Unplugging DVI from powered-on PC?

[LintMan]

I'm trying to get my old and new pc's networked together to ease the data transfer between them, but only have one monitor, which is a making the setup a real pain. It would be slightly less painful if it was safe to pull the dvi plug from the one pc and put it on the other without having to power things off first. Could that wreck my nice video card and/or monitor? It'd be nice if it was hot-swappable, like a USB port.

Thanks!

 

[StopSign]

I'm pretty sure it'll be fine. You can do it with the VGA connector and I don't think DVI is that much different (aside from being digital).

 

[LouPoir]

Sounds risky to me. I do standard VGA all the time. Proceed at your own risk.

 

[Steve]

I've never had problems doing so.

 

[Matthias99]

DVI is not technically hot-plug. There's a lot more negotiation that happens than in VGA.

However, you are extremely unlikely to damage anything. Worst case is usually that it won't work until you reboot.

 

[Avalon]

I do it all the time at work 😛

 

[keeleysam]

Why don't you hook one up via VGA and the other via DVI?

 

[Capt Caveman]

I've done it numerous. No problems.

 

[LintMan]

Originally posted by: keeleysam
Why don't you hook one up via VGA and the other via DVI?

I had the same great idea last night and went looking for my VGA cable. Turns out that my wife threw it out when she disposed of the junky old CRT in the garage that it was still attached to. 🙁

I could buy a new one, but it's not worth it. I'll just swap until I get it worked out, or worst case, just temporarily move the hard disks into the new system.

Thanks for the info, everyone!