Cards that run dual monitors - How can you tell?

[itakey]

How can you tell if a video card is capable of running dual monitors? I forget if it has to specify that, or if most will do it if they have 2 outputs.

Can someone confirm if it is common for most, if not all cards to have this capability, or if it must be specified?

 

[SergeC]

Any modern card with two outputs (and most old ones as well) will run 2 monitors.

 

[itakey]

Sweet, thanks.

 

[Majic 7]

There are a few caveats. ATI with crossfire or one card can, nVidia with SLI can with Big Bang Drivers, nVidia can without SLI enabled on older drivers. Vista 64 bit can have problems with VPU recovery with either brand and two monitors. Mostly ATI I think, but there are some reports of nVidia cards doing it also. You get a driver stopped responding and about 4 VPU recovery and then a BSOD. This is while at the desktop, not gaming. It's hardly universal, but I got VPU recovery and disconnected the second monitor. Never had problems on XP with two monitors. Vista SP1 didn't fix it.

 

[faxon]

if you really have a lot of trouble with it in vista the simple fix is to get a cheap ass video card (like a super low end HD3 series or HD2 series card) and just pop it in the PCI slot. works well for monitors not running games.