2 monitors one rendered by CPU and another by GPU

Question

I want to hook up 2 monitors to my system, currently I'm only using one monitor connected via DVI through my GPU. I have a VGA(sad face) connector behind my motherboard and I found an old monitor basically only capable of running through VGA. I've connected them both up, my main monitor is connected to my GPU and the other is via the motherboard VGA connector, but it's not working no signal is received. Can I run both the integrated graphics and the GPU at the same time without any adapters?

Solution

Most motherboards disable the onboard graphics when an external graphics card is detected. In most cases, there is no way to enable the embedded graphics with a external GPU installed.

Your best bet is to drive both monitors off of the graphics card, if that isn't possible, you will most likely have to replace the graphics card.

This post and the accepted answer might make it a little clearer why from a technical perspective.

To summarize the post, essentially the same PCIe lanes are used by the IGP and the graphics card, it is one or the other, but not both, with few exceptions.

Comments

[JaredT]

Is the device recognized in windows? Can you hit win-P and extend the desktop?

[Keltari]

is it enabled in BIOS?

[Blaine]

Does your CPU support integrated graphics?

[David Schwartz]

What operating system are you using? How is the integrated graphics set in the BIOS?

[NullOverFlow]

the post you found is from 2011... that is 5 years if you can't count.

[acejavelin]

@NullOverFlow That doesn't change the validity of the answer... If you noticed I said with most motherboards this isn't possible. You didn't give any specifics of your system such as make, model, graphics type, etc. so I gave the best answer I could with the information provided.

[acejavelin]

I am glad you found the solution, but this is not a discussion forum and I will not up-vote this answer as it is, even though it appears to be correct due to the negative, sarcastic tone of the first paragraph... That tone of comment is not acceptable on Superuser. Also, a properly formated answer would contain a reference link to the source of your solution.