Dual monitor - game in one, desktop on the other?

[MDesigner]

My cousin seems to think it's possible to have one machine w/ 2 monitors..and on one screen you can be gaming or something, and the other will have the Windows desktop. I think this is not possible. Anyone care to verify this?

 

[OnEMoReTrY]

Of course its possible, its called dual display =o

 

[BW86]

it is possible and i've been running 2 monitors for years....

 

[Rent]

Its very possible, up until a month ago I was running 2 monitors... I'll do it again when I decide to pony up for the 2nd 2001FP

 

[Feep]

I think he was wondering if you can play a game on one and and use a windows desktop on the other at the same time.

 

[RobFDB]

Then if its so easy to have a game on one moniter and desktop on the other, perhaps someone will be kind enough to tell me how, as i didnt get a whole lot of help in the thread i made about it. All i get are errors, eg: Prince of Persia 2 demo doesnt thing i have any video memory and madden 2005 doesnt think i have a D3D capable card in my machine. Im running a Radeon 9800 Pro.

 

[imported_elwood]

Originally posted by: RobFDB
Then if its so easy to have a game on one moniter and desktop on the other, perhaps someone will be kind enough to tell me how, as i didnt get a whole lot of help in the thread i made about it. All i get are errors, eg: Prince of Persia 2 demo doesnt thing i have any video memory and madden 2005 doesnt think i have a D3D capable card in my machine. Im running a Radeon 9800 Pro.

Are you sure you are running the game on the "Primary" monitor?

 

[MDesigner]

My question was: Is it possible to do this in a dual-monitor environment:

monitor 1 = gaming (Lineage 2, Doom 3, whatever)
monitor 2 = Windows desktop
(at the same time)

If so...how do you do it?

 

[MercenaryForHire]

Originally posted by: MDesigner
My question was: Is it possible to do this in a dual-monitor environment:

monitor 1 = gaming (Lineage 2, Doom 3, whatever)
monitor 2 = Windows desktop
(at the same time)

If so...how do you do it?

No. The game on Monitor 1 captures the mouse.

- M4H

 

[MDesigner]

Ahh.. didn't think that would be possible. Sounded too cool to be true.

 

[skene]

It is sortof possible. As MercenaryForHire said, the game will capture the mouse and all you'd get to do on the other scren is see stuff but not interact with it. If you play a game in windowed mode, ie it's run in a window on the screen rather then full screen, then you can interact with both monitors. I dunno how many FPS games let you do this though, but neverwinter nights and some others have no problems.

 

[Alptraum]

Yep, the only option for what you want is to run the game in windowed mode. The drawbacks are that not all games support this and at least in the past (I expect its still true though) many games take a big performance hit when you run them in windowed mode. Anyways, thats your only option.