- Feb 25, 2015
- 8
- 0
- 10,510
I have two monitors on my gaming PC.
A small one on the left set to "Primary", and a large one on the right set to "secondary".
Small left primary is for desktop icons, start bar, small programs like chat, media player, occasionally-referenced documents, etc. Also, there are usually a couple sticky notes and always a CPU gauge on this monitor.
Large right secondary is for games, movies, and other "focus of attention" things. It's also the TV that I use for everything else besides my computer.
There are two major problems.
First, if I turn one monitor off, everything crams onto the other one. And when I turn on both monitors again, sometimes everything gets rearranged. I have to manually rearrange my desktop icons at the very least...And since I use the right TV for other things, changing the channel counts as "turned off" as far as Windows is concerned.
Second, If I put a game in Fullscreen mode, it goes fullscreen on the smaller left display. Even if it was windowed on the big right display immediately prior.
I would just set the big display as primary, for gaming purposes, but that usually makes rearranged desktop troubles happen more frequently.
What can I do to make everything always be on the screen I intend it to be?
Is there any way to tell Windows to just stop paying attention to whether any monitors are on or not, so it stops trying to "help" me by moving things? If I turn off a monitor, I just want to not see whatever was on that monitor until I turn it on again.
Or is there a way to reliably control what screen a fullscreen program goes to?
If I could solve either one of these problems, I could keep the other one manageable.
A small one on the left set to "Primary", and a large one on the right set to "secondary".
Small left primary is for desktop icons, start bar, small programs like chat, media player, occasionally-referenced documents, etc. Also, there are usually a couple sticky notes and always a CPU gauge on this monitor.
Large right secondary is for games, movies, and other "focus of attention" things. It's also the TV that I use for everything else besides my computer.
There are two major problems.
First, if I turn one monitor off, everything crams onto the other one. And when I turn on both monitors again, sometimes everything gets rearranged. I have to manually rearrange my desktop icons at the very least...And since I use the right TV for other things, changing the channel counts as "turned off" as far as Windows is concerned.
Second, If I put a game in Fullscreen mode, it goes fullscreen on the smaller left display. Even if it was windowed on the big right display immediately prior.
I would just set the big display as primary, for gaming purposes, but that usually makes rearranged desktop troubles happen more frequently.
What can I do to make everything always be on the screen I intend it to be?
Is there any way to tell Windows to just stop paying attention to whether any monitors are on or not, so it stops trying to "help" me by moving things? If I turn off a monitor, I just want to not see whatever was on that monitor until I turn it on again.
Or is there a way to reliably control what screen a fullscreen program goes to?
If I could solve either one of these problems, I could keep the other one manageable.
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