# 3 Monitors?



## Happy Haggis (Feb 16, 2012)

At the moment I am using 2 monitors, an Eizo S2243W and a Dell 22". The Eizo is connected to DVI and the Dell to VGA. I have an HDMI port available and a Dell 20" monitor spare. It seems a waste not to utilise the Dell 20" as I can't sell it, it's just gathering dust.
My graphics card is a Palit Nvidia GT250 1Gb and I was wondering if anyone here runs 3 monitors and if so, whether it would be viable for me to use all 3. The Eizo has a Displayport port and I could easily buy a Displayport>HDMI cable.
Thanks!


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## clee01l (Feb 16, 2012)

I ran 3 monitors for a while on a Win7 laptop. LR only is aware of two monitors and these are primary and secondary and will . In my case the Primary monitor was the 13" laptop. If I ran LR on one of the larger monitors the secondary window defaulted to the Primary monitor (i.e. the laptop) I could make the secondary window less than full screen drag it to the monitor I wanted it to use and manually expand that windo to the limits of that screen.  In any event LR only ever uses two monitors.  However the third monitor is useful for a mail client or an internet browser while you maximise the use of LR on two displays.


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## Happy Haggis (Feb 16, 2012)

Thanks for the response, Cletus. 
From what I have been able to find on the web, it appears that I would need another graphics card. I'm going to check with the company I bought the PC from just to be sure.
Thanks again.


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## clee01l (Feb 16, 2012)

FWIW, On my HP Desktop, I had only one graphics card.  It had a DVI port and a VGA Port.  I successfully ran and HDMI/DVI cable and a VGA cable to drive both monitors.  If you have two ports on one card, it should work.  (You will be sharing Video memory).  If you have the cable, attach all monitors to the computer ports and see if Windows will detect all displays. I can't see where any harm coud come to your computer or displays.  If it does not detect, then think about getting an additional card


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## Happy Haggis (Feb 16, 2012)

Hi Cletus, I have just received an email from Scan Computers who built my PC for me and it seems that I cannot use all three ports at the same time. I may look into getting another card at some stage. As you suggested, I was thinking of using it for web browsing or whatever and keep the other 2 for LR and Photoshop.


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## Brad Snyder (Feb 16, 2012)

Adding an additional card can be a pain as well. My mobo has a PCIe x16 for the primary video adapter. All the remaining slots are single lane x1's. For some reason PCIe x1 video adapters, even generic low-performance, are expensive.   I have one sitting here to install, but I'm in the middle of my day job, and don't want to start a science project, when I'm on deadline.

I have run up to four monitors on older XP /PCI based systems. Cletus is right, Lr (on Windows, at least) assumes what it wants about primary and secondary monitors and that's that. You if you reduce the windows from full screen by a tad, you can drag them around.


I also have a USB to VGA adapter to add a 3rd display, (I think Cletus used to use one as well) but I've never been happy with it. It screws up the Aero features of the Windows display, and I've come to rely on those.


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## Happy Haggis (Feb 17, 2012)

Hmm.. Thanks Brad. If I decide to proceed I'll check with the PC computer company to see what is involved. As they built the system for me, they will know how difficult it will be.


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