Connecting external monitors/TVs to laptop w/Vista

ke1n · Nov 28, 2008

No matter how flashy and improved windows gets, it always contains the same amount of Microsoft stupidity that I know will never disappear from the windows platform.

I have an HP laptop with the standard built in Intel graphics card. I always connect my laptop to one of my LCD monitors or lately my plasma TV. Its great. but these two problems really kill my mood:

1- when I connect them it often times forgets what my previous settings were (Second monitor set as primary, not mirrored) so i have to always go into settings and change that. For weeks it might remember those settings then out of the blue it reverses them so that the laptop monitor is actually hte primary while the TV is the secondary, or isnt checked as "Attached". What is this? In 2008 Microsoft still can't get something like this right. On one of the monitors it forgets the resolution i set it to so I have to keep resetting it.

2- When I unplug the external monitor from the laptop sometimes, like right now, the task bar becomes invisible (except for the start menu button) so the only way for me to figure out where the icons in the tray are is by mouseovering them. totally retarded. I have to restart to fix this.

What pisses me off the most is concern #1. it should remember what the settings are without contantly reversing them or worse, me having to go into settings and actually tell it that there i another monitor connected.

Anybody have this problem? Are there any fixes? I have already downloaded the latest driver for this built in graphics card.

thanks alot,

ke1n

MrNeeds · Nov 29, 2008

I've just noticed something that nobody else has, Microsoft isn't stupid, infact its the latter, No.1 Rule when connecting hardware... Turn off the computer before connecting any new hardware, I worked this out with Windows XP and if it's been happening since this version then the problem isnt Microsoft's operating system , it's the user being oblivious of how to use the operating system without fault.

ke1n · Nov 29, 2008

There is still no explanation for the inconsistent things it does. And I appreciate your trying to blame this on the oblivious user but I assure you I have been using Windows OSs since its 3.x days and Microsoft still does not "get" certain things, which is why they are losing and will continue to lose market share.

You still didnt answer my question. It used to work fine, but lately it has been inssiting on reverting to certain settings.

MrNeeds · Nov 29, 2008

you have just openly admitted to disconnecting your hardware and connecting your hardware with the operating system running, that is a one way ticket to BSOD, if you have been using windows platform for soo many years, you should understand this, im not trying to pin the blame on the user, but you are using a laptop with a static monitor always connected to it. this will naturally reset your settings everytime you disconnect and reconnect your plasma screen, i have had no problems whatsoever with multiple monitor configurations on my system, heres a couple of photos to prove im actually running multiple monitors on vista right now.
But to answer your original problem, i believe its the fact you are using a laptop with a static display

johngalt · Nov 30, 2008

Before this turns into a flame war:

MrNeeds - the display system in XP, and *particularly* in Vista, is setup so you don't *need* to turn off that machine to change hardware - in the world of corporate electronic we call it hot-swapping. And before you go bashing me about knowing what that means, I don't know your tech level so I am explaining it.

However, you're right about one thing - Windows seems to do better without hot-swapping than it does with. The caveat, though, is Vista - I have had issues with XP always forgetting my settings, but in Vista I have not had the issue - but then again, I made sure that my primary monitor is my primary monitor, and the system seems to like things where they are, and I don't go disconnecting things on the fly. Superficially, that is....

One good thing about the whole new VDDM in Vista is that it can be 'restarted' without requiring the OS to reboot. A perfect example - I was testing XP for gaming and when I installed XP and then the drivers for both my GTX 260s, to enable SLI, *I HAVE TO REBOOT*. WTF?

Vista, OTOH, allows me to set SLI, and it kills the VDDM and restarts it after the cards have been SLI'd - and even asks me if I want to keep this after making the change, similar to making a screen resolution change.

Thus, is it not overly unreasonable to expect that Vista will remember monitor changes like this.

Now, ke1n, I suppose you're going to argue that this should not be occurring - but I have found that one of the mos frequent times these things happen is when the alternate configuration is being used *and* a Window Update is performed, causing a System Restore point to be created. See if that is causing your problems as well....

Connecting external monitors/TVs to laptop w/Vista

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