Someone please correct me if I'm wrong but I think the answer is no. Your typical laptop that can support more than one screen can support two screens being the attached LCD and a separate screen that can be a projector, a second monitor, or something else.

This lets you do one screen of projected video but not a second.

With a tower it's easier. For example, I used to run a setup with 2 video cards and one supported two outputs. This gave me the ability to do 3 screens.

Your problem here is with the laptop hardware. Does anyone know of something that would add another video out to a laptop? This would be good for those who don't have a second output on their laptop, too.

Matt Farina
Geeks and God Co-Host
www.mattfarina.com

I think you're right here, MF...the reason this won't work is hardware, not software. No matter what machine you're running, as long as it has 2 video source outputs, you CAN do this...but most laptops don't have this.

I know there's presentation software that will run, not only 2 screens, but 3 (two projectors and a preview monitor) or more...it's just a matter of hardware.

-Rob Feature
Geeks and God Co-Host
www.bobchristenson.com

Here is a company that makes what you might need. It is a second video card that uses your PCMCIA slot (provided you don't use it already). It looks like cool stuff... Village Tronic

Chordinator

www.calvarycolorado.org

hey y'all! just wanted to mention that there are USB video adapters now available that are a good solution for laptop users that want to add another video output. Not sure what data throughput you could expect, but unless you're running an intense 3D game it should perform fine.

That's pretty cool. USB (especially 2.0) has some really high throughput. I bet you could do some graphic intensive stuff there. I'd love to hear from someone who found the limit to these devices.

Matt Farina
Geeks and God Co-Host
www.mattfarina.com

you CAN run 2 or 4 or 6 ect. projectors off of one laptop so long as you want the same view on all of them...i.e a stage with 2 screens...only thing you need is a spliter and maybe a power slipter if you have long cords

There are plenty of hardware options out there, like the SideCar from Digital Tigers http://www.digitaltigers.com/sidecar.asp but the trick is finding a presentation software that can support more then the usual 2 displays. Since your needs are for the two displays to be in sync, you could play around with the windows display properties and make you media into a video and use something like VLC to display the video which would be as wide as the two screens. Just an idea. Maybe something like Media Shout would do it. If the budget is big enough, you may need to go up to a digital signage software like Navori.

Hope that Helps

As Trenton said, there is such a thing as a USB-to-VGA adapter. EVGA makes one, as do several other companies. (No, that is not a referral link. It's just the first place I looked to find a product example.) Matrox also makes gadgets called the DualHead2Go and the TrippleHead2Go, which should do exactly what you want, but are exorbitantly expensive.

--- Mr. DOS

My bad, I misunderstood how the Matrox adapters work. They don't actually give you multiple screens that can be accessed individually; instead, they get Windows to run your output at a very wide screen resolution (say, 3840x1024) and then split that resolution into three chunks of 1280x1024, each of which is passed to its own monitor. So yeah, as others have said, the USB adapter is probably the best option.

--- Mr. DOS

Actually the Triple and Dual Head 2 Go solutions work really well. With ProPresenter on the Mac you can effectively address each part of the screen as a separate screen. It will take a triple and either span your graphic across each screen, set up each screen separate (and you choose which of them get lyrics and which don't), or setup 2 screens to both have the same image and then the 3rd to have black background with lyrics. I use the latter mode at churches in order to run a choir monitor for the lyrics. No distraction of a background helps them to see better.

In my youth room, I plan to have 3 projectors that are to each side and then behind the band. I stretch the same image across all 3 for the background and then project lyrics just on the left and right. So the band has lighting behind them that matches everything else and keeps the worship mood together.

The triples are about $350 out there. Great product and it'll work on a laptop or even a mini to give you multiple screens.

Doc

Hi everyone.

I want connect my laptop to two projectors. I want the projectors to project different screens, like two different powerpoint presentations.

Any suggestions on how to do this...?

Angel

I have no idea whether this would work, or not.

Some docking stations, I think Targus makes one, connect via USB and provide a video connection along with other ports. You might be able to connect one projector to your laptop's external video, and another to the docking station video port. Whether this works, or not, will be a function of the drivers.

There may also be other USB to video converters as well as video expansion port (we used to call them PCMCIA cards, but I don't think anyone uses that standard any more) adapters.

Good luck,
Curt

@Teacher - probably not powerpoint. Powerpoint is a PEACOCK program, when you run it, it takes over your display and says "look at me!". Trying to get more then one of these to run and display their presentation at the same time will take some geeky tweaking if it's at all possible.
What's the application, there might be a better solution.

Hi,

I need to run two powerpoint or Keynote presentations to two projectors from my MAC Pro Tower. Each projector would run one presentation. Is that possible?

Thanks

-Lilly

Lilly, if you mean you will be presenting the same slides on both projectors at the same time, you will hopefully find that your projectors come with a second port, where you can plug a video cable from the computer into one of the projectors, and then from that projector into the other projector. The second projector would then just show whatever the first projector is showing.

Hello

Is it possible to use 2 or 3 projector and 1 laptop at the same view? What kind of materials that i need to run?

Bogz

Bogz,

If you're going to display the same thing on two or three projectors, or monitors for that matter, this switcher should do the job. Considering the price differential, I'd be inclined to go for the four port model, just in case, even though my initial needs might only require two projectors.

Note that you'll need a HD15 F/F gender bender if you want to use standard M/M video/monitor cables. Using a gender bender with standard cables is cheaper than buying a female input switcher or using "extension" cables.

Good luck,
Curt

I use on of these for our sermons.
http://jaycar.com.au/productView.asp?ID=XC4879&key...

We use easy worship setup so the laptop screen is the control interface, the laptop VGA out runs the main projector, and the USB to DVI box runs the teleprompt for the song words.

Nice and easy, apparently you can run upto 6 USB to DVI boxes if you have enough USB ports.

Im not sure if it will work on a Mac...sorry

Martin.

Yeah, definitely go with that switcher, it should do the trick. Be sure to get a high quality projector rental as well because that can often make all the difference

Try to use VGA splitter. Connect your laptop to the VGA splitter device and the two out to projector.

This is what i did during the conference.

Mediacast claims to be able to project on 3 screens. many video cards also do 3 screens of extended desktops but I have not tried them yet.