Desktop mirroring, higher resolution?

[Keith Purfield]

I have a G4 iMac (15"). I know that if I were to connect another monitor to it, all I can do is desktop mirroring. But what I want to know is if I could use a higher resolution that the external monitor is capable of?

I'm an "artist", so a bigger resolution would be a big help with digital art.

Thanks in advance,
Keith

 

[rainman::|:|]

well no, because mirroring is *exact* duplication, resolution and all. There's really nothing you can do in this regard, unless someone has some idea i don't know about...

pnw

 

[Keith Purfield]

Ah. That's what I feared. Though I think I remember seeing my brother's Gateway laptop mirror onto a monitor with a higher resolution...

 

[robbieduncan]

Originally posted by Keith Purfield
Ah. That's what I feared. Though I think I remember seeing my brother's Gateway laptop mirror onto a monitor with a higher resolution...

"Mirroring at another resolution" is called spanning in Mac terms. Only Apples "Pro" hardware can officially support spanning as well as mirroring. That said some consumer products can be made to span (for example the iBook 700/800/900 can be made to span through an OpenFirmware mod). There was a post yesterday or the day before about an AppleScript that can enable spanning - have a quick search for it...

Note that you may well notice a quartz performance hit with spanning enabled (I do on my iBook, only when it is spanning though).

 

[robbieduncan]

Just in case the AppleScript is here http://www.heise.de/ct/03/16/links/192.shtml

 

[iShater]

Originally posted by robbieduncan
Just in case the AppleScript is here http://www.heise.de/ct/03/16/links/192.shtml

Are you using this script? what kind of iBook do you have? does it do a software solution or does it make firmware changes?

Thanks.

 

[solvs]

The hacks are only for Radeon video cards, that I know of. Go to XLR8YourMac for more info. Some earlier ATI and nVidia cards won't work. Depends on which model of the iMac you have. Same with the iBooks.

High end Macs, like the PowerBooks, have dual or spanning displays, when you can use 1 video card as 2. Mirroring is just displaying the same resolution, size and refresh rate.

 

[robbieduncan]

Originally posted by iShater
Are you using this script? what kind of iBook do you have? does it do a software solution or does it make firmware changes?

Thanks.

I am using the original OpenFirmware hack. This script is meant to check whether the machine it is running on will support spanning so should be relativly safe to run.

 

[Keith Purfield]

I've got the 800MHz 15" iMac with a GeForce 2 MX. I'm guessing I can't use the hack?

 

[solvs]

G2MX, I don't think so. G4MX, apparently there is a hack for it. I'm not sure of the specifics, though. Try http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/ for the info. That's where I get it.