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I have Dell Optiplex 960 with ATI Radeon HD 3470 graphics card, which allowed me to hook two monitors to it. However there is still VGA port on mother board is unused. I tried plugging another monitor, surprisingly my third monitor doesn't directed.
Can any one give me a hint how to fix this problem?
Prashant Cholachagudda
Posted 2010-05-11T08:11:52.277
Reputation: 791
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There are very few motherboards that support using both the motherboard integrated graphics unit at the same time as a dedicated graphics card. Some newer motherboards support Hybrid Crossfire or Hybrid SLI to boost the performance of the dedicated card using the onboard graphics, which to me would suggest that they are also capable of being used independantly.
It may be that you simply need to go into the BIOS and enable some option that switches the integrated graphics back on irrespective of the dedicated graphics, but I wouldn't bet on it being there or working the way you expect. Information on which systems support using the integrated at the same time as dedicated graphics is patchy at best and depends entirely on the manufacturer.
The other way to get that third monitor would be to use a cheap PCI graphics card in a spare slot. You could probably get one that would work for £30.
Another question about the same thing, and the long and short of it is that it depends very much on your motherboard and whether it supports re-enabling the integrated graphics. It works for some boards but not others, not all motherboards are created equal, YMMV.
Mokubai
Posted 2010-05-11T08:11:52.277
Reputation: 64 434
I considered buying another Graphics card, unfortunately I don't have slot to spare :( Thanks. – Prashant Cholachagudda – 2010-05-11T12:09:46.060
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This is because your motherboard/bios automatically disables the integrated graphics' VGA output. If you're lucky you could browse your BIOS to see if there is such an option you could disable. Otherwise to hook up three monitors you need to have a minimum of 3 outputs from (usually requires 2 dedicated graphics cards working together) or try eyefinity by purchasing a 5770.
jay
Posted 2010-05-11T08:11:52.277
Reputation: 6 287
I'll is there any option to enable it in BIOS, thanks. – Prashant Cholachagudda – 2010-05-11T12:10:35.933
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For a possible solution see Radeon HD 3670 on Dell XPS16 laptop. Are 3 monitors possible? - a little external gadget required.
Suma
Posted 2010-05-11T08:11:52.277
Reputation: 1 307
despite my answer, i'm still hoping that there's something out there that can do this – jay – 2010-05-11T08:23:49.933