For those of you using dual monitor setups, do you have each monitor on a separate videocard or are you feeding both by the same videocard? I've heard that some monitors get tricky when it comes to calibration if both are on one card. Just making sure what I'm getting myself into before I buy my second monitor. Thanks.

I can't speak to the calibration issue, but I know most video cards these days come with dual monitor out (and generally in DVI). The calibration profiles are stored on your system and your system can also differentiate which monitor is which so I don't think (though I can't verify) calibration would be an issue. Maybe someone else knows for sure?

I use one card, a gts8800sli
I calibrate with a spyder pro3 and it knows I am using two diff monitors and calibrates them independant of each other.

I was under the impression that you can only have one profile per card, thus can only calibrate one monitor per card. Is the difference that newer cards have chips for each output? Or am I missing something alltogether?

Chris

i just got a new dell and it has one video card with dual video out and I have two different monitors hooked up each with a different profile. worked perfectly the first time with my eye one calibration stuff.
my card is a GeForce GTS 240
Doug

I just went through this. You either need two cards or one card that can support multiple lookup tables (LUT). There is a workaround for windows XP but nothing for vista (don't know about windows 7 yet). I just ended up putting in a second card, reinstalled the spyder software and did the calibration. Works great.

Hope this helps,
Mark

windows 7 has a great color correction utility that can individually profile each monitor independently. I'm not advocating using the color calibration built into windows 7... just the profile thing.

Depend from video card.
The calibration issue depend from number of LUT. If the video card have 2 separate LUT you can calibrate them indipendly otherwise no chance to do that.

Windows? Stick with cards known to work well with 2 monitors. Macs? Everything works well

I have 2 cards driving 4 displays.

I only do critical color work on my primary monitor, so never thought about color correction on the other one. I couldn't imagine a workflow where you would efficiently be making color adjustments/decisions on two monitors simultaneously..

Chris Miller
www.imagineimagery.com

I only do critical color work on my primary monitor, so never thought about color correction on the other one. I couldn't imagine a workflow where you would efficiently be making color adjustments/decisions on two monitors simultaneously..
- Chris Miller

I'm adding a 27" to my 24" - all color sensitive work will be done on the 27" acting as main display. The reason I want them both calibrated isn't because I will be doing color work on both of them. If they don't both look the same yet sit side by side, I'll get compulsive and annoyed and wind up throwing the secondary out the window. My friend has a dual monitor setup and the screens look nothing alike. I have no idea how he sits there for hours looking at two monitors showing completely different colors, hues, tints, etc. Granted he's not a photographer and has them for misc. use. I wouldn't be able to stand it.

Depend from video card.
The calibration issue depend from number of LUT. If the video card have 2 separate LUT you can calibrate them indipendly otherwise no chance to do that.
- ophidio

Will be using a GTX 260 or 275. Will make sure to check up on the LUT issue mentioned. Thanks.

Using a Dell 30" and Samsung 24" on an ATI 2600 Pro with 64-bit Windows 7 Pro. The Dell 30" is calibrated, the Samsung 24" isn't.

In my experience, two video cards is more trouble than its worth.

Saad Syed wrote:
I only do critical color work on my primary monitor, so never thought about color correction on the other one. I couldn't imagine a workflow where you would efficiently be making color adjustments/decisions on two monitors simultaneously..
- Chris Miller

I'm adding a 27" to my 24" - all color sensitive work will be done on the 27" acting as main display. The reason I want them both calibrated isn't because I will be doing color work on both of them. If they don't both look the same yet sit side by side, I'll get compulsive and annoyed and wind up throwing the secondary out the window. My friend has a dual monitor setup and the screens look nothing alike. I have no idea how he sits there for hours looking at two monitors showing completely different colors, hues, tints, etc. Granted he's not a photographer and has them for misc. use. I wouldn't be able to stand it.



I still don't see why you would need to look at the same image on more than one monitor simultaneously.

I have Windows7 64bit 2-monitors main Samsung Syncmaster 215tw 2nd is Hanns.G JW199D

Both color calib using Spyder3 and my videocard is a EVGA NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GT

When booting into windows, you can see a popup of each profile being loaded on each monitor.

Ya, I also don't understand the need to view the same image on two monitors at once, both being color managed. My 30" is calibrated, and my 2 20" are not. Funny enough though, that the uncalibrated ones are just as accurate.

...one for WORK and one for FM.... </Thread>

I have dual Samsung Syncmaster 215TW displays and a card that supports multiple LUT's running in Vista x64.

Using an EyeOne DisplayII I had to power off one display to calibrate the other and reverse or it would seem to not allow me to designate which one.
I would hang the puck here and it would run over there and I would fiddle around trying to
know how to make it predictable and gave up and did the above and made sure I named the .icc file so I knew where they belonged if I had to check on them.
Even though they are both calibrated I stick to one for processing.

sboerup wrote:
Ya, I also don't understand the need to view the same image on two monitors at once, both being color managed. My 30" is calibrated, and my 2 20" are not. Funny enough though, that the uncalibrated ones are just as accurate.

There isn't always a reason for everything my friend =) Sometimes it just has to do with feelings... and I start feeling compulsive about some things. This is one of them. If I pay for two monitors, I want them both looking exactly the same - even if one stays off and is unused.

2 x GTX 260 SLi'd with both monitors hanging off one card. Spyder is aware and applies different profiles to each.