You Cannot View the Same Video on Two Monitors at the Same Time

If your computer has multiple monitors, it may not be possible to use Windows Media Player to display video across two monitors simultaneously. For example, if you drag Windows Media Player between the two monitors, video may only appear on one of the two monitors.

This behavior can occur because the video mixing renderer (a Microsoft DirectX component) in Windows XP cannot create a surface across two monitors simultaneously. This would cause the video to be cut in half if the video were placed in the middle of two monitors.

IMPORTANT: The following procedure results in a decrease in video performance.

To work around this behavior, disable the video mixing renderer:

1. In Windows Media Player, click Options on the Tools menu.
2. Click the Performance tab, and then click Advanced.
3. Under Video Acceleration or DVD Video (depending on which item you want to disable), click to clear the Use video mixing renderer check box, and then click OK.

This behavior is by design.

For more information about DirectX architecture or the video mixing renderer, please see the following Microsoft Web site: