT5 from the terminal to the PC and plug it into a special card in the PC. There are cards with 4 ports and cards with two ports. It works well for souped-up point of sale applications - one PC at the front of a small store can handle several terminals.

Just to be clear, this is not TCP/IP. It is keyboard, video and mouse signals multiplexed on cat5. If using a GUI, you run a separate X Server per terminal on the PC. They are very Linux friendly - I used them with Red Hat.

Why bother with these when there's UltraMon?

[Polyphemis]

I run dual 17" monitors (GF4 MX and a GF2 MX) on Windows 2000 Professional and I don't even bother with NVidia's NView app. Haven't found a single use for it other than it being unreasonably slow for features I don't need. For everything Windows 2000 doesn't do out of the box, I just use UltraMon.

UltraMon still leaves a bit of a memory footprint but it's not nearly as bad or as slow as NView. It's this unobtrusive (and persistent) little system tray icon that gives me all kinds of settings that NView seems to offer as well, except faster. Some of the features I appreciate in particular are:

Shortcut keys to swap programs between monitors (proportionally or to fit - INCREDIBLY useful if you run different resolutions)

Shell extensions for switching monitors or maximizing.

A simple double-click on the systray icon (or a definable keyboard shortcut) to turn off the secondary monitor on demand, such as if you want to run an OpenGL game without the second monitor looking all weird.

Individual desktop wallpaper settings.

The program itself creates shortcuts that set a program to start on a certain monitor.

Saving window sizes and positions.

You can enable two separate taskbars if you want, and either have each taskbar show all the tasks or have each separate taskbar show the tasks running on that specific monitor.

That's the bulk of its features. Great little program. Unfortunately, yes, it is $40 to register, and there are discounts for multiple licenses, but for me personally it was well worth the cost for the extreme ease of use it provides me with my monitors.

I have tried NView, but it kind of seems like it's trying too hard to be useful, where UltraMon just works, and works great. I'd definitely recommend it for anyone with dual monitors.

Dual Head in Linux: X + console?

[iezhy]

Does anyone tried to do $subj? Is it posible to have X virtual desktop in one monitor, and a virtual console in another? Or two different virtal desktops or consoles?

Flamebait -- Re:RTFM -- Re:Multi-monitor in Linux

[SetiAlphaOne]

I mean, if the detection routines are intelligent enough to find my dual head display card and my two monitors, why the hell can they not automatically configure the display?

Why the hell can't you WRITE THE EASILY CONFIGURABLE INTERFACE YOURSELF instead of subjecting us to your attitude? If you aren't part of the solution, YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM. Heaven forbid you should have to look up how to do something. We all know that every other possible feature of every aspect of every OS is right there with a checkbox beside it. How they could have missed this one is so beyond me, how unfair for you.

"I can't get this to work."
-Did you read the manual?
"I shouldn't have to read the manual"
-Did you read the manual?
"Yes, and I tried everything but it still won't work"
-Did you read the manual?
"Yes, and nothing works!"
-Did you read the manual?
"Yes, I did"
-Did you read the manual?
"No."
-Exactly.

RTFM Neither the world, nor the OS, nor the GUI owes you anything. If you want to help out, find out how to add that checkbox. If not, don't complain about how someone else should have intuitively known that _you_would need it. If a friend of mine did it in such a short time, you should be able to as well.

Re:Flamebait -- Re:RTFM -- Re:Multi-monitor in Lin

[No inspiration]

It is self-righteous attitudes such as yours that brand the Linux users as zealots and their comments idiotic.

I am a pretty happy owner of various Linux boxes, both as web servers as well as sql servers and I have never had a problem with reading the fucking manual regarding a problem I have had in my work. But I am not prepared to WASTE time for something that in my opinion should be there in the first place.

If you think that Linux desktop users should WASTE their time trying to figure out how the hell to put their system to use, then permit me to say that YOU are the problem, since you seem to think that everyone who runs Linux should know how to "write an easily configurable interface". If it works for you, great. It did not work for me, and I voiced my opinion.

Re:Flamebait -- Re:RTFM -- Re:Multi-monitor in Lin

[SetiAlphaOne]

If you think that Linux desktop users should WASTE their time trying to figure out how the hell to put their system to use, then permit me to say that YOU are the problem, since you seem to think that everyone who runs Linux should know how to "write an easily configurable interface". If it works for you, great. It did not work for me, and I voiced my opinion.

You bitch about how you don't want to read any documentation, then you bitch about how you don't get what you want, then you bitch about being asked to make a contribution to the cause. Bitch, bitch, bitch.

I didn't say it was easy to make a interface to solve the problem. Heaven forbid you should actually try to learn something or give back to the community from which you take so much. I suppose compared to a lazy self-righteous layabout like yourself I could be considered a zealot. I try to give back to the community and suggest to others that they might do the same. What a horrible person I must be.

It is YOU and others like you my friend that are the problem. If you don't want to help others and you don't want to help yourself then you're just plain lazy. So what if you have some boxes set up with some software? That is irrelevant. All that matters here is that you whine about how everyone else should be doing things that you consider important, but not important enough to get off your ass to do it yourself.

My attitude isn't self righteous, it is proper. If you don't know how to do something you should look for the answer instead of bitching about it. That is common sense. Instead you complain. Poor you. You're the one who said that it was useless for people to give you information and directions on how to do it yourself.

You're pathetic. Don't give me guff just because you're a lazy sack that can't be troubled to solve your own problems. Bitch bitch bitch. Not too lazy to try to push your problems off on everyone else though, are you? Bitch bitch bitch. Go find something else to complain about.

If you think that Linux desktop users should WASTE their time trying to figure out how the hell to put their system to use, then permit me to say that YOU are the problem....

Yeah, that's it. I must be the problem because I think we should all try to help one another. Maybe if helping one another didn't involve any effort you would be more giving to the community. There's no need to blame anyone except yourself for your shortcomings. You are a waste of time.

Last Post!

[alpg]

Not far from here, by a white sun, behind a green star, lived the
Steelypips, illustrious, industrious, and they hadn't a care: no spats in
their vats, no rules, no schools, no gloom, no evil influence of the
moon, no trouble from matter or antimatter -- for they had a machine, a
dream of a machine, with springs and gears and perfect in every respect.
And they lived with it, and on it, and under it, and inside it, for it
was all they had -- first they saved up all their atoms, then they put
them all together, and if one didn't fit, why they chipped at it a bit,
and everything was just fine ...
-- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"

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