Horizontal span games in Win7 and Vista!

[AphexDreamer]

I'm still trying to figure it out but I got TF2 to span very awkwardly across 2 monitors.

Its called SoftTH.

Main Site http://www.kegetys.net/SoftTH/

Forum and Support http://www.kegetys.net/forum/index.php?board=1.0

Good Luck guys and if you guys learn more stuff before I share!

THIS IS AWESOME!

Just read the Quick Install to get started.

 

[AphexDreamer]

Ok so it works, but I need a third monitor lol. With two it cuts off whats being displayed on the third. I only have card though so I can't hook up my third one.

Still should help others.

 

[Easy Rhino]

that is cool but prolly only worthwhile if it is for a flight or driving sim.

 

[AphexDreamer]

that is cool but prolly only worthwhile if it is for a flight or driving sim.

Trust me its worth it for every game. This should hold people up till ATI Eyeinfity goes public.

 

[spud107]

its a pity this only works in some games and is a pain to setup,
think if we bug ati enough they can bring back span mode?

 

[spud107]

bumping for info,
is it worth installing xp to use span mode?, or is there an alternative iv missed? like hacking eyefinity to work with any card, as eyefinity is really just spanning monitors to give one big juicy res.

 

[AphexDreamer]

bumping for info,
is it worth installing xp to use span mode?, or is there an alternative iv missed? like hacking eyefinity to work with any card, as eyefinity is really just spanning monitors to give one big juicy res.

Well I don't know anything about hacking eyeinfinity which would be nice but if you use SoftTH it would only be able to work with games in DX9. So really you might as well just use XP and use its easy to use Horizontal Span vs trying to get SoftTH to work on Vista or Windows 7 in DX9.

 

[digibucc]

bumping for info,
is it worth installing xp to use span mode?, or is there an alternative iv missed? like hacking eyefinity to work with any card, as eyefinity is really just spanning monitors to give one big juicy res.

yeah that's all there is - and it sounds simple but far from it. Eyefinity is the first mainstream solution since TripleHead2Go .... and i have not heard of any hack to make eyefinity work. XP will limit you to DX9 and a system that is a decade old. Eyefinity or bust

 

[spud107]

Well I don't know anything about hacking eyeinfinity which would be nice but if you use SoftTH it would only be able to work with games in DX9. So really you might as well just use XP and use its easy to use Horizontal Span vs trying to get SoftTH to work on Vista or Windows 7 in DX9.

yeah softth isnt working for me so far, windowed across all 3 is the most iv gotten atm, and thats without softth, it dies when trying to enable third monitor, most i can figure out is 7 uses the main card to render across all 3, the nvidia card is only recieving output from main gpu, can run a 3d app like furmark and move between all 3.
softth seems to try to use an nvidia driver for the 3rd, so i guess it needs to have 2 of the same gpu.

edit - no its just my retardation and wrong settings.

yeah that's all there is - and it sounds simple but far from it. Eyefinity is the first mainstream solution since TripleHead2Go .... and i have not heard of any hack to make eyefinity work. XP will limit you to DX9 and a system that is a decade old. Eyefinity or bust

although only dx9 for the few games i play it would be awesome, as even on windowed mode just now its still a pretty good experience,
eyefinity is out for me as that requires new graphics card, and 3 new monitors, it would be nice if they made span mode work again but i guess they wont want to hurt eyefinity sales.


edit - also kinda related, if i try to make a source game like tf2/halflife2 anything above its max res it crashes,(running windowed) anybody know a fix?

 

[AphexDreamer]

If you want to get softTH to work you'll have better luck in their forum. Any question I had they were pretty good about answering and you could also search older threads to help aid in getting your setup to work. You have to edit the config a lot before you will get it work. For instance try changing Left Monitor and Right Monitor to 1, -1, 0 or 2. Something along those lines.. :/

 

[MadClown]

doesnt TF2 natively support and monitor configuration known to man?

 

[spud107]

aye, but it appears no not on my system, with or without softth it just crashes after the intro with any res above what is set for desktop. (1280x1024)
using the launch options to set res,
-novid -32bit -windowed -noborder -width 1280 -height 1024

having nothing in the launch option and using softth same thing
softth log
0.000 SoftTH: SoftTH v1.09 by Kegetys (D3D9)
0.000 SoftTH: Module: d:\steam\steamapps\lol\team fortress 2\bin\d3d9.dll ("d:\steam\steamapps\lol\team fortress 2\hl2.exe" -game tf -steam -novid )
0.000 SoftTH: Loading configuration C:\Users\spud\SoftTH.cfg
0.000 SoftTH: Loading configuration d:\steam\steamapps\lol\team fortress 2\SoftTH.cfg
0.156 SoftTH: sideExtraWidth autodetected as 0 (1280x1024 / 1280x1024)
0.203 SoftTH: Added auto resolution 1280x1024 75Hz
0.203 SoftTH: Activating Win32 hooks...
0.000 STHook: Hooks: Attached
0.000 STHook: Existing hook detected at user32.dll/ShowCursor, redirecting JMP (0x0185E2FE -> 0x69629175)
0.000 STHook: Existing hook detected at user32.dll/ClipCursor, redirecting JMP (0x0184D0E2 -> 0x69629295)
0.000 STHook: Existing hook detected at user32.dll/GetCursorPos, redirecting JMP (0x0185F478 -> 0x69628E75)
0.000 STHook: Existing hook detected at user32.dll/SetCursorPos, redirecting JMP (0x018265B8 -> 0x69628CD5)
0.250 SoftTH: Direct3DCreate9 (ver 32)
0.312 SoftTH: Adapter 0: atiu9pag.dll, ATI Radeon HD 3800 Series with SoftTH v1.09 by Kegetys (D3D9)
0.328 SoftTH: Adapter 1: atiu9pag.dll, ATI Radeon HD 3800 Series
0.328 SoftTH: Adapter 2: nvd3dum.dll, NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GS
0.812 SoftTH: Added mode 3840x1024 f16
1.547 SoftTH: ProxyDLL deinit (d:\steam\steamapps\lol\team fortress 2\bin\d3d9.dll)
1.562 SoftTH: RELEASE HOOK! <"d:\steam\steamapps\lol\team fortress 2\hl2.exe" -game tf -steam -novid >
1.562 SoftTH: Released mouse hook

 

[spud107]

lol got fallout 3 working,

il need to turn settings down for more fps but it was not too bad when i took the sc . .



config file if anyone wants
;
; SoftTH 1.09 configuration file
; by Kegetys, http://www.kegetys.net
;

[config]
; deviceIDLeft/right: Direct3D device ID's of left and right monitor, or 'auto' for automatic
; secondaryWidth/Height: Left&right monitor resolution, or 'auto' to use same as middle screen resolution
; secondaryRefresh: Refresh rate of left & right monitors, or 'auto' for automatic
; secondaryFormat: Secondary device image format: 'RGB32', 'RGB16', 'RGB16D' or 'RGB32CUDA'.
; uploadMethod: Method used to upload image to secondary card(s): 'blit', 'D3D' or 'D3DCUDA'
; forceAffinity: Set to 1 to force process affinity to all processors/cores.
; borderSize: Size in pixels of frame border between monitors that is discarded
; sideExtraWidth: Width difference between middle and side monitors, or 'auto' to autodetect from desktop resolution
; noHotkeys: Set to 1 to disable all hotkeys
; noOSD: Set to 1 to disable on-screen display when changing settings
deviceIDLeft=auto
deviceIDright=auto
secondaryWidth=1280
secondaryHeight=1024
secondaryRefresh=75
secondaryFormat=RGB32
uploadMethod=D3D
forceAffinity=0
borderSize=0
sideExtraWidth=auto
noHotkeys=0
noOSD=0

[Direct3D]
; ** Advanced setting for Direct3D games **
; lensCorrection: Lens correction, set to 1 to enable support. >1 to enable by default
; lensCorrectionEdge: Lens correction edge offset
; hideNondefaultDevices: Hides all but the default adapter from the game
; forceHorizontalFOV: Forces horizontal FOV to be three times as wide
; forceResolutionWidth/Height: Forces device to be created with this resolution
; force16bitDepth: Force game to use 16bit depth buffer, can improve performance and reduce memory use
; sleepBeforeRead: Time in ms to sleep before reading back buffer data from video card
; useMultihead: Uses multihead features of primary card if available, can increase performance and reduce memory use
; delayedPresent: When useMultihead enabled, delay primary monitor present to sync with secondary head
; d3d8dll: Path to D3D8.dll/D3D9.dll to use or auto for automatic (system32 dir)
; altResetBehaviour: Do not reset lost main device after secondary device initialization (WDDM crash workaround)
lensCorrection=0
lensCorrectionEdge=0
hideNondefaultDevices=0
forceHorizontalFOV=0
forceResolutionWidth=3840
forceResolutionHeight=1024
force16bitDepth=0
sleepBeforeRead=2
useMultihead=0
delayedPresent=0
autoSquash=0
altResetBehaviour=0
d3d8dll=auto

[hooks]
; Win32 API hooking settings - Used for some extra compatibility and game-specific fixes
; doHooking: Enable/disable hooks in Direct3D, with OpenGL hooks are always enabled
; doScaleMouseCoordinates: Scale mouse coordinates for getCursorPos to fix games which do not handle negative screen coordinates properly
; doScaleFromLeftScreen: Spread out mouse coordinates from left screen to full width
; doScaleWindowRects: Scale focus window WindowRect
; doScaleClientRects: Scale focus window ClientRect
; mouseXoffset: Number of pixels to offset mouse cursor position in X axis, to fix misplaced cursor due to negative screen coordinates. auto = use X resolution
doHooking=1
doScaleMouseCoordinates=0
doScaleFromLeftScreen=0
doScaleWindowRects=0
doScaleClientRects=0
mouseXoffset=auto

; Triplehead screenmodes to add to resolutions list (width multiplied by three and border added)
; width x height x refresh rate in Hz
; 'auto' adds current primary monitor desktop resolution
; Must be last in this file
[modes]
1280x1024x75
auto


in my fallout prefs

"Documents and Settings\*User Name*\My Documents\My Games\Fallout3\FalloutPrefs.ini"

iSize W=3840
iSize H=1024

"Documents and Settings\*User Name*\My Documents\My Games\Fallout3\FALLOUT.INI"

fDefaultFOV= mines set to 110 till i figure out optimal fov

 

[spud107]

so the menus work now, fps isnt too bad, so this is basically cheap eyefinity lol

 

[AphexDreamer]

so the menus work now, fps isnt too bad, so this is basically cheap eyefinity lol

http://imgur.com/lMy1o.jpg

Well done mate! Glad it worked for you. I even spent money on a second card but I just had more problems and gave up. I'll just save up for a 5000 series card.

 

[spud107]

thanks, although still a pain to setup, i wonder if these problems would happen on eyefinity too?
tf2 is apparently messed up after an update not long ago . . .

stuff gets bigger/smaller as you look up/down, including hud/menus.

still i think this functionality would be easy to have on any card, we just need to bug ati/nvidia/ms a lot lol

 

[Necrofire]

I did something similar with CSS a few years ago on my 8600gts. I used the nvidia control panel to set my desktop resolution to 3360x1050 (2x 1680x1050) and CSS thought it was one monitor. Although, it was really funky with the crosshair being split like that, and the geometry in the middle was really messed up do to the monitor bezel.

I'm sure we can all agree that this would only be practical with an odd number of monitors though

 

[spud107]

on 2 i can see it being a bit weird, but 3 is pretty awesome imo,
span display should have been left in vista/7, at least games might support these resolutions better.

 

[spud107]

tf2 appears to work using dx8.1,
add -dxlevel 81 to launch options

also works for hl2 episode 2 (without setting to dx 8.1)

;
; SoftTH 1.09 configuration file
; by Kegetys, http://www.kegetys.net
;

[config]
; deviceIDLeft/right: Direct3D device ID's of left and right monitor, or 'auto' for automatic
; secondaryWidth/Height: Left&right monitor resolution, or 'auto' to use same as middle screen resolution
; secondaryRefresh: Refresh rate of left & right monitors, or 'auto' for automatic
; secondaryFormat: Secondary device image format: 'RGB32', 'RGB16', 'RGB16D' or 'RGB32CUDA'.
; uploadMethod: Method used to upload image to secondary card(s): 'blit', 'D3D' or 'D3DCUDA'
; forceAffinity: Set to 1 to force process affinity to all processors/cores.
; borderSize: Size in pixels of frame border between monitors that is discarded
; sideExtraWidth: Width difference between middle and side monitors, or 'auto' to autodetect from desktop resolution
; noHotkeys: Set to 1 to disable all hotkeys
; noOSD: Set to 1 to disable on-screen display when changing settings
deviceIDLeft=2
deviceIDright=1
secondaryWidth=1280
secondaryHeight=1024
secondaryRefresh=75
secondaryFormat=RGB32
uploadMethod=D3D
forceAffinity=0
borderSize=0
sideExtraWidth=auto
noHotkeys=0
noOSD=0

[Direct3D]
; ** Advanced setting for Direct3D games **
; lensCorrection: Lens correction, set to 1 to enable support. >1 to enable by default
; lensCorrectionEdge: Lens correction edge offset
; hideNondefaultDevices: Hides all but the default adapter from the game
; forceHorizontalFOV: Forces horizontal FOV to be three times as wide
; forceResolutionWidth/Height: Forces device to be created with this resolution
; force16bitDepth: Force game to use 16bit depth buffer, can improve performance and reduce memory use
; sleepBeforeRead: Time in ms to sleep before reading back buffer data from video card
; useMultihead: Uses multihead features of primary card if available, can increase performance and reduce memory use
; delayedPresent: When useMultihead enabled, delay primary monitor present to sync with secondary head
; d3d8dll: Path to D3D8.dll/D3D9.dll to use or auto for automatic (system32 dir)
; altResetBehaviour: Do not reset lost main device after secondary device initialization (WDDM crash workaround)
lensCorrection=0
lensCorrectionEdge=0
hideNondefaultDevices=0
forceHorizontalFOV=0
forceResolutionWidth=3840
forceResolutionHeight=1024
force16bitDepth=0
sleepBeforeRead=2
useMultihead=0
delayedPresent=0
autoSquash=0
altResetBehaviour=0
d3d8dll=auto

[hooks]
; Win32 API hooking settings - Used for some extra compatibility and game-specific fixes
; doHooking: Enable/disable hooks in Direct3D, with OpenGL hooks are always enabled
; doScaleMouseCoordinates: Scale mouse coordinates for getCursorPos to fix games which do not handle negative screen coordinates properly
; doScaleFromLeftScreen: Spread out mouse coordinates from left screen to full width
; doScaleWindowRects: Scale focus window WindowRect
; doScaleClientRects: Scale focus window ClientRect
; mouseXoffset: Number of pixels to offset mouse cursor position in X axis, to fix misplaced cursor due to negative screen coordinates. auto = use X resolution
doHooking=1
doScaleMouseCoordinates=0
doScaleFromLeftScreen=0
doScaleWindowRects=1
doScaleClientRects=0
mouseXoffset=auto

; Triplehead screenmodes to add to resolutions list (width multiplied by three and border added)
; width x height x refresh rate in Hz
; 'auto' adds current primary monitor desktop resolution
; Must be last in this file
[modes]
1280x1024x75
auto

 

[Necrofire]

From all these screenshots, it looks like you should up the FOV a little, maybe to 120 or 130 degrees for 3 monitors.

 

[spud107]

yeah, some games its not too bad, others you can see it more, just trying to see how many of the games i have will work with this setup.

also got test drive unlimited going :3

 

[spud107]

here's fallout with 150 set for fov, and corrected for bezels,

 

[Morgoth]

it would be nice if there was a monitor that can do 3840x1020 having 3 monitors just looks ugly with those lines

 

[spud107]

yeah i bet it would cost a fair bit lol,
atm this setup didnt cost anything, so cant really complain, and the edges arent that bad, when your playing your still focusing on middle screen, just makes it soo much more immersive.

 

[spud107]

more screenshot . . .
x3

winamp milkdrop