How do I attach two monitors in a dual head configuration?

Question

I'm considering buying a Raspberry Pi or compatible solution. My problem is that I could not find how to achieve a dual head configuration.

I would like to attach two 1920x1200 displays by digital connection (HDMI, DVI, DisplayPort, etc.). Any ideas how to achieve such hardware configuration?

score 20 · Answer 1 · answered Jun 24 '12 at 22:53

20

Simple! :) Buy TWO Raspberry Pies and hook them up with ethernet cable. Then use synergy to hook up the two systems in a virtual multihead config. See http://synergy-foss.org/ for more details.

Apart from that - there's not much you can do now as hdmi & composite cannot be used simultaneously.

This may change once we find out more about how to use the DSI video connector.

answered Jun 24 '12 at 22:53

Maria Zverina

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I wondered about attaching additional video car in some way, but I'm not yet so familiar with that hardware design. – Grzegorz Wierzowiecki Jun 24 '12 at 23:01
Connecting two rasperry-pi with ethernet cable might help if I would split apps to two devices. What about sharing apps ? Or do you think about things like Xmove ? – Grzegorz Wierzowiecki Jun 24 '12 at 23:03
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There is no interface on the Pi capable of handling bandwidth for such a "video card" especially given that you're asking of resolution that's HD+. Besides second Pi is bound to be cheaper that any video card! :) And yes, synergy allows you to move apps across the windows by using vnc type connection under the hood. So apps stay running on the computer that launches them, despite the fact that they can be moved to either monitor as if the system was running dual-head. – Maria Zverina Jun 24 '12 at 23:07
Synergy is interesting. For Windows, Microsoft developed a solution, called Microsoft Garage Mouse without Borders. It can't move apps between computers but it does allow the mouse and keyboard and clipboard to be focused on up to 4 computers (and each can have multiple monitors). I have 3 computers with 2 monitors each. Win8, Win7, Vista, and can control everything from a single keyboard and mouse. Download for free at microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35460 – SDsolar Jan 01 '17 at 22:38

score 4 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 24 '12 at 22:25

4

At present I believe this to be a no-go:

There are two outputs on the RPi - the hdmi and the composite, however the composite is turned off when hdmi is connected.

You can get hdmi splitters, but that will just mirror the display on the two outputs, so if you're after that then fine.

answered Jun 24 '12 at 22:25

Jon Egerton

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Actually "hdmi splitter" is "mirror" not "Dual-Head" so it is completely not what I want. Even thou, thanks for try. – Grzegorz Wierzowiecki Jun 24 '12 at 23:00
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I said it was a mirror. It was more that I wanted to point out that it is a way to get two screens out of an RPi, even if they're the same. – Jon Egerton Jun 24 '12 at 23:01
In that sense, you are absolutely right :). – Grzegorz Wierzowiecki Jun 24 '12 at 23:03
You can split an DVI signal side by side using kit like the Matrox DualHead2Go or TripleHead2Go but these would be serious overkill for a Raspberry Pi, assuming it could do 3840x1080 or 5760*1080, which I doubt. It may work for multi-monitoring lower resolution monitors though. – Mark Booth Jun 26 '12 at 10:33

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 15 '19 at 01:30

Well, now the Raspberry Pi 4 model B has come out with two Micro HDMI ports, so I think that gives the best solution to the problem?

If you don't want a Pi 4, it seems that buying two Pis may still be the next best option. But I would use x2x instead of Synergy to connect them, because it is free software.

For additional displays, I noticed that there are USB 3 to HDMI adapters, which could be used with the Raspberry Pi 4 B, which has two USB 3.0 ports, however such adapters don't work well with Linux. There is a related question "USB to VGA on Linux" which I found helpful.

How do I attach two monitors in a dual head configuration?

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