Windows 7 and dual screen

[ajn03001]

Falsfire, may I ask your system's specs? I'm very interested in running 2 accounts on dual monitors, and this threads been a nail hitter. I'm deciding if I should upgrade to make 2 accounts run maxed and smoothly but spending the least money possible.

[Xar]

Sorry, been a while since I've seen this thread so didn't see your reply Lax. What I mean is XP has a "span" mode where it makes one big desktop based on width of monitor 1 + width of monitor 2. So windows has just 1 huge virtual display, the taskbar spans across both monitors and it's highly annoying when alt-tabbing because the alt-tab box is right in between both monitors. The span mode works best with 2 monitors of the same resolution.

In XP dualview (as opposed to span), where each monitor can have it's own resolution, xp falls down and the framerates are horrible.

In Vista there is no span mode but dualview was fixed...until adding another of the same card and going to 3 monitors.

I believe someone said that they were able to run 3 monitors on 2 cards without lag but only when one card was from Nvidia and one from ATI.

[Tanntyn]

I have been running W7 from when they released the public beta and have had as many as 4 running at once. I have my graphics settings on "average" and get around 20 to 25 frames on the main and limit the background ones to 12. When I do not limit frames, I get between 60 and 80 with all the setting on max in Delaran with 2 copies going.

[zanthor]

Sorry, been a while since I've seen this thread so didn't see your reply Lax. What I mean is XP has a "span" mode where it makes one big desktop based on width of monitor 1 + width of monitor 2. So windows has just 1 huge virtual display, the taskbar spans across both monitors and it's highly annoying when alt-tabbing because the alt-tab box is right in between both monitors. The span mode works best with 2 monitors of the same resolution.

In XP dualview (as opposed to span), where each monitor can have it's own resolution, xp falls down and the framerates are horrible.

In Vista there is no span mode but dualview was fixed...until adding another of the same card and going to 3 monitors.

I believe someone said that they were able to run 3 monitors on 2 cards without lag but only when one card was from Nvidia and one from ATI.

XP Dual View can be setup to look identical to having two monitors if you have appropriate software.

Vista does not span but dualview is fixed and supports 3d accelleration on both heads now.

You can run multiple cards just fine as long as you specify which card to utilize when you launch the game (IS does this or you can switch your "primary" video card in windows.)

[Drew]

I've been having pretty much perfect results using two monitors to dual-box under Windows 7.

Quick specs:
CPU E8400 @ stock 3.0GHz
8GB DDR2-800 RAM (just bumped up from 2GB 3 days ago)
Radeon 4870 512MB video card (with spiffy, non-standard cooler)
2x 7200rpm SATA drives with a full WoW install on each one
Screens - 2 iiyama PLE1902WS screens at 1440x900 (2nd screen added 3 days ago)
HKN for passing keystrokes
standard keyboard
Logitech VX Nano 5 button mouse
Ergotron Neo-Flex™ Dual LCD Lift Stand (arrived, yup - 3 days ago. )



If needed, I can rotate the screens 360 degrees. I have a HKN profile set for what I call "info mode."



I haven't actually boxed with it like that yet, since I really enjoy having two full screens instead of cramming everything together on one monitor.

Even when I was running under Win7 with 2GB of RAM I didn't have any problems aside from the standard slowdown in Dalaran. Since adding the extra RAM, though, my framerates have gotten noticeably better, even after turning the details up much, much higher. (When I set my display options, I move the slider to Ultra, then turn shadow detail, ground clutter density and ground clutter radius all the way down. Every other effect is left at max.)

If you're still on the fence, I'd say take the leap and give Win7 a try. It's free right now, so if you don't like it it won't cost you anything but your time.

Me, I'll actually be buying a full, release version as soon as it's available.

[Deumus]

Thanks for this topic.

I recently upgrade my hardware to run 5 WoW at same time. After buying an Quad Core and Geforce GTX 260, i'm not happy with my FPS (~20) and don't know why this PC config not working properly.

I using Dualview!

I try to install Windows Seven and test if my FPS is better.

[Modes]

I had the same problem in XP until I switched to SPAN and it was like night and day. Went from like 5-7 FPS to 30+ sustainable over 4 additional WoWs. That system was running a Q6600 and 2 x 8800 GTXs.

I'm using Windows 7 now (starting new team, on new PC) and I'm pleased and not noticing the same issue. Long story short, shadows and SPAN vs. Dualview are your most likely culprits, seriously. It was really annoying switching modes every time, but it was absolutely, 100% worth the performance increase. It was not small.

[roflstomp]

well i am running windows 7 with 6 moniters and 3 card with 5 wows and a movie no problems i also made a post under screenshots and digi art of my new system if u wanta look kinda messy but need to tiddy it up

[Eggy]

So, how do you go about setting wow to load on different GPUs? I run a 295 and honestly I dont think it normaly takes advantage of the duel GPUs, or atleast not as much as it ought to, so I want to mess around with this abit, but I cant really find it in Inner Space...

[Lax]

So, how do you go about setting wow to load on different GPUs? I run a 295 and honestly I dont think it normaly takes advantage of the duel GPUs, or atleast not as much as it ought to, so I want to mess around with this abit, but I cant really find it in Inner Space...

The setting is in the IS configuration window, in the Game Configuration tab. Select the game from the drop-down, then there will be another drop-down for the game profile. In the game profile, there is a display selection drop-down that defaults to "Application controlled". It has options for selecting display 1-4.

You'd want to have a profile for the first GPU, and a profile for the second GPU, then select the different profiles per Character in ISBoxer. (Restart both IS and ISBoxer after creating new games and/or game profiles in IS, for it to show up in ISBoxer)