2nd Screen Only (Windows Constantly Connects and Disconnects the 1st Screen With Audible Notification)

[deadman_uk]

I have a MSI Optix MAG274QRF-QD Monitor (1st screen) and Samsung KS8000 4K TV (2nd screen). Often I will game on the TV in the next room with a controller as I find it more comfortable than sitting at my desk. I usually select 'Duplicate Display' and turn off my monitor while I game on the TV. I would prefer to use the '2nd Screen only' option (Windows + P) so my monitor goes on standby on it's own. When I do this however, everything works fine but Windows 11 (and 10) keeps playing the device reconnect and disconnect sound every 10-15 seconds. When going into display properties, I see my monitor keep appearing and disappearing. The only way to stop this is to physicaly unplug the monitor, then everything is fine. Why does it do this? and how do I fix this? The TV and monitor are connected via a 10m fibre optic HDMI 2.0b cable.

Why don't I just use 'Duplicate Display'? usually this is fine but with HDR games, this is hit or miss as to whether I get HDR or not (each game has a different step process. For example with Forza Horizon 4, I launch the game with both displays on, I enable HDR in the settings, I then start the game from the menu and then immediately I put my monitor on standby. HDR works fine after that. For most other games, I immediately put my monitor on standby the moment I launch the game.

 

[GiGaBiTe]

It sounds like you have a signal integrity, bandwidth and/or drive problem. Your video card may not have enough grunt to drive such a high resolution over such a long cable, or the cable itself can't maintain signal integrity running such a high resolution over such a distance. The reason it sometimes works after fiddling with settings may be that you might be right on the knife edge of one of those aforementioned things being stable.

Try lowering the resolution on the Samsung 4k monitor to 1080P and see if it makes the connection stable. If it does, then the cable is just too long for the resolution you're trying to push to it. There are several solutions, but none are cheap or convenient. The cheapest is to obviously move your PC closer to the TV and use a shorter HDMI cable. More expensive options would be to use an HDMI repeater, or an HDMI to ethernet bridge and use twisted pair instead of HDMI, which can go for much longer distances.

 

[deadman_uk]

It sounds like you have a signal integrity, bandwidth and/or drive problem. Your video card may not have enough grunt to drive such a high resolution over such a long cable, or the cable itself can't maintain signal integrity running such a high resolution over such a distance. The reason it sometimes works after fiddling with settings may be that you might be right on the knife edge of one of those aforementioned things being stable.

Try lowering the resolution on the Samsung 4k monitor to 1080P and see if it makes the connection stable. If it does, then the cable is just too long for the resolution you're trying to push to it. There are several solutions, but none are cheap or convenient. The cheapest is to obviously move your PC closer to the TV and use a shorter HDMI cable. More expensive options would be to use an HDMI repeater, or an HDMI to ethernet bridge and use twisted pair instead of HDMI, which can go for much longer distances.

Thanks for replying. No, I don't think so. I am able to game at 4k resolution for hours in HDR on games like Horizon Zero Dawn, Mafia Trilogy, Tomb Raider, GTA V, all demanding games in 4k. No problems at all. My issue is really not to do with the hoops I jump through for HDR, it's running on 2nd display only and having the monitor constantly connect and disconnect. Doesn't sound like a bandwidth issue to me because it works fine on duplicate display mode. If anyone has any ideas please let me know. The Samsung is not a monitor but a TV. I will try lowering the resolution but I don't think that will have any impact as it does it while sitting idle on the desktop too. My HDMI cable is a fibre optic, it should be able to handle the bandwidth.

 

[GiGaBiTe]

When you run both monitors in mirroring (duplicate) mode, it means that the Samsung TV is automatically running at a lower resolution, since the MSI monitor is only a 2k monitor. So this would mean the Samsung TV is using considerably less drive bandwidth. The video card is much less taxed drawing the same thing to multiple screens than it is drawing unique content to multiple screens.

I wouldn't rule out your fancy fiber optic HDMI cable. Fiber optic cables are more subject to damage from kinks or sharp bends breaking the fiber strands in the cable and causing issues. The laser diodes that pass the light signal along the fibers are also an additional failure point. Maybe try putting your PC in the same area with the TV and bring the MSI monitor in and connect both with short HDMI cables, like 6' or less.

 

[deadman_uk]

When you run both monitors in mirroring (duplicate) mode, it means that the Samsung TV is automatically running at a lower resolution, since the MSI monitor is only a 2k monitor. So this would mean the Samsung TV is using considerably less drive bandwidth. The video card is much less taxed drawing the same thing to multiple screens than it is drawing unique content to multiple screens.

I wouldn't rule out your fancy fiber optic HDMI cable. Fiber optic cables are more subject to damage from kinks or sharp bends breaking the fiber strands in the cable and causing issues. The laser diodes that pass the light signal along the fibers are also an additional failure point. Maybe try putting your PC in the same area with the TV and bring the MSI monitor in and connect both with short HDMI cables, like 6' or less.

Are you 100% sure that is correct regarding the TV running automatically on a lower resolution? My TV info button confirms that the resolution is 3840 x 2160 and different video game settings also allow me to use that 4k resolution.

My fibre optic HDMI cable is installed under the floorboards brand new from the packet. It shouldn't have any damage to it and it doesn't have sharp bends either.

I cannot move my PC to the next room without major difficulty. I will do some investigations based on what you said though. Thank You.

 

[GiGaBiTe]

Are you 100% sure that is correct regarding the TV running automatically on a lower resolution? My TV info button confirms that the resolution is 3840 x 2160 and different video game settings also allow me to use that 4k resolution.

If you're running two monitors in mirrored mode, Windows generally will run both monitors at the maximum resolution of the smaller monitor, but not always. If the smaller monitor supports resolution scaling over its maximum, it can run higher. Windows can also go into virtual desktop mode, where the desktop is larger than the screen, and the screen is a window into that larger desktop where you can move around. Sort of how TV stations used to pan-and-scan large format movies to fit into NTSC television resolution. This mode was used for decades on laptops with tiny screens to be able to drive larger external monitors at their full resolution.

My fibre optic HDMI cable is installed under the floorboards brand new from the packet. It shouldn't have any damage to it and it doesn't have sharp bends either.

By "under the floorboards", does that mean you had to pull the HDMI cable, or did you tear the floor up and lay it down? Pulling cables can definitely cause breaks in them, even if there are no bends. I've seen cable pullers go he-man hulk-smash and pull wires so hard that it ripped the sheathing clean off the wire. But much less can cause internal breakage, especially on fiber optic cables.

 

[deadman_uk]

If you're running two monitors in mirrored mode, Windows generally will run both monitors at the maximum resolution of the smaller monitor, but not always. If the smaller monitor supports resolution scaling over its maximum, it can run higher. Windows can also go into virtual desktop mode, where the desktop is larger than the screen, and the screen is a window into that larger desktop where you can move around. Sort of how TV stations used to pan-and-scan large format movies to fit into NTSC television resolution. This mode was used for decades on laptops with tiny screens to be able to drive larger external monitors at their full resolution.



By "under the floorboards", does that mean you had to pull the HDMI cable, or did you tear the floor up and lay it down? Pulling cables can definitely cause breaks in them, even if there are no bends. I've seen cable pullers go he-man hulk-smash and pull wires so hard that it ripped the sheathing clean off the wire. But much less can cause internal breakage, especially on fiber optic cables.

My floors are suspended timber floors so there is a large void below. When I moved in, I lifted up a row of floor boards, I fed a brand new from the packet fibre optic HDMI cable from one room to the other (I had to drill a hole in the floor board at the entry and exit point to feed the cable up to the TV and the PC but 95% of the cable is under the floor in the void. The cable looks as good as it did in the packet. I haven't touched it, just fed it under the floor and plugged it in both ends. Does that make sense?

If this is a bandwidth/cable issue then why is it when I pull the power cable out of my monitor (or pull it's displayport cable out of the PC) and leave the mode on 2nd screen only, I am able to game in 4k fine without any issue and I don't hear the constant connection and disconnect notification sound that Windows plays? but when I plug back in the disabled monitor, I can still game in 4k fine but I hear the constant connect/disconnect sound?