Broken Screen + External Monitor + Windows

[Nny0]

Hello,

I recently dropped my macbook and the monitor cracked. sadface

Having used external monitors with it in the past (under Mac OS), I just connected one and all was fine there. Happy enough face

But then I needed to get into windows, and the same way to get the external monitor working was not working. sadface again

So I went to google and was like "yo google help me out plz"

And I found out that in order to get an external monitor to work in windows period, you have to mess around in the settings.

Threads I was reading though were from 2006-2008ish range. Does anyone have any idea how I can get an external monitor to work in windows without having to configure anything (since I can't see)?

I'll love you forever

(Or at least for a little bit)

 

[blackburn]

win key + p or in an mac keyboard cmd + p (it works for windows 7) or you could try unplug and plug back the external monitor onto the macbook after windows boots.

 

[Nny0]

Thank you for the response! Unfortunately, I'm not using Windows 7 but rather Windows XP, and cmd+P does not do anything

unplug/replug also didn't work.

I did have a light bulb though.

The way I get the monitor to work on macbook is as so: Load into Mac OS, close the lid, and plug in my USB Controller. After this, the external monitor becomes the only monitor, and I can open back up my laptop and use that mouse/keyboard (I do not have a USB keyboard/mouse with me, away at college).

So anyway, light bulb:

Upon holding down alt after the computer starts up, to select between Windows and Mac, I could apply the above so that the external monitor becomes the main monitor before even loading up windows.

Problem: Plugging in my USB Controller did not load up the external monitor.
Possible solution: Maybe a USB keyboard/mouse, which would send commands to the computer, would wake up the computer so that it would load on the external monitor.

I'm going to try this out once I can find a USB keyboard or mouse, but figured I'd post it now to see if anyone knew ahead of time if it would(n't) work.