Dual Display Set Up?
 

I just hooked a second monitor up to my G4. Both mointoes work perfectly, except they both show the same thing. It's a duplicate of my main monitor. I looked in display settings and couldn't find anything having to do with dual displays. How can I set this up so I can use the screen space of both?

Model? Is this iMac G4? iBook G4?

Trevor

It is a G4 digital audio. I have a flat apple cinama display and an Diamantron hooked up.

System Preferences > Displays > middle tab (I can't recall the name of this tab right now) > uncheck "Mirror Displays".

Trevor

The middle tab is actually "Color" but none of the tabs have a mirror display option I can uncheck. Is it possible that the mac isn't registering the second monitor even though it's mirroring through it?

Yes, that's possible if your video card does not support dual display. What video card do you have?

Trevor

OK, I'm now on a machine with dual displays. The tab whose name I was trying to think of is "Arrangement" as you can see in the attached picture. Apparently you have some other tab to the right, making "Color" your middle tab. This is fine.

Note that when you have more than one distinct display, you get a Displays Preference Window on EACH display that you have connected. (Obviously, Twelve Motion, since you can't get out of mirroring yet, that is not the case for you, but I'm mentioning this fact for others who may read this.) The Arrangement tab is found ONLY on the Displays Preference Window that is on your primary display (the one with the menubar).

Also, note the "Mirror Displays" box in the lower left of the window. Unchecking this will stop you from mirroring the displays, assuming that your video card supports dual displays, or if you have more than one video card.

Trevor

The ATI card that was supplied with that G4 model does not support dual displays.

Hmmm well I am using the stock video card. If a put a different video card in, it will work?

Trevor, I do not have an arrangement tab. I do have 3 tabs, but they are none of them are arrengment. I am on a PC now so I can't go look what the third is, but Color and display are two of them.

Display Color and Options are my three tabs.

Options has 2 check boxes "Disable Power button" and "Disable display preferences."

But yeah it looks like Las Vegas is right.

Not to split hairs :-P but I don't believe that this is strictly true, although I'll admit I'm not positive.

There are three or four possible video cards that could ship with the PowerMac G4 Digital Audio. There was the ATI Rage 128 Pro (only in the 466 MHz version), the ATI Radeon (a build to order option), and the nVidia Geforce 2mx (the default in the 533, 533 dual, 667, and 733). Neither the Rage 128 Pro nor the Radeon (no number) support dual head displays.

Edit: According to Apple's ADC documentation for the PowerMac G4 Digital Audio's video card, I'm incorrect about the Radeon--they claim that it does support dual displays. They also say that the Geforce 2MX in this computer supports dual displays.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Apple Depending on the configuration, the Power Mac G4 computer comes either an ATI or an Nvidia graphics card installed in the 4x AGP slot. The main features of the graphics cards are as follows: Graphics IC Video RAM Connectors ATI RV200 32 MB DDR ADC and VGA Nvidia NV17 64 MB DDR ADC and VGA EIther graphics card can support two monitors at the same time.

However, there is a version of the Geforce 2mx, called the Twinview, that shipped with some Macs, and I believe that it shipped with Digital Audio PowerMacs near the end of their lifetime, making it the fourth possible card shipped with Digital Audio PowerMacs. The Geforce 2mx Twinview definitely supported dual displays.

Please let us know WHICH video card you have in there. You can find out the information (although it may use a slightly different name from what I've mentioned above) from System Profiler > PCI/AGP cards.

However, odds are that, based on what you are seeing, your existing card does not support dual head displays.

Yes, if you put in a modern card that supports dual displays, and is compatible with your 4x AGP slot, then it will work.

Trevor

If you'r looking to swtich cards, even the venerable Radeon 9000 that you could always purchse from here (this card works with any G4 that has an AGP port) has dual display.

This is just my office machine, I am hoping we will get a junker with a good video card and I will swipe that.

I have a G4 with DVI and VGA connectors (not ADC/VGA). Will my G4 support dual monitors?

If it doesn't, can I just plug in a PCI video card into a free PCI slot and a monitor to that card? Will I need special drivers for the new video card?

I have an old Matrox PCI video card, will it work if I plug it into a PCI slot of the G4, will there be conflicts?

(I'm new to Macs, from the PC world)

Thanks in advance!!!

You need to tell us which video card you have. Just telling us the external connectors doesn't help. You can find out information on your video card in Apple Menu > About This Mac > More Info... (which launches System Profiler) > Hardware > Graphics/Displays (in OS X 10.4.x, other versions of OS X may have it placed differently in System Profiler). Copy/paste all the information in Graphics/Displays to the forum.

If you have a PCI card with Mac firmware, then yes. Depending on the card, the drivers are probably already in OS X, but we won't know for sure until you tell us what card.

It will not be recognized, since it has the wrong firmware.

For PCI cards, I'd recommend an ATI Radeon 9200 PCI Mac Edition: http://www.ati.com/products/radeon92...0me/index.html
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/ATI%2...ies/100436011/

Trevor

zipp, on the bright side, if you have a Mac version of a Graphics card, you're all set: you can stuff every free PCI slot in your Mac with those, no IRQ headaches and most probably no driver install, it'll just work.

You get to arrange where the dfferent monitor images show up relative to each other using the Monitors prefpane.

Have fun !

Retain arrangement?
 

I've had dual displays working for some time, and the Arrangement tab appears for me. Now if only I could get it to remember that I want my Cinema display above my laptop display. Every morning when I come into work and I plug my monitor into my laptop, the arrangement is reset with the Cinema display to the left.

Anyone know how I can make this stick?

That exact arrangement sticks for me. Try trashing the relevant preferences file.

Trevor

Unfortunately, the relevant files are:

~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.systempreferences.plist

and

~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.windowserver.<your MAC address here>.plist

so expect to re-do quite some settings.

Thanks for the help, my graphics card info:

ATY,Rage128Pro:

Type: display
Bus: AGP
Slot: SLOT-A
VRAM (Total): 16 MB
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x5046
Revision ID: 0x0000
ROM Revision: 113-63001-108

Display:

Resolution: 1280 x 1024
Depth: 32-bit Color
Built-In: Yes
Main Display: Yes
Mirror: Off
Online: Yes

It's the one that came with the G4. Does it support dual monitors? I connected a monitor the DVI port and another to the VGA. I only get a black screen on the one on the VGA port but the DVI monitor is working.

Thanks.

The Rage 128Pro does support dual monitors. It's likely that your monitor that's connected to the VGA just can't handle the frequency/resolution that the card thinks it expects. Try using the utility SwitchResX to support the resolutions that monitor can handle.

BTW: The Rage 128 Pro is not supported by Quartz so most of the cool video effects in Tiger won't work.

The ATI Rage 128 Pro does not support more than one monitor showing different images (spanning).

You will either need to replace this card with a newer card, or else add PCI cards such as the ATI Radeon 9200 Pro in the computer's PCI slots.

Trevor

Dual monitor set up
 

Hi
Does anyone know if the ATI rage128 VR 32M PCI card will operate a second monitor?
It is in an emachine W2646 with an Intel 82845g/gl/ge/pe/gv graphics card.

Sorry if this is too much info, I'm an old guy and this is the first time I have posted to a discussion group.

I bought a PCI card on ebay (new) and I can't get it to "start"

Jim

Hi Jim,

I sent you a private message with some advice on this question, since it's really outside of the scope of this forum. This is a Mac OS X forum, and your computer must be running a different operating system, since it's an eMachines.

Trevor