'Luckless' said:

'tstrimple' said:

Multiple monitors has worked just fine on windows for ages, often defaulting to cloning what is on your desktop which is typically the behavior desired on a projector. I don't understand what problems people have with it, especially people who would frequent these forums.

The problems I usually see are a result of changes in settings, and things simply not acting as expected/desired. The Overhead and presenter views option tends to cause people the most headaches, (The one where they want PowerPoint to display one screen to the audience, and then another screen with the presenter's notes on the laptop.) as they often end up just cloning the screen.

Of course, one of the other common problems seems to be when the system had been setup for some dual display mode, and the user wants to clone,…

But of course the issue I see the most often stems from resolution errors, where the projector is at one size, and the laptop is at another, and they just don't play nice at all.


(And all this reminds me: I should likely find the time over the weekend to upgrade my netbook to 10.x, it is still running 8.04 or whatever. Multiple monitors doesn't play as nicely as I would have liked in this version, and I changed something awhile ago that now causes my script to make it play nice fail.)

Right click your desktop, go to properties. You can control the resolution for both monitors, as well as the multiple monitor mode you want to use. Alternatively you can go to the control panel and choose display properties. On Windows 7 they named it "Connect to an external display" under the control panel. It's very straightforward as to my confusion as to why people have problems with it.

Oh yes, but the kicker is that some systems get these overridden by other 'helpful' software, or any number of other conflicts in the system cause them to simply not work. One of my classmates has a laptop that refuses to acknowledge the existence of the projector in one of the labs, but is fine with every other projector on campus.

Oh yes, but the kicker is that some systems get these overridden by other 'helpful' software, or any number of other conflicts in the system cause them to simply not work. One of my classmates has a laptop that refuses to acknowledge the existence of the projector in one of the labs, but is fine with every other projector on campus.

So you're judging windows based on some crappy software that is installed, not the OS itself. Understood. OEM software DOES suck and is painful to use compared to a clean Windows install.

'Luckless' said:

Oh yes, but the kicker is that some systems get these overridden by other 'helpful' software, or any number of other conflicts in the system cause them to simply not work. One of my classmates has a laptop that refuses to acknowledge the existence of the projector in one of the labs, but is fine with every other projector on campus.

So you're judging windows based on some crappy software that is installed, not the OS itself. Understood. OEM software DOES suck and is painful to use compared to a clean Windows install.

No, I'm saying people use computer systems, and they All have flaws and issues. I've seen people have issues with Nvidia's or ATI's software that came bundled with their graphics card. I've had Windows 7 (Clean install, nothing but the OS with the network and updated graphics card drivers on the hard drive) decide that my 1680x1050 monitor was actually an SVGA, and limited me to choosing between 800x600 and 640x480. I never did find out what was going on with that, but resorted to a last ditch hail Mary option of formatting the drive a second time and starting over. (Magically, that worked. I haven't had any issues with Windows on this box since.)

Hey, what do you guys think about Ubuntu?

That's what i think!

Your argument is wrong!

No, YOUR argument is wrong!

YOUR argument about MY argument is wrong!

No, YOUR argument about MY argument about YOUR argument is wrong!

YOUR argument about MY argument about YOUR argument about MY argument is wrong!

No, YOUR argument about MY argument about YOUR argument about MY argument about YOUR argument is wrong!


You guys keep going. I'm going to warm up some nachos. This is great!

If you're interested in trying and trust my word for it: for starting up windows 7, connecting the projector, pushing windows+P and opening the powerpoint it took me 19.7secs on my current laptop.

Actually I would be interested if people tested this specific case and reported results

On my desktop with Ubuntu 10.10, an Ati 4850 (Catalyst 10.12 drivers) and an Intel SSD:
- boot time: 12 seconds (6 seconds for BIOS, 6 seconds for OS boot)
- time to enter password: 3 seconds (I use a big password)
- time to light up monitor: ~2 seconds (just plug it in and it lights up at native resolution)
- time to launch Evince: <1 second (try doing that with Adobe Acrobat)

Total time for launching a presentation: 18 seconds.

- time to launch Evince: <1 second (try doing that with Adobe Acrobat)

Time to launch the last version of Adobe Acrobat (Adobe Reader X) is less than 1 second as well, at least on my desktop: AMD Athlon 64 X2 2.9 GHz, 3 GB RAM, Windows 7 x86 Enterprise.

On my desktop with Ubuntu 10.10, an Ati 4850 (Catalyst 10.12 drivers) and an Intel SSD:
- boot time: 12 seconds (6 seconds for BIOS, 6 seconds for OS boot)
- time to enter password: 3 seconds (I use a big password)
- time to light up monitor: ~2 seconds (just plug it in and it lights up at native resolution)
- time to launch Evince: <1 second (try doing that with Adobe Acrobat)
Total time for launching a presentation: 18 seconds.

Cool
Now I have to go and look if I can shave off some precious seconds.

'Fiddler' said:

- time to launch Evince: <1 second (try doing that with Adobe Acrobat)

Time to launch the last version of Adobe Acrobat (Adobe Reader X) is less than 1 second as well, at least on my desktop: AMD Athlon 64 X2 2.9 GHz, 3 GB RAM, Windows 7 x86 Enterprise.

Is it less than 1 second as soon as you login to your desktop? I somehow doubt that.

Please, please don't hold up Acrobat Reader as an example of why Windows is OK. It's not. Acrobat Reader is an abomination and a pox on humanity. Use Foxit.

Please, please don't hold up Acrobat Reader as an example of why Windows is OK. It's not. Acrobat Reader is an abomination and a pox on humanity. Use Foxit.

Foxit uses an atrocious, adware-ridden installer. It's even worse than Acrobat Reader.


Use Evince instead and keep your sanity intact.