thinkpad T61P + external monitor problems

[Hakubi]

Hello all,

I am using a thinkpad t61P w/ windows XP sp3 and nvidia driver version 195.62. the external monitor is a Samsung T240HD over VGA.

When I install a monitor on the VGA port and configure it in Nvidia control panel to clone the image while having pre OS boot messages goto the laptop LCD ... it always sends it to the VGA monitor and nothing appears ever on the laptop LCD, once it finishes the windows XP loading splash screen the monitor goes into standby and the laptop LCD stays black even if I unplug VGA ... I am forced to hard reboot.

the funny thing is, If i boot with the VGA disconnected everything goes to the thinkpad LCD like it should ... I can then reconnect it while on the windows desktop and the monitor doesn't go into stand by and I can use both screens like normal.

Is this a hardware or driver problem?

[TTY]

In BIOS, you can set the notebook to boot to the notebook's display.

[crashnburn]

Is it possible to choose which Screen / LCD to PRIORITIZE the video output to.. at BIOS / Boottime even before the OS boots?

e.g. Internal, VGA & DVI ports?

[TTY]

Is it possible to choose which Screen / LCD to PRIORITIZE the video output to.. at BIOS / Boottime even before the OS boots?

Yes, enter BIOS, go to Config -> Display. But if you set it to boot to two displays, such as VGA+DVI, it can happen that output is restricted to the first of the two chosen devices while booting.