Solution: The computer does not see the second monitor. What to do if the computer "does not see" the second monitor? The laptop does not see the screen resolution

To get the best experience and improve productivity, users use a pair of two or more monitors. This does not mean that you need to buy another computer or laptop to use two monitors.

If your video card supports many connection ports, then you can safely connect multiple monitors to it. Based on this, the number of monitors you can connect to a PC depends on the number of ports on your graphics card.

You can find various ports on your video card such as VGA, DVI, HDMI and Displayport. These days, HDMI and Displayport are the most popular connection interfaces. VGA and DVI-I (not DVI-D), in turn, are practically no longer used (connecting a modern video card to a VGA monitor is incredibly problematic anyway).

Most widespread the connection interface is HDMI, which provides users with access to the highest resolutions available at the moment. Plus, HDMI can also carry the signal from the sound card.

In addition to different connection interfaces for transmitting a video signal from a video card to a monitor, there are two different types of video cards: integrated and discrete (PCIe). What is the difference between these two types of video cards?

The integrated graphics card is built into the motherboard, while the PCIe graphics card plugs into the PCIe slot of the PC motherboard. If you play video games, do graphic design or video editing, then we recommend that you use a discrete graphics card, as it is designed for such tasks and is much more productive.

Sometimes, you will need to connect a second monitor to your machine. This procedure is quite simple: we take a cable with the desired connection interface, for example, HDMI, connects one end to the connector on the video card, and the other to the connector on the monitor. That's all.

However, sometimes things do not go so smoothly, and your computer, for some reason, cannot detect the second monitor. What is the reason behind this trouble? So, there are many reasons: cable problems, incompatible drivers, configuration problems on the user's computer, and so on.

In this article, we will look at 10 different methods that we hope can help you with the problem of detecting a connected monitor.

If you correctly connected the monitor to your video card, but nothing is displayed on it, then you can try changing the projection mode. The problem could simply be due to the fact that your video card did not know what to do with the second monitor connected. Now we will show you how to change the projection mode on Windows 10. Although, the same can be done on operating systems such as Windows 8 and Windows 8.1.

Press the key combination on the keyboard Windows+P.
Then you will see the projection mode selection menu, which will contain four settings. Select the setting according to your preferences and click on it.

Well, the second monitor finally came to life? If not, then that was not the point and we move on.

In the Windows operating system (as, indeed, in any other OS), various bugs and errors sometimes occur that prevent it from working correctly, and, as a result, prevent the user from using the OS functionality.

Try rebooting your machine to fix the possible issue. There is a possibility that the problem is on the side of your OS, which stubbornly does not want to detect the connection of another monitor in the available devices. After rebooting, try the method above again.

Method #3 Disconnecting the computer, monitors and cables

Ok, in the last method, we tried with you to simply restart the computer in order to get rid of a possible “jamb” of Windows 10 / 8.1 / 8. However, perhaps the problem is not at the software level, but at the hardware level.

Try turning off your computer completely, disconnect all monitors from it, disconnect all cables from them. Also don't forget to unplug your two monitors. Wait a couple of minutes, and then reconnect all equipment.

Perhaps there was some kind of conflict in the connected hardware of your computer and the second monitor refused to be detected by the system. This method helps some users on the network (at least some of them claim so). Plus, there is simply no risk when performing, say, this trick. So why not try it.

Method number 4 Reconnecting the video adapter (video card)

Some users claim that a simple reconnection of the video card through the Device Manager system utility helped them solve the problem of not displaying the second monitor.

This is very easy to do and now we will show you how to do it:

Right-click on Start and select Device Manager.
You will see a list of equipment that is installed and running on your system. Find the "Display Adapters" section.
Find the name of your video card in the list and right-click on it.
Select Disable Device.
Then right-click on the driver for your graphics card again and select "Enable device".
Test your second monitor again.

Perhaps your second monitor is diligently not being detected due to the fact that the driver for your video card starts to malfunction for some reason. This simple procedure of reactivating the device can often correct the situation.

Method #5 Reinstall Monitors

Ok, if re-enabling your video adapter did not help fix the situation, then let's try to reinstall the monitors themselves, which are now connected to your system. Go back to the Task Manager system utility and follow these steps:

In front of the list of installed equipment, find the "Monitors" section.
Open this section and find your monitor in the list. Right-click on it and select "Remove device".
After your monitor turns off, restart your computer and connect a second monitor to it, if it has not already been connected to the system unit, and then the main monitor.
Then check if your second monitor is displayed in conjunction with the main one.

Method #6 Roll back a video card driver to a previous version

It is possible that the problem with detecting the second monitor lies in the driver for the video card that is currently installed on your system. To resolve this issue, you can try rolling back your video driver to a previous version. This is done, again, through the Device Manager.

Go to Device Manager, go to Display Adapters and find your graphics card.
Right click on it and select "Properties".
Go to the "Driver" tab.
Click on the "Rollback" button.

As soon as the driver for your computer is rolled back, try again to connect two monitors to it. If this time everything went fine and you did what you had planned, then the problem was definitely in the driver for the video card.

Method #7 Changing the Refresh Rate

In this method, we will now try to change the refresh rate on your monitor, since it can be the cause of problems when connecting a second monitor. For example, you might have set your main monitor to a refresh rate of 75Hz, while both it and the secondary monitor have a maximum refresh rate of 59-60Hz.

Click on the keyboard Windows+I to go to system settings.
Go to the "System" section.
Then select the Display tab.
Go down to the very bottom of the display settings window and click on the "Graphics adapter properties" link.
Go to the "Monitor" tab.
Click the dropdown menu and select the correct refresh rate for your monitor, such as 60Hz.
Apply the changes.

After changing the refresh rate, try plugging in a second monitor and see if anything changes. You can also try setting something in the projection settings that we mentioned in the very first paragraph.

Method #8 Tricks for Laptop Owners

If you are trying to connect a second monitor to your laptop, then we can recommend you follow a couple of tricks that may help when connecting a second monitor:

Try shutting down your laptop while the monitor is connected (this will make the laptop's display temporarily disabled). The second monitor should now be marked as the main monitor. As soon as you open the laptop, both displays should work at once.
Try entering sleep mode on your computer while a second monitor is connected to your computer, and then wake it up.

Method #9 Activating Multiple Displays

If you are an Nvidia graphics card user, then you can try enabling the multiple display option in the Nvidia Control Panel.

Right-click on the desktop and select Nvidia Control Panel.

If you have connected a second monitor or TV to your laptop or computer via HDMI, Display Port, VGA or DVI, it usually works right away without the need for any additional settings (except for selecting the display mode on two monitors). However, sometimes it happens that Windows does not see the second monitor and it is not always clear why this happens and how to fix the situation.

This guide details why the system may not be able to see a second connected monitor, TV, or other screen, and possible ways to fix the problem. The following assumes that both monitors are guaranteed to be working.

Unfortunately, a very common situation among novice users is trying to update a driver in Device Manager, getting a message that the most suitable driver is already installed, and then making sure that the driver is really updated.

In fact, such a message only says that Windows does not have other drivers and you may well be told that the driver is installed when the device manager shows "Standard VGA graphics adapter" or "Microsoft basic video adapter" (both of these options report that that the driver was not found and a standard driver was installed, which can perform only basic functions and usually does not work with multiple monitors).

Therefore, if you have problems connecting a second monitor, I strongly recommend installing the video card driver manually:

Download the driver for your video card from the official website of NVIDIA (for GeForce), AMD (for Radeon) or Intel (for HD Graphics). For a laptop, you can try downloading the driver from the official website of the laptop manufacturer (sometimes they work "more correctly" despite the fact that they are often older).
Install this driver. If the installation fails or the driver does not change, try first.
Check if the issue has been resolved.

Another option related to drivers is possible: the second monitor worked, but, suddenly, it was no longer detected. This may indicate that Windows has updated the graphics card driver. Try going to the device manager, open the properties of your video card and on the "Driver" tab, roll back the driver.

Additional information that may help when the second monitor is not detected

In conclusion, some additional nuances that may help figure out why the second monitor is not visible in Windows:

If your situation differs from all the proposed options, and your computer or laptop still does not see the monitor, describe in the comments exactly how, to which video card the displays are connected and other details of the problem - maybe I can help.

If the computer turns on, you hear sound and see light signals on the case, but the image is not displayed, then the problem may lie in a video card malfunction or improper connection of components. In this article, we will look at several ways to solve the problem when the graphics adapter does not send an image to the monitor.

There are a number of reasons for this problem, each of which has solutions of varying complexity, so we will move from the simplest to the most complex so as not to perform unnecessary actions if a minor problem is found. Let's start to analyze all the ways.

Method 1: Checking the Monitor

Sometimes the problem lies with the monitor itself. Check if the power is connected, if it is turned on and if the cable is connected to the video card. Try replacing the cable if possible. In addition, you should carefully make sure that the HDMI, VGA, DVI or Display Port wire is connected correctly.

Method 2: Checking the health of the PC

In rare cases, the computer does not completely go through the power cycle, but freezes at a certain point, which may make it seem that the problem is in the video card. For example, the most common problem is a crash when waking up from sleep or standby. To check this, you need to hold down the power button for a few seconds, wait for the computer to turn off completely, and then turn it on again. If the problem persists, then move on to the next method.

Method 3: Determine the cause of the failure by the BIOS signal code

Each manufacturer uses a different combination of short and long signals, so we strongly recommend reading our article on this topic to be familiar with all the signals of your BIOS manufacturer. Based on the results, try to solve the problem yourself or take the computer to a service center.

Method 4: Reinstalling components

When assembling the computer, some parts may not fully fit into their connectors or the connection was made incorrectly. Remove the side panel of the case and carefully examine everything inside. Check the wire connections with the instructions that came with the computer or motherboard. Pay special attention to the video card, whether it is well installed and whether additional power is connected, if any. In addition, pay attention to the processor, whether it is installed correctly and securely.

If the computer does not detect a second monitor after connecting, first of all check if the cable with which you are trying to connect the monitor to your system unit is working.

Connect your monitor to your computer with a different cable if you have multiple monitor wires.
If the screen worked, then most likely the problem was a malfunction of the second wire, which can be safely disposed of.
If the screen, on the contrary, still does not work, then the problem may be in the video output of your PC or in incorrect system settings.

The PC "does not see" the second monitor: check the video output

If your second monitor has different interfaces, check if it can be connected, for example, via HDMI instead of a VGA connector. Alternatively, you can try using other available interfaces on your computer, or try connecting via a VGA-HDMI or DVI-HDMI adapter. The latter option is relevant if the monitor does not have an HDMI connector, but the PC does.

As a rule, computers are equipped with several video outputs: the most common are VGA, DVI and HDMI. Try all of them using the appropriate cable types.
Attention: you can often find several outputs of the same type on a computer. If you have connected your second screen, for example, to the VGA output, check if there is another one of the same free one. Try changing the cable to an alternate output and see if the monitor is recognized.
If even after these manipulations you did not see the picture on the monitor, the problem may lie in connecting the cable to the integrated graphics card, which is deactivated by default, since the image from the selected card is displayed on the monitor.

In the photo you see just such a case: the right connectors belong to the graphics card (highlighted in red), while the left ones belong to the motherboard. Since the integrated video system is disabled by default in this situation, you can only get an image from those outputs that the dedicated graphics card offers.

The PC "does not see" the second monitor: turn on the detection of the second monitor in the system settings

Another reason for the second monitor not being recognized may be incorrect system settings on your computer. In this case, follow the instructions below to pair the second monitor with your computer:

Go to "Control Panel", select the option "All Control Panel Items | Screen | Screen Resolution" and click the "Define" button
Click on the found monitor and select the menu item "Extend these screens".
If you are establishing a connection to a wireless display, click on the "Detect" button and wait for the connection to the monitor to be established.

The video card is an important element of a personal computer. Its task is to convert a graphic image, information about which is stored in the computer's memory, into a video signal that is sent to the monitor for display. Correctness is also ensured by the latest installed driver (such a driver comes with the purchase and / or is easily found on the Internet).

Sometimes when buying a new system unit with all the necessary contents, or after self-assembly, or when replacing an old video card with a new one (for example, a discrete one, as it is better and more modern), such a problem arises: the computer does not see the video card. That is, it is known for sure that the video card is installed in the system unit, but there is no information indicating its presence on the computer. In this case, the device driver is completely installed and correctly. But this driver does not help at all.

What to do, how to cope with such a misfortune and why it happens, will be discussed further.

Install, for example, the driver on the device under the force and "teapot". But the contents of the system unit are perceived by most users as "something complicated and completely incomprehensible, what, where and why." And the solution to the issue, if the computer stopped seeing the video card or something else like that happened, boils down to “I’d rather not touch anything and call the wizard.” This is certainly a logical approach. But in the context of the presence today of a huge number of sources (of course, first of all, these are Internet resources), from which you can get useful information on any issue, you should still try to cope on your own. The main thing is to approach the sources in a differentiated way, choosing reliable ones, and when manipulating wires and fasteners, act carefully and carefully (do not damage or lose anything).

How to force the video card to "come out of the shadows"

As you know, the solution to any problem, including the one when the computer does not see the video card, be it discrete Nvidia GeForce or AMD Radeon, must begin with the simplest methods. In this case, one of them is a visual check of the design of a turned off computer. You need to make sure that the video card is installed correctly (in the right place and in the right position) and connected to the motherboard. You can find out what exactly is meant by a “correct” installation from the instructions that came with a specific device model. You also need to check whether the fastening of the wires connecting the monitor to the electrical network and to the system unit is secure.

If everything is in order from a constructive point of view, try turning the system on again. If that doesn't work, then reboot. If these actions are ineffective, you need to check the BIOS settings. This abbreviation of the name of the program, after decoding and translation into Russian, literally means "basic input / output system." It is the BIOS program that is responsible for connecting / disconnecting individual components of a personal computer, one of which is a video card.

So, when you turn on or restart your computer, follow the information that is consistently displayed on the monitor. When you see the phrase Press DEL to enter setup, press the appropriate key on your keyboard. This phrase may contain a different key or a combination of keys, why this happens - it's not so important, press what is written. In any case, follow the instructions. This will take you to a menu containing settings options. There you need to find the section responsible for the settings of the video card. Its name may contain words such as Graphic, Video, Display or VGA. The fact is that BIOS programs have variations in the names of menu items, so it is impossible to specify a specific section name here. Once the partition is found, try enabling the following options: Video, VGA, and Primary Display. Set the bus of your video card model: PEG, PCI, IGD, or AGP. Finally, press the F10 key to save the changed settings and reboot the system. If the download was successful, check if your graphics card appears in the list of connected devices (for example, if we are talking about a discrete AMD Radeon card, the device will be AMD Radeon Mobile Graphics BF4).

Alternatives

If the device is still "not found", try to go the other way if possible: install your discrete graphics card (NVidia Geforce, AMD Radeon) on another computer. Perhaps everything will function normally here. Then it could be a problem with your motherboard.

Another option: connect another new video card to your computer (for example, instead of Nvidia - AMD Radeon). If it works fine, the original graphics card may be defective. There are programs that allow you to test a given computer component - a new or old video card, both discrete and any other - for serviceability. As a result of such a check, it is sometimes revealed that the device itself is not able to function normally: during testing, the card overheats or the system starts an emergency reboot. It should be noted that working with these programs requires certain knowledge, otherwise you may irreversibly damage an initially healthy video card that does not work / does not display for other reasons.

It would also be useful to check the system for viruses and update the video card drivers. Although initially we assumed that we already had the most correct and latest driver, nevertheless, it is worth checking this again and searching the Internet for the most suitable driver.

Finally

As you can see, the question of the article can lead a user who does not have special technical knowledge, skills in working with software and, in the end, screwdrivers, to a dead end.

However, you have learned what to do in this situation. We hope that the above information was useful and you came out of the situation as a winner. Good luck!