Software to Create Virtual Monitors and

[paulrockliffe]

I had a play around with Nview Desktop Manager (Windows 10) last night to try to split a large monitor into two virtual screens and failed as various programs ignored the virtual monitors. Discovered NVidia discontinued it a few years ago, so that's probably why.

Does anyone have any experience of third-party options for creating virtual screens?

I want to be able to split my monitors into pre-defined areas and ideally over-ride that quickly to go properly fullscreen when required.

Along vaguely similar lines, Windows is supposed to remember what was open when it restarts but only Chrome reopens itself. As a result I don't use Windows Virtual Desktops as much as I'd like because it takes too long to set it all up every time Windows forces a restart on me.

Is there some software I can use to open programs, files etc and tell them which monitor to put them on and which virtual desktop when Windows loads up?

Essentially I'd like to create Virtual desktops for normal web-browsing, photo-editing, finances, my loft conversion project and a couple of other things I'm working on, setup all the files, explorer windows, webpages etc and then have it survive reboots.

Thanks!

[sjg]

I spent a while researching this a while back because I run a single big 4k display rather than multiple smaller monitors - main thing I wanted to be able to have a powerpoint deck on one virtual "screen" that I can share while I have presenter view elsewhere. Have yet to find anything that actually works on that level so that Windows programs think there's more than one monitor.

Outside that, Windows 10 has some stuff built in - you can drag a window to a corner and it goes to 1/4 of the screen, or to the sides for half the screen. There's also virtual desktops - https://www.howtogeek.com/197625/how-to-use-virtua...

The main 3rd party thing for controlling this stuff is DisplayFusion - it probably doesn't cover all your list but does give much more control over where windows open, save/load profiles of where things are, etc. https://www.displayfusion.com/

[devnull]

As mentioned above, DisplayFusion may help. Takes quite a bit of setting up. I started to use it, but found it too cumbersome for what I needed.

[paulrockliffe]

sjg said:

I spent a while researching this a while back because I run a single big 4k display rather than multiple smaller monitors - main thing I wanted to be able to have a powerpoint deck on one virtual "screen" that I can share while I have presenter view elsewhere. Have yet to find anything that actually works on that level so that Windows programs think there's more than one monitor.

Outside that, Windows 10 has some stuff built in - you can drag a window to a corner and it goes to 1/4 of the screen, or to the sides for half the screen. There's also virtual desktops - https://www.howtogeek.com/197625/how-to-use-virtua...

The main 3rd party thing for controlling this stuff is DisplayFusion - it probably doesn't cover all your list but does give much more control over where windows open, save/load profiles of where things are, etc. https://www.displayfusion.com/

Thanks, that's helpful, I'll have a look at Display Fusion next....

I know about the options in Windows, I use them a bit, but like I said they require a lot of work to setup and then Microsoft forces a reboot and I end up with Chrome with 17 windows open on the Desktop1, Screen 1 and everything else just ignores that it's supposed to reopen. The snap thing is good for adhoc, I like that you can resize the snap windows on demand, but it's a pain across multiple screens as you can't snap on all the edges then.

I really need something that will actively reopen stuff and put it in the right place. Probably moon-on-a-stick territory, but surely not a huge ask!

[OlonMusky]

You didn't say what brand screens you have but some manufacturers, Dell and LG from first hand experience, have tools which allow you to do exactly what you want out of the box.