Dual monitors - Laptop-

Check if supported?

[henry0]

I have a laptop with too much screen real estate 2000 + resolution
If I change it to 1024 0r 1200 I do not use my available space, need to play with font size and cannot properly dev my webs which I like to see in 1024.
Since I do not see another alternative, I am thinking to add a second smaller monitor and run it at 1024.

The laptop is a very recent Inspiron E1705
How may I ahead of time figure if it could support two monitors?

Or any other suggestion?
Such as a program that could in no time change resolution back and forth?

Thanks

[spencer2072]

Why not download Mozilla Firefox and download its Developer Extension which allows you to resize the browser to any size! This way you can at least do some testing while you work out how to config 2 screens.

Out of interest a laptop with 2000px width, very impressive, i hope its a 20" laptop lol.

[j_h_maccann]

Or in Windows XP, use Control Panel / Display / Settings / Advanced / DPI Setting / Custom Setting to set the LCD display on the laptop to a different nominal density.

This works surprisingly well, and it's fairly common for users to change the DPI setting of large displays from the default "96dpi" to "120dpi", so as to be able to read the teensy fonts on web pages whose designers have used px values, unaware that different screens have different physical densities.

[henry0]

Thanks both
I do also use FF to check my work, did not think to load it on my new machine and did not know about that capability.

I will also look at custom settings

<edit>
I didn't remember that I tried it,
at first glance sounds OK, but for ex:
header 100 px height
logo 90 px
text 10 px

change to 120 dpi results in text ONLY resizing but pics are the same so the design looks broken
</edit>

[kaled]

The display properties should allow you to change the screen resolution even though you are using a laptop. How good the result is will depend on your computer. For instance, my 1024 LCD laptop screen makes a good effort at 800*600 but it is a little blurred. You may find that only a central portion of the screen is used - in this case you'll need to change a bios setting so that the image is stretched.

If you want to add another screen, you should find that capability listed in the specifications. If the driver supports it, you should also see a dual-monitor option in the display properties dialog.

Kaled.

[henry0]

Kaled,
Thanks Yes both of my laptops support it (as you mentionned I found it in display property)

So two monitors it will be, sounds to be the most productive solution.