Playing video games and watching DVD's simultaneously?

[Dwebtron]

First of all, I'm not sure if this is the right spot to post this in, if it's not I apologize.

A few days ago I dug up an old LCD monitor and hooked it up to the second port on my ati X800pro. It's working great and playing along with my newer, faster BenQ, but I've only run into one thing I can't figure out on my own. I want to play video games on my BenQ, and watch a DVD on the old monitor.... simultaneously.

I've noticed that when I tried this, the game seems to take over, and the dvd player (InterVideo) goes blank. I can still hear the sound, but the screen is gone. Does anybody know a way to keep the video playback happening while playing the game?

- Thanks in advance. 🙂

P.S. I have Windows XP pro with what I believe are the latest ATI drivers. And lastly, if anyone's curious, I'm trying to watch NIN's beside you in time while playing Warcraft 3.

 

[HN]

which video player? if WMP, you need to turn off Overlay (Tools-->Options-->Performance-->Advanced-->uncheck "Use Overlays")

if you don't want to mess with settings, open the video in one instance of WMP (or whatever media player), pause it, then re-open video/dvd in another instance of media player. Overlay will be disabled for this second window.

let us know if these work for you.

 

[Dwebtron]

I'm trying to use the InterVideo player. I don't use WMP only because I'm not paying to have a 3d sound decoder for my dvd's; InterVideo is the only one I have for free that does it. I'll mess with some of the options on it and get back to you.

As for WMP, I played with the overlays controls, all I can get it to do is make some cool studdering sounds when I move it around (with the game minimized) or when I alt + tab

 

[snapper316]

i've had that happen, have you tried restarting the video a few times?

My problems with warcraft 3 (I was trying to run windowed War3 and WoW) was when a cutscene hit. I could run them side by side until a cutscene then war3 would switch back to the main monitor I would try moving/renaming the Video files in your warcraft 3 directory so it skips these sequences.

You could also toss war3 into a window, i think add -windowed to the shortcut

 

[homercles337]

Please explain why one would want to watch a DVD while playing a game. 😕

edit: is your game really THAT boring?

 

[Dwebtron]

yeah, snapper, restarting it only made it turn purple. I'm thinking I should have mentioned earlier that I'm using WMP9 (can't upgrade, don't ask). The windowed idea worked perfectly, and I can live with it, but I'm just curious: does anyone know if it's possible to have both 'full screened'?

and homercles, it's not that the game is boring, it's just that there isn't always action in a RTS. Sometimes theres a loading screen, you gotta wait for some buildings and units, organize games with friends, that kinda thing.

 

[ayabe]

Originally posted by: Dwebtron
yeah, snapper, restarting it only made it turn purple. I'm thinking I should have mentioned earlier that I'm using WMP9 (can't upgrade, don't ask). The windowed idea worked perfectly, and I can live with it, but I'm just curious: does anyone know if it's possible to have both 'full screened'?

and homercles, it's not that the game is boring, it's just that there isn't always action in a RTS. Sometimes theres a loading screen, you gotta wait for some buildings and units, organize games with friends, that kinda thing.

Ok, but please don't tell me you are trying to do this with Supreme Commander.

 

[snapper316]

have you tried this with a different game in full screen? it could be the war3 causing the problems.

 

[jfall]

You know you use your computer too much when you need to watch a DVD while playing a game