Dual monitor possible?

[Liam Proven]

On 05/10/2007, SteVe Cook <yorvik.ubunto at googlemail.com> wrote:
> Liam Proven wrote:
>
> >
> > In my experience, on a lot of machines, if you have what are called
> > "integrated graphics" - that means, the graphic chip is built into the
> > motherboard, not on a separate card - then there is circuitry in the
> > motherboard logic which will automatically disable the onboard
> > graphics when you insert a graphics card.
> >
> > It sounds to me like that's what's happening here. On such machines it
> > is, as far as I know, *impossible* to use the integrated graphics
> > /and/ an additional graphics card simultaneously.
> > Sorry about that. It's a pain, but alas, multiple monitor support is a
> > fairly new thing on the PC - it's less than a decade old as a
> > mass-market thing. Macs, of course, have been doing it for twenty
> > years.
> >
> I have two machines that run dual-head with integrated video and a PCI
> card so it can be done with some machines.

Oh it /can/, sometimes. However, AIUI, it's only possible to have one
AGP card at once. If the integrated graphics are electronically on the
AGP bus, then it's electronically impossible for both them and an
add-in AGP card to be active at one. However, onboard AGP plus a PCI
card might well be doable. I've never tried, though!

In these days of PCIe, one of the main selling points of which is
multiple graphics cards, it would probably be much more
straighforward. But then again, I'm not aware of any SLI-capable
motherboards with onboard graphics. It sounds an unlikely combination
to me.

-- 
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