# dualscreen with quake 3 arena



## Zammy-Sam (Apr 15, 2003)

I was asking myself if anyone ever considered to try quake3arena on two screens. I don't mean two mirrored screens, but split-screen. Does it work at all? Wanna try out on my powerbook...

tnx


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 16, 2003)

Hmmmmmm, not so many quake3arena gamers here, I guess! ;-)
Ok, let me rephrase my question:
did anyone ever succeed to display any kind of 3d-rendered game in fullscreen on two screens with different views?


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## senne (Apr 16, 2003)

not me. (i've never tried it)


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 16, 2003)

at least one reply! ;-)

tnx anyway


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## Da_iMac_Daddy (Apr 16, 2003)

Why wouldn't it be possible?


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 16, 2003)

well, I tried on the easiest way: plugged another screen, adjusted dual-screen on macosx and started quake3arena. Result:
one screen turned off, the other was working. Well, since there is no such option in the menu of quake3arena, I supposed I should try somehow else. I have seen quake3arena on two and even three screens...
So? Anyone an idea?


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## Bad Co (Apr 16, 2003)

quake 3 arena does not support dual screens, any game that you want to play on mutiple screens must be written to allow you to do that and quake sadly does not.


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 16, 2003)

You sure Bad Co? I seriously saw pics of quake3arena on even three screens. Might habe neen peecee system, but I doubt it would work for windows systems and not macosx systems...


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## lurk (Apr 16, 2003)

I can do this with random OpenGL windows so in general I don't think that it is fundamentally a problem.  One thing to keep in mind though is that you will be really taxing your video card since that extra screen burns up video memory.  One screen at 1280x1024 in thousands of colors mode needs more than 8 MB of video memory just for the OpenGL context.  Two screens would take twice as much and keep in mind that you still need someplace to keep all of the textures and such.  It could well be that the video card in your powerbook doesn't have the guts to handle it.

-Eric


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 16, 2003)

you mean the ati 9000 with 64mb? I doubt this! I can easily play highest quality...
So, did you succees iin playing quake3arena in multiscreen mode?


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## cq107 (Apr 16, 2003)

you need a SINGLE video card with dual monitor support... It will work fine... the 3 monitors Quake 3 was a demo for the Matrox Parfilia...


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 16, 2003)

and this I got!
Ati9000 supports this.
Any more ideas?


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 16, 2003)

did you make it cq107?


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## lurk (Apr 16, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Zammy-Sam _
> *you mean the ati 9000 with 64mb? I doubt this! I can easily play highest quality...
> So, did you succees iin playing quake3arena in multiscreen mode? *



I did not se where you specified how much memory your particular model had.  I know of quite a few 16 MB ones where that would have been a significant issue.  But still don't underestimate the open GL demands at _Highest Quality_ for each pixel you need 16 bytes for the color + zbuffer if that is doubled buffered that is 32 bytes which requires 42MB  of video RAM.  Some tricks with the zbuffer can bring that down to under 40MB but still it would bee too much for you Powerbook to drive two displays in that configuration although it could handle on just fine.

So one option would be to try to run it in _Not quite highest quality_ mode and see if you can span screens then. 

Now another thing is the program could be actively doing something wrong to prevent you from spanning screens I have one simulation program that does that here by just being stupid.  It assumes that it will fill your screen and that you will not move the window (stupid).  Now I have some other scientific visulization stuff that uses OpenGL in a normal window and I can span the displays with that just peachy on my 16MB Powerbook.

Have Fun,
-Eric


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## lurk (Apr 16, 2003)

Just as a note about the stupid simulation program I mention above it assumes that you will be running at 1024x780 which leaves a strip down the side of my LCD and only server to cover up the menu bar.

Grrrr.


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## ex2bot (Apr 16, 2003)

Moved from Mac OS X System & Misc. Software. . .


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 17, 2003)

Well, I think performance shouldn't be an issue. I would rather lower the quality, but the point is actually, I wanna impress some of my friends thinking mac sucks... ;-)
It would be quite amazing...
Ok, another thing is, that I actually succeeded to run two opengl progs on splitt-screen, so basically I doubt there is a programm suppressing this. What I am actually looking for is some kind of add in an ini-file or so.


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## Vash137 (Apr 18, 2003)

Not that hard to do actually. I just did a google search for "multi screen quake"  I am not sure these directions will work since I have no way of testing it, but anyway here goes.
go to "your home folder/Library/Application Support/Quake3/baseq3" and open up "q3config.cfg" enter the following lines in there:
"seta r_customaspect 1
seta r_customheight 480
seta r_customwidth 1280
seta r_fullscreen 1
seta r_mode -1"
save the text file and boot quake, should work according to this site which I got directions from: http://www.planetquake.com/mhg/#q3


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## Malachite (Apr 19, 2003)

I just spent the past couple of hours playing with this using the free download of the Return to Castle Wolfenstein single player demo which uses the Q3 Team Arena engine. Although I can get the mirror displays function to work properly (which is not what you're really looking for) I cannot get a true dual display going.

Some thoughts: Using the customheight video settings in the config file that are cited above from planetquake.com will cause the display to be vertically limited to the upper portion of the LCD on your Powerbook. So normally you should use a customheight of 854. Width is correct at 1280. I was thinking that if I set Wolf up to display at a larger size than the settings of the two displays that it would force the image to span across displays. But instead the image is rendered in the main LCD display. Drats! Maybe the customaspect, fullscreen, or mode settings can be tweaked to get the desired results.

Note: setting the display size in the console or config file too large (not sure where that boundary actually is) will cause a kernel protection fault, but no worries mate with OS 10.

P.S. How did you find your video memory size? I have a TiBook 1GHz but I can't find that video memory spec shown in "About this Mac" from the Apple menu, on the receipt from the Apple store, or on the Knowledge Base specifications PDF (which shows 32Mb to 64Mb). Did you have to upgrade to install extra video ram?


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 19, 2003)

Try Apple System Profiler, Malachite.
There you can find the amount of video-ram your graphic has. I hope it's 64, since the ati9000 with 32mb has just 64bit memory-connection. The 64mb has 128bit...

Tnx Vash137! I will try it and post if it worked...


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## Malachite (Apr 20, 2003)

Yes but where did you look in Apple System Profiler? This is the tool that is launched when one clicks on "About this Mac" but I cannot find any video ram size information shown. If you could tell me which tab you found this under that would help. My game performance could be significantly enhanced by this... so I appreciate your help here.


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## Zammy-Sam (Apr 20, 2003)

Well, since I have german version of macosx here, I try like this:
2nd tab (should be "devices and volumes")
and now chose "PCI" and downclick the triangle for "built-in AGP"
last note should be videoram memory. But I thought all 1Ghz tibooks have 64mb...


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