Advice on how to set up Dual Monitors

[meaner02]

Hewlett Packard Compaq Presario SR 1000
Microsoft Window XP
Home Edition
Version 2002, Service Pack 3
2.19Ghz, 1.00GB of RAM

ACPI Uniprocessor PC
AMD Athlon ™ 64 Processor 3700+
NVIDIA GeForce 6200SE TurboCache™


Hello,

I wish to connect a second monitor to my PC desktop.
My current monitor is a LCD, Plug and Play monitor, manufacturer: standard monitor type, model WJ1780PI, D-12055 - one straight wire, connecting to a VGA port near the bottom.

There is also another VGA port, situated vertical near the USB slots. However I tried taking out the VGA cable and slotting it into the vertical slot and it came up that there is no signal?

What would be the best way to get around this. Would a VGA splitter work??

[Computer_Commando]

The VGA port at the bottom is onboard or integrated video.  The one on the vertical slot is a separate graphics card.  The existence of a separate card usually turns the onboard off.  You cannot use them simultaneously.  The BIOS determines which video take precedence.

[DaveLembke]

Its best to have a video card that has 2 ports for dual displays, although sometimes both on board (integrated) and expansion card can work side by side as was the case with a small form factor HP DC5000 with single VGA out GeForce 4 MX440 64MB video card stuffed into PCI slot. Was able to have dual displays GeForce 4 MX 440 working along side Intel Integrated GPU  on Windows XP Pro SP3.

I'd look for a video card upgrade, guessing your expansion slot in that system is AGP given its age. There are lots of cheap AGP 8x video cards out there with dual display support. Last one I bought was a 7600GT AGP 8X with 256MB DDR2 memory with dual display 1 VGA and 1 DVI and it cost me about $60 2 years ago. Since then the GPU fan died as is common with many Geforce cards I have owned. Seems as though they are poor quality fans or maybe because I run my computer too much they never have much off time and wear out.