Not recognizing second monitor after hibernate (Windows 7, Dell D630 laptop)
- by Brooks Moses
I have a Dell Latitude D630 laptop which I've recently updated to Windows 7 64-bit. (The Dell site confirms that it's Windows-7-compatible.) Normally it lives in a docking station with a second monitor connected to the DVI port on the docking station, and I use the second monitor in a multi-monitor configuration with the laptop screen. Sometimes I undock the laptop and use it separately.
Here's the problem: If I hibernate the laptop while undocked, and then power it back up in the docking station, it does not recognize the second monitor. By which I mean that not only does it not share the desktop onto the second monitor, but if I go into the control panel for display settings and press "Detect", it does not even detect the existence of the second monitor. I can tell it to "use the VGA port anyway" for a second monitor, but the monitor is connected to a DVI port on the docking station, so that doesn't do anything useful.
If I entirely reboot the laptop while it's connected to the docking station, it has no problem recognizing the second monitor and using it. But then, if I hibernate, undock, de-hibernate while undocked and rehibernate, and then re-dock and de-hibernate, it's back to not recognizing the second monitor again.
I'm reasonably certain that this is not a limitation of the hardware; this worked fine on Windows XP.
I'm currently using the Windows 7 driver for my video card. I attempted to use the video driver from the Dell website for this laptop, but Dell only provides Vista 64-bit drivers, not Windows 7 64-bit drivers. Their "Windows 7 compatibility" page suggests that the Vista drivers should work, but when I attempted to install the driver, it gave me a "this operating system not supported" error and refused to install.
Any further ideas?
