Dual Monitor Troubles

[Guest flightpro08]

Hey everyone :D (This is kind of a long post, so bear with me. ;-) )After many months of waiting, I was finally able to purchase a second monitor this past weekend. The reason for this purchase was for me to create a "Dual Monitor Setup", specifically for FS2k2. I have had a setup like this before with a previous system, and everything worked just fine. But this time, I haven't been so lucky.Everything on my Dual Monitor Setup seems to be working fine, that is until I ALT-TAB out and go back into FS2k2. Whenever I ALT-TAB out of FS2k2 and attempt to come back, the sim is in a "frozen state", and remains at the view in which I left it. Though, it never actually locks up, as I am able to press the Cycle View button, and hear the engines running at various degrees of loudness as the views change. (While I am stuck in the one view)While ALT-ENTER does work, I've really found this to not be as nice as ALT-TAB. ALT-ENTER takes a signifcant amount of time to work (up to 30 seconds), and while this is minor to most, I find it annoying. :-lol Being able to ALT-TAB in/out of FS2k2 is vital to me, as I fly 100% of my flights on VATSIM. And while I could get the HOSTSB program to run Sqawkbox within FS2k2, I still enjoying surfing the net and such while flying.After playing around with various things this afternoon, I've found that ALT-TAB works if I disconnect my second monitor. This quite obviously defeats the perpose of having two monitor though. :-lolDisconnecting my second monitor is the only thing that has worked. Here are is a list of all of the other things I've tried that have not worked:-Trying various Detonator Drivers (I've tried lots of them ;-) )- Reinstalling DirectX 9.0a-Installing the latest drivers for both of my monitors-Running various settings on my video card (FSAA, etc.)-Deleting my FS2002.cfg file and letting the sim generate a new oneThe two monitors I am running are the "Viewsonic UltraBright A90f+ 19" CRT Monitor" (this is my primary monitor) and the "SAMSUNG SyncMaster 753DF 19" CRT Monitor" (this is my secondary monitor).As you can see, I've tried quite a few different things and I'm flat out of ideas. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. :-)Ryan-Flightpro08 :-cool VATSIM Pilot/ControllerZLA ARTCC Senior Controller (C-3)ASRC (Advanced Simulated Radar Client) Beta Testerhttp://vatsim.pilotmedia.fi/statusindicato...tor=OD1&a=a.jpg-----------------------------My "Home Made" System Specs:Intel Pentium 4 2.2GHz ProcessorTurbo Gamer ATX Mid-Tower with 420W Power SupplyEPoX 4G4A Motherboard with Intel 845G ChipsetVisiontek XTASY GeForce4 128MB Ti4600 (Det 42.86 Drivers)512MB PC2100 DDR RAM40GB Matrox 7200RPM Hard DriveWindows XP Home Edition SP1*No CPU or GPU Overclocking*3dMark2001SE Score: 11298-----------------------------Click Here to Download my American Eagle POSKY CRJ-200!

[Guest ba747heavy]

Ryan,I am not sure what your problem is, but I would recommend keeping your sim in the windowed state until a solution comes up.Sorry I can't help more.

[Guest flightpro08]

I should add that my secondary monitor is hooked up to the DVI port on my video card. (I'm using a DVI to VGA Adapter)Ryan-Flightpro08 :-cool VATSIM Pilot/ControllerZLA ARTCC Senior Controller (C-3)ASRC (Advanced Simulated Radar Client) Beta Testerhttp://vatsim.pilotmedia.fi/statusindicato...tor=OD1&a=a.jpg-----------------------------My "Home Made" System Specs:Intel Pentium 4 2.2GHz ProcessorTurbo Gamer ATX Mid-Tower with 420W Power SupplyEPoX 4G4A Motherboard with Intel 845G ChipsetVisiontek XTASY GeForce4 128MB Ti4600 (Det 42.86 Drivers)512MB PC2100 DDR RAM40GB Matrox 7200RPM Hard DriveWindows XP Home Edition SP1*No CPU or GPU Overclocking*3dMark2001SE Score: 11298-----------------------------Click Here to Download my American Eagle POSKY CRJ-200!

[Guest flightpro08]

Anyone? :-(Ryan-Flightpro08 :-cool VATSIM Pilot/ControllerZLA ARTCC Senior Controller (C-3)ASRC (Advanced Simulated Radar Client) Beta Testerhttp://vatsim.pilotmedia.fi/statusindicato...tor=OD1&a=a.jpg-----------------------------My "Home Made" System Specs:Intel Pentium 4 2.2GHz ProcessorTurbo Gamer ATX Mid-Tower with 420W Power SupplyEPoX 4G4A Motherboard with Intel 845G ChipsetVisiontek XTASY GeForce4 128MB Ti4600 (Det 42.86 Drivers)512MB PC2100 DDR RAM40GB Matrox 7200RPM Hard DriveWindows XP Home Edition SP1*No CPU or GPU Overclocking*3dMark2001SE Score: 11298-----------------------------Click Here to Download my American Eagle POSKY CRJ-200!

[Guest Stompy]

I've got a setup very similar to yours, but I don't honestly remember if I've even alt-tabbed out of FS once. I might have an idea though...Since you typically are just alt-tabbing to other programs, why don't you throw those shortcuts and program windows onto the second monitor? Then you shouldn't have to alt-tab at all.Oh, and I don't know if it matters or not, but have you tried just minimizing the FS window instead of switching out of it?

[Guest flightpro08]

Thanks for the advice, Stompy, but neither of this methods work. I've tried placing windows over in my second monitor and then clicking on them whiel flying, but this minimizes FS2k2, and as a result, the same problems occur. And, in full screen mode, you can minimize FS2k2 unfortunitly. :-(Any other ideas anyone?Ryan-Flightpro08 :-cool VATSIM Pilot/ControllerZLA ARTCC Senior Controller (C-3)ASRC (Advanced Simulated Radar Client) Beta Testerhttp://vatsim.pilotmedia.fi/statusindicato...tor=OD1&a=a.jpg-----------------------------My "Home Made" System Specs:Intel Pentium 4 2.2GHz ProcessorTurbo Gamer ATX Mid-Tower with 420W Power SupplyEPoX 4G4A Motherboard with Intel 845G ChipsetVisiontek XTASY GeForce4 128MB Ti4600 (Det 42.86 Drivers)512MB PC2100 DDR RAM40GB Matrox 7200RPM Hard DriveWindows XP Home Edition SP1*No CPU or GPU Overclocking*3dMark2001SE Score: 11298-----------------------------Click Here to Download my American Eagle POSKY CRJ-200!

[Guest Stompy]

Oh, that's right...any time you click a 2D window it makes everything switch to 2d...or something like that...which is why all that 3rd party stuff is hard to interface with outside of the sim...forgot about that.Are you using the built-in multi display feature or are you using nView?Could the refresh rate you have selected be to blame?I assume you're not cloning your display on the second monitor...What happens if you run FS on the other monitor and try minimizing it from there? (Is that even possible?)Are the two monitors running at different resolutions and color depths?

[Guest gasebah]

Ryan,I had this very same problem after I installed a certain WinXP Hotfix. The name is XP security hotfix Q328310. Check if you have this installed on your puter and uninstall it.After I uninstalled it the problem never came back.The hotfix messes with timings and refresh rates and the desktop yadda, yadda....If that don't work set your desktop to the same refresh rate you run MSFS and see what happens.Alex

[Guest flightpro08]

Alex,Thanks for the great tip. Though, after reading through that article, I didn't notice a way to uninstall the fix. How does one go about doing this? Thanks.Ryan-Flightpro08 :-cool VATSIM Pilot/ControllerZLA ARTCC Senior Controller (C-3)ASRC (Advanced Simulated Radar Client) Beta Testerhttp://vatsim.pilotmedia.fi/statusindicato...tor=OD1&a=a.jpg-----------------------------My "Home Made" System Specs:Intel Pentium 4 2.2GHz ProcessorTurbo Gamer ATX Mid-Tower with 420W Power SupplyEPoX 4G4A Motherboard with Intel 845G ChipsetVisiontek XTASY GeForce4 128MB Ti4600 (Det 42.86 Drivers)512MB PC2100 DDR RAM40GB Matrox 7200RPM Hard DriveWindows XP Home Edition SP1*No CPU or GPU Overclocking*3dMark2001SE Score: 11298-----------------------------Click Here to Download my American Eagle POSKY CRJ-200!

[Guest ba747heavy]

Usually hot-fixes can be uninstalled via the Control Panel - Add/Remove programs applet.Good luck :-beerchug

[Guest flightpro08]

Woooooohoooooo!!! :D :D :D :-lolIt worked. Uninstalling that Hotfix was the trick.Thank you so much Alex, Fred, and everyone else. You guys are what make this community the best on the internet. :DRyan-Flightpro08 :-cool VATSIM Pilot/ControllerZLA ARTCC Senior Controller (C-3)ASRC (Advanced Simulated Radar Client) Beta Testerhttp://vatsim.pilotmedia.fi/statusindicato...tor=OD1&a=a.jpg-----------------------------My "Home Made" System Specs:Intel Pentium 4 2.2GHz ProcessorTurbo Gamer ATX Mid-Tower with 420W Power SupplyEPoX 4G4A Motherboard with Intel 845G ChipsetVisiontek XTASY GeForce4 128MB Ti4600 (Det 42.86 Drivers)512MB PC2100 DDR RAM40GB Matrox 7200RPM Hard DriveWindows XP Home Edition SP1*No CPU or GPU Overclocking*3dMark2001SE Score: 11298-----------------------------Click Here to Download my American Eagle POSKY CRJ-200!

[Guest ba747heavy]

Great news! :D :D :D

[Guest Stompy]

Oh, crap. So there's no way to make everything play nicely with the hotfix installed? It's marginally more important for me to be up to date with security patches than dual monitor support...I could uninstall it but would prefer not to if it was a possibility...

[Guest gasebah]

Stompy,I am not sure but I guess the problem has something to do with switching the refresh rate when jumping between FS2002 and the desktop. I suppose that if you manage to set your desktop and MSFS2K2 to the same resolution and refresh rate you might be able to work around the problem without uninstalling the hotfix.Alex