dual-display on X200

  • Thread starter Thread starter 4himarks
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4himarks

I have a Compaq with onboard X200 graphics chip. I've been told that
all newer ATI graphics chips support dual-displays, but can't find any
official documentation about it. I get CRT/LCD or LCD/TV info, but
nothing about two plain, ordinary, old-fashioned CRTs.

If I want to have dual-display CRTs like I had with my old Matrox 550,
do I just need to get a VGA "Y" cable? I would believe it if it had
DVI, but with a plain VGA, the best I would expect is a cloned desktop.
Has anyone tried this? Can I have two independent CRT displays (I'll
run both at 1280x1024 though) without purchasing a new card?

I'm not a gamer so I don't need 3D graphics. The old Matrox still works
fine, but it is AGP and the new mobo has PCI-E only. Replacement cards
in big box stores all seem designed for gamers and run $200+, and I
suspect that if I plugged one in, it would disable the X200 anyway.
 
I have a Compaq with onboard X200 graphics chip. I've been told that
all newer ATI graphics chips support dual-displays, but can't find any
official documentation about it. I get CRT/LCD or LCD/TV info, but
nothing about two plain, ordinary, old-fashioned CRTs.

If I want to have dual-display CRTs like I had with my old Matrox 550,
do I just need to get a VGA "Y" cable? I would believe it if it had
DVI, but with a plain VGA, the best I would expect is a cloned desktop.
Has anyone tried this? Can I have two independent CRT displays (I'll
run both at 1280x1024 though) without purchasing a new card?

I'm not a gamer so I don't need 3D graphics. The old Matrox still works
fine, but it is AGP and the new mobo has PCI-E only. Replacement cards
in big box stores all seem designed for gamers and run $200+, and I
suspect that if I plugged one in, it would disable the X200 anyway.
Click to expand...

Your laptop likely supports two monitors, but one of the monitors MUST be
the laptop display. It will use the monitor connected to the VGA port as
the second monitor. A splitter would not help as it would just clone the
output of the VGA port.
 
It isn't a laptop. It's a desktop, so there is no built-in display.

Sorry I didn't mention it, but I thought it was obvious when I talked
about AGP and PCI-E slots and replacement cards. Also, the OS is XP
MCE, if that makes a difference.

-Chris
 
Chris said:
It isn't a laptop. It's a desktop, so there is no built-in display.

Sorry I didn't mention it, but I thought it was obvious when I talked
about AGP and PCI-E slots and replacement cards. Also, the OS is XP
MCE, if that makes a difference.

-Chris
Click to expand...

Sorry, my mistake -- don't know why I assumed that. Does the machine have
both a DVI and a VGA port? If so, I would think one of each could be used.

Tom
 
No. It just has a VGA connection. If it had even just one DVI-D port I
would have tried a DVI-to-VGA splitter - we use them at work. But I
don't see how I'm going to get two separate VGA signals out of one DB15
connection.

This is the first PC I've ever bought - I usually build them myself.
The documentation that came with it really sucks. It was written for
idiots who would never *think* of opening up the case to perform an
upgrade. I had mine open the day I got it. That's how I learned it
didn't take AGP cards. The model is Compaq Presario SR1650NX.

-Chris
 
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