X31: Dual Displays under Vista

[rckrchrdsn]

I have been running vista on all my X31's for some time. The main issue was I was not able to find a Vista driver for the ATI 7000. This limited me to the standard VGA, which meant no dual displays, laptop screen/external monitor. I did find references to two different ways to solve the problem. One at DriverHeaven.Com, which I will leave the reading up to the interested or simply using the Microsoft ATI 7200 driver. It works just fine after reboot.

To do this, you simply right click the desktop, choose personalize, then advanced, then properties. On properties choose the driver tab, then update, then choose from a list, then check non-compatible drivers, find ATI and about half way down the ATI 7200 (NOT X7200 or V7200, just plain 7200). follow the rest of the directions and reboot.

The display will be faster and you will be able to use two displays.

Moderators: I wasn't sure if this one should be in the X31 or the Vista forum. Since it seemed more specific to X31, I went this way.

[Jason404]

Vista must run like a complete pig on an X31, and I do not see the point. You cannot even use 3D Flip! (joking). Seriously, why run an OS (very slowly) that has no real advantage over XP, which runs nicely on an X31?

Have you tried using Ultramon? www.ultramon.com
I'm not sure if it can help with your problem, but I find it very useful on my desktop computer.

[rckrchrdsn]

Jason404,

Actually I was explaining how to set up dual monitors on the X31, so there was no problem to fix. But I will checkout Ultramon.

As for Vista being a Pig on the X31. Categorically, No, it runs well. I have sufficient memory. XP ran well in under 320Mb. Vista needs 512Mb. I have at least a Gig on every machine I use now. True I can use Aero, but that doesn't bother me much and the general environments are the same across all my machines.

Vista has many advantages over XP. Most have been downplayed because most people didn't upgrade the components they needed to upgrade. Vista was in far better shape on release than XP or Win2K. Interestingly I used to hear the EXACT same comments on XP vs. Win2K.

Security alone is worth it. Set up out of the box, programs, viruses, and unknown humans find tampering with system level resources a lot harder. Most people, unfamiliar with security under XP, don't appreciate the differences and see them as a hinderance. Not to mention recovery from crappily written software and drivers.

Oh, on my Quad and Dual processor machines, Vista outperforms XP easily. Vista does a much better job of controlling processor resources. My development environments run very nicely, whether Windows or Linux.

Sorry about going off topic. But I do discuss my observations in the Vista discussion area.

[cmarti]

Vista must run like a complete pig on an X31, and I do not see the point. You cannot even use 3D Flip! (joking). Seriously, why run an OS (very slowly) that has no real advantage over XP, which runs nicely on an X31?

No in my opinion it runs nice, my daughter has a 1.4ghz X31 with only 1gb of ram and it runs very well.
(She's not complaining)