MCE on Secondary Display?

[ukgovsucks]

I have just installed Windows 7 Build 7048 and having a tinker around with it. Very nice.

One thing though. Does anyone know how I can run MCE on the secondary display. i.e. Not on my main pc monitor but on the cable that runs to my LCD TV?

Having never used MCE before ( always used MediaPortal before ), I assume that you can do this. But I just can't see how! MediaPortal allows you to set it to appear on the TV as the main display, but this won't install on Windows 7, at least not the normal way anyway!

 

[ibocpro]

Hi ukgovsucks,

what gov doesn't? :sarc:

You should be able to set up a second display.

The 8600 GT can run two monitors so you need to plug both in and go to the Nvidia Control panel and enable multiple displays. nView will let you set each monitor's res to fit. I set up a system with two monitors using a 9600 gt and it works well enough.

One little quirk though was that if you are running MC on your second display you can not enter full screen mode as it will set on the primary display and black out the secondary. So you can run the MC in windowed mode and strech it to fit the second display.

Should go pretty easy for you.. just enable two displays and drag MC to the second.

Cheers.

 

[ukgovsucks]

Hi ukgovsucks,

what gov doesn't? :sarc:

You should be able to set up a second display.

The 8600 GT can run two monitors so you need to plug both in and go to the Nvidia Control panel and enable multiple displays. nView will let you set each monitor's res to fit. I set up a system with two monitors using a 9600 gt and it works well enough.

One little quirk though was that if you are running MC on your second display you can not enter full screen mode as it will set on the primary display and black out the secondary. So you can run the MC in windowed mode and strech it to fit the second display.

Should go pretty easy for you.. just enable two displays and drag MC to the second.

Cheers.

Thanks mate.
I know what you mean about "what gov doesn't"!!
lol

 

[hdjunkie]

you need to plug both in and go to the Nvidia Control panel and enable multiple displays.

You can do this without any special software. Right click desktop, and choose screen resolution.

One little quirk though was that if you are running MC on your second display you can not enter full screen mode as it will set on the primary display and black out the secondary. So you can run the MC in windowed mode and strech it to fit the second display.
Cheers.

That's not true. You can go full screen mode no problem. Even if it does go to the main monitor when you go full screen, hit winkey/shift/+left or right depending on which direction the window needs to move.

 

[johngalt]

Yup - confirmed - if you hit [WIN] + [SHIFT] + {left or right arrow} WMC moves to whichever direction (and thus other monitor) you want it to go to. And if it is in full screen mode, hitting [WIN] gives you your mouse back *outside* of WMC so you can do other things- I been doing that for years so I can watch TV on one monitor and do whatever on another....

 

[ukgovsucks]

NICE ONE lads!
Now I can carry testing everything out. If I couldn't have my MCE working on the TV I would of given up Win 7 as a bad job! lol.

THANKS!

 

[ibocpro]

Hi hdjunkie,

OK I feel a bit..

Cool stuff though, does this work for Vista also? I would assume so since johngalt says he has been doing it for years.

My sisters system has the dual monitors and is running Vista 32. It is a home office and so work is done on the primary and TV is background on the secondary. So I did set up the build and configured the system but alas I did not look far enough into running dual monitors...

Again many thanks!

 

[johngalt]

The part I said I was doing for years was the WIN key trick to get the mouse out of the full screened WMC so I could do stuff on the other monitor.

I don't think Vista had the WIN Shift Arrow shortcut for moving windows, IIRC....

 

[hdjunkie]

Yeah, the shortcuts are new in win7. I can't imagine not having them now, though.

 

[LePoilu]

There's nothing really tricky for having MCE on the secondary monitor in full screen mode.

Put MCE in windowed mode => move the windows on the display you want => put MCE in full screen mode. Like any other application it will go in full screen in the monitor you put it on. The good news is that it will keep this settings. Nxt time you launch it, it will be ont the "good" display.

 

[M51AB]

Sorry to revive a dead thread, but...

I just installed Windows 7 Ultimate 32-bit and dragged Media Center in windowed mode to the second display (an LCD TV connected by S-Video) and then maximized the window without a problem. However, Media Center is not automatically launching in the second display; it's launching on my monitor, where I have to re-drag it every time I want to use it on the LCD TV.

I upgraded with a clean install from Vista Professional using Windows Easy Transfer and everything is working perfectly except Media Center will no longer automatically launch on my second display.

What am I doing wrong? :sarc:

 

[T0r0]

Performing thread necromancy:

Dual display here (small lcd and 50"plasma). All of a sudden my media center will only open on small display.

I've dragged it to my main and maximized but it wont stick.
Rerun the setting in media center for display to no avail.

Thoughts?

***Fixed now**
thanks to a post by Mr. Headend over at the GB.
" Try this: launch MC, put into a window, drag the window over to your 2nd display. Press the red "X" to close MC. Launch MC, and hopefully it will be back on your 2nd display."

Apparently I had to close it and not maximize after I dragged it onto the display.

 

[Sardonicus]

It used to happen to me after installs.
I would swap the primary and secondary monitor, then open MCE.
Do the swapping one or a few times more.
MCE will eventually open in the monitor you want.

No need to rerun the MCE setup, that's not the problem.

 

[Hikertrash]

When I use WMC in the secondary display in full screen mode it traps my mouse in the 2nd display. In order to get around that I need to stretch the window to fit

 

[Everlong]

When I use WMC in the secondary display in full screen mode it traps my mouse in the 2nd display. In order to get around that I need to stretch the window to fit

There's been times where I've managed to keep it maximised and have the mouse on the primary display. I think I just did some quick alt+tabbing. Though I didn't like it. The fps of the video playing is quite noticeably slower. I just keep it stretched like you said now.

 

[T0r0]

Windows key frees it up.