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Dual Monitors...

J

jtalerico

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Nov 23, 2005
358
0
I have two 2005fpws and i would like to expand one desktop through both of them, instead of having two desktop areas. Is there a way to do this? Thanks!

(Pictures soon!)
 
What do you mean? You want to hook up your PowerMac to them both? Or somethin' else?
 
When my friend had dual monitors, he had his desktop span between both the screens and manually cut the desktop images he found in half to fit the monitors correctly. It was on a windows machine though. Good luck!
 
edesignuk said:
That link is a LAN address, we can't see it.

Do you mean you want a desktop picture to span across the two displays? :confused:
Click to expand...


OMG I am a idiot!!

http://69.68.181.132/~joetalerico/gallery_img.php?dir_name=New_Desk

So basically what i am hoping for is to basically make these two displays seem like one big display.. Does that make sence? Because in the one display it has the apple logo thing at the top and the other one does not. I just want to be able to have one BIG monitor. I was just curious if there was some sort of emulation to do it.


ALSO!! The pictures are VERY large (sorry i will try to cut them down asap)!
 
Maybe using SwitchResX to define 1 big resolution that spans both? (You can figure it out by keeping the same height and doubling the horizontal amount of pixels)...but I think they would need to be hooked to the same display port in order to do that.
 
if you just want a corresponding background on both you have to find or make two images that work together. As others have said, you can't have the dock on both monitors.

PS - your server is soooooooo slow.
 
adk said:
if you just want a corresponding background on both you have to find or make two images that work together. As others have said, you can't have the dock on both monitors.

PS - your server is soooooooo slow.
Click to expand...

But remember that thing that lets you use dual monitors with a Mac mini or any computer with only 1 display port? It basically took the signal and split it to both monitors, then they used SwitchResX to define a big resolution. Only downside was that dialog boxes and anything else that should open up centered, did just that, opened centered and split between the 2 screens making some unmovable dialogs harder to read or something.
 
There is a VGA splitter that basically takes one VGA signal and cuts it in half, then outputs to two monitors. Google for it.
I still don't understand why you would want this, as your dock and toolbar will be cut in half. its better to just use OSX's built in screen spanning. It is very good.
What computer are you using?

Edit: Dang ITASOR, you beat me to it.
 
The server is a dual proc 64bit XServer so I would not call it slow... But what you can call slow is my ISP. I am on a 3mb down 1.5mb up. Those pictures are just HUGE.

The apple built in monitor support does not have the ability to "span" it just allows two different desktops or to mirror them. I am driving it with G5 that has a 6800GT DDL. Am I missing like a box to check or somethin in the monitior area to set the "spanning" of the desktop?
 
We're all a bit puzzled, as almost every Mac for the last decade has had screen spanning built in. And I downloaded your link, but am still not sure what you are showing.

Here's how to activate screen spanning.

1. Hook up two monitors. On a laptop, this means connecting a second display.

2. Open System Preferences/Displays, then click on the Arrangement tab.

3. Your two monitors should be shown. Drag them around to arrange them as you like. You can drag the grey "Finder" bar to whichever display you want it shown on.

4. Make sure the "Mirror Displays" box in NOT checked - this will produce the identical image on both displays.

Edit - this thread was ,moving fast, so by the time I posted a few others covered some posts as well. The big issues, I guess, is whether your unit has output for 2 monitors...
 
CalfCanuck said:
We're all a bit puzzled, as almost every Mac for the last decade has had screen spanning built in. And I downloaded your link, but am still not sure what you are showing.

Here's how to activate screen spanning.

1. Hook up two monitors. On a laptop, this means connecting a second display.

2. Open System Preferences/Displays, then click on the Arrangement tab.

3. Your two monitors should be shown. Drag them around to arrange them as you like. You can drag the grey "Finder" bar to whichever display you want it shown on.

4. Make sure the "Mirror Displays" box in NOT checked - this will produce the identical image on both displays.

Edit - this thread was ,moving fast, so by the time I posted a few others covered some posts as well. The big issues, I guess, is whether your unit has output for 2 monitors...
Click to expand...


Pretty sure he knows that, as his pictures show that he's spanning just fine. I'm not sure exactly what he wants, but it sounds like they want the menu bar and dock to extend through both monitors as if they were one. That's not easily done without extra hardware to make them share 1 video port on your computer.
 
CalfCanuck said:
We're all a bit puzzled, as almost every Mac for the last decade has had screen spanning built in. And I downloaded your link, but am still not sure what you are showing.

Here's how to activate screen spanning.

1. Hook up two monitors. On a laptop, this means connecting a second display.

2. Open System Preferences/Displays, then click on the Arrangement tab.

3. Your two monitors should be shown. Drag them around to arrange them as you like. You can drag the grey "Finder" bar to whichever display you want it shown on.

4. Make sure the "Mirror Displays" box in NOT checked - this will produce the identical image on both displays.

Edit - this thread was ,moving fast, so by the time I posted a few others covered some posts as well. The big issues, I guess, is whether your unit has output for 2 monitors...
Click to expand...


All great info. Thanks. I knew how to do most of that anyway. ( I did not know i could move my Finder bar)

But yes, want to have some sort of way of having both monitors run together and make it seem like one big 40" display. From what I am reading this cannot be done.
 
jtalerico said:
All great info. Thanks. I knew how to do most of that anyway. ( I did not know i could move my Finder bar)

But yes, want to have some sort of way of having both monitors run together and make it seem like one big 40" display. From what I am reading this cannot be done.
Click to expand...
One other thing in trying to help (when I'm not really understanding the difference between the Mac's built in screen spanning and this "custom" one, other than the menu bar extending across the top).

Have you tried using the resize spot in the lower right to extend any given application's window across both screen? Just because one has the real estate of two screens, some windows will reside in one or the other (often based on preferences based on your last use of the program).

For example, you can drag an application to show half in each , but if you really want the window to span the full width of both you'd set it on the left and resize the window to the right to utilize both screens.
 
So yea, Still have not figured out ow to span one desktop to both... I guess it is livable right now. Just thought it would be cool for gaming.. Or if there is way to keep my left monitor (the one that is not set as main) to stay on the desktop and the right one do the game like halo that would be cool... If anyone has any information on how to do that, it would be great to hear..

Things i have noticed...

Firefox and dual displays do not go hand in hand. If you pull firefox to the second display ( not the one with the apple bar, that one i consider "main") the search bar ends up on the main screen. Which is real weird. I tried this with Safari, and it worked fine. Anyone else ever witnessed that?
 
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