In search of ... external video support

[barney]

Folk,

I'm looking for something that will allow me to connect a laptop to multiple external monitors.  Right now I'm interested in the ViDock series, but I'm not really comfortable with their representation of the specs.  I assume, from the online literature, that the ViDock will take pretty much any card - I have a Sapphire, HD5770 that I've never been able to use - but what I don't see is whether there'll be conflict between that card in the ViDock and the GEForce 3xx in my laptop.  Don't know how well nVidia and ATI cooperate  .

So, any of ya have any experience with the ViDock series?  I know there are some hardware nuts here  .  It seems a bit pricey, at least for the one I think I'd need, but if it'll let me do what I want, it'll be worth it.

OK, for hardware configs, this is a Dell Vostro 3700, i7 processor, 4G RAM, Win7 Ultimate.  Currently I'm connected to one (1) external monitor via the HDMI slot.  I tried another monitor via the VGA slot, but the video driver only supports two (2) monitors  .  I'd like to stretch that to three (3) or four (4), if possible, but at least two (2) extermal. 

[Ath]

Would this be of help?

And as it doesn't support a proper docking station, maybe a USB dock like this Targus (as offered by Dell) with an extra DVI port could help?
Most likely the performance is not up to par with the expectations or requirements, so the ViDock combined with a multi-monitor card (advice: choose a (mini)DisplayPort model, so a lot of monitors can be connected) could be a better solution.

OTOH, if you need much better graphics power then available in a laptop, you could have bought a more than decent desktop that allows for multiple graphics adapters with multi-monitor capabilities .

[Carol Haynes]

How about this sort of thing:

http://www.matrox.co.../products/gxm/dh2go/

They do various versions for 2 or 3 screen (or more) and a variety of interfaces (VGA, DVI and HDMI, if I remember correctly).

Not cheap though.

[Ath]

For that kind of money I'd get ViDock 3 or 4 I guess, that holds a 'real' video card, giving a real performance-boost, and can be upgraded if needed.

[barney]

The ViDock 4+ is likely the one, although I've yet to ascertain the power requirements on the Sapphire.  Currently have a Kensington Universal w/DVI, but when I upgraded to Win7 Ultimate, it lost the capability to access another monitor - 64-bit drivers not extant <sigh /> - so I'm a bit loath to trust the other USB docks.  Too much of the information I'd need is not published in the specs  .  That's part of the problem with the ViDock series. 

When I bought that Sapphire card a couple of years ago, one (1) of the pieces of information that was not published kept me from being able to use it.  The only slot it would fit on the tower was at the very end of the row of slots ... and the card is a double-wide, so even had I forced it into place, I'd not have been able to access half of it - it'd have been blocked by the case  .  The missing piece of information then was which side the motherboard access plug was  .

If I'm gonna lay out ~$300 for the ViDock, I wanna know it'll work before purchase  .

[Marcel25]

I have a Dell Latitude laptop (E6410) and docking station (Port Replicator : EURO2 Advanced E-Port with 130W AC Adaptor) and that enables me to work with 2 22" monitors that each have 1680x1050 pixels. it works fine. Besides the two DVI connectors the docking station also has one VGA connector, but when I used one DVI and one VGA the VGA was blurred. Could be my cable, but I am happy just using two DVI monitors. Also the docking works fine, you can leave the laptop powered on when putting the laptop in the docking station or taking it out and it switches fine, between internal and 2x external. I am a happy user!