Multi screen and EW

[mlanahan]

Hi everyone,
I just started serving with a new church that uses EW. They run 4 screens (a 30' center 16:9 and 2 10' 4:3 sides and a 10' cheat on the back wall). We use 2 computers with EW. 1 controls sidescreens with lyrics. There is also a Roland switcher for imag using chroma red underlay. The other computer controls the center screen is used for imagery during worship video and scripture. The back screen has a switcher for side screen feed or center screen feed. All this is functional but a little cumbersome. Transitions are a little tough and I would prefer one media operator. I know other presentation software has multi screen support by doing things like purchasing USB devices or software upgrades. Does EW do this? Im hoping to get 1 touch transits on all screens. The timing with 2 computers at 2 different speeds is tough even with a countdown.
Thanks
Mike
Btw we are on 2009

[bggowing]

I believe EW2009 has a dual display (control sceen and display screen) plus a foldback display for the stage. Unless you use a DualHead2Go or TripleHead2Go and have the same thing displayed across all 3 screens I don't think it's possible. But EW does have a support tech that reads the posts so he'll probably jump in and answer especially if I said something in error!

[shane2943]

Won't work. There are two problems that you have that EW can't overcome. The first problem is that you actually need 3 different content screens (your worship screens, foldback, and your large sermon screen). EW serves a max of 2 (plus control but the audience doesn't want to see that). The second problem is the screens you have run at 2 different resolutions. One is 16:9 and the others are 4:3. EW doesn't like that; not one bit. In fact, I've found EW only plays nice when all screens (including the control) are not only set to the same aspect ratio, but the same resolution as well (we run 1024X768 on all screens).

Looks like one EW source won't serve your needs.

BTW: I'm not the EW tech support guy.

[chazman14]

It could work if you have the worship screens and the foldback screen displaying the same thing and then the second display is the center... Then again, you would have the resolution issues, unless you make the 4x3 screens display at widescreen.

[EWSupportGuy]

EasyWorship does have the ability to run a foldback screen and a front of house screen, but they are still tied together. I don't think you'll be able to get the functionality you want out of the foldback feature. It sounds like you are wanting to queue multiple sets of different content at the same time. That brings an enormous about of complexity to building an running a service. The current version of EasyWorship doesn't have any way of handling that.

I disagree with shane2943 about resolutions though. EW can handle different resolutions on all screens. If you use the dualhead2go, you are locked to using the same resolution on both monitors connected to it. That's a dualhead2go limitation not EW. If you use a video card like the ATI Radeon 5850 that has 3 video outputs, you can use three different resolutions with no problems. This could have been a problem in the past with older versions, but I haven't seen a problem with it lately.

[shane2943]

Originally Posted by EWSupportGuy

I disagree with shane2943 about resolutions though. EW can handle different resolutions on all screens. If you use the dualhead2go, you are locked to using the same resolution on both monitors connected to it. That's a dualhead2go limitation not EW. If you use a video card like the ATI Radeon 5850 that has 3 video outputs, you can use three different resolutions with no problems. This could have been a problem in the past with older versions, but I haven't seen a problem with it lately.

Maybe the problem has been addressed since version 2009 which is what we're currently using. I was simply speaking from my experience. Our EW doesn't like different resolutions one bit. We run it with two video cards (no DualHead2Go) and if the resolution of all 3 screens (FOH, Foldback, Control) is not the same, EW will lock up on us or struggle to play motion backgrounds or glitch on slide transisions, etc. Troubleshooting has been extensive as well and matching the resolutions has been the only fix that I've found [for our setup].

[EWSupportGuy]

Are you using two PCI Express video cards or is one of them a PCI graphics card? I could see there being issues with a PCI graphics card. I've also seen driver issues with when you have two nvidia graphics cards that aren't the same model. I haven't had anybody complain about the problem you speak of. I haven't seen a problem with the triple head ATI EYEFINITY graphics cards. Also make sure you have build 1.9. You can get it at www.easyworship.com/support

[shane2943]

Originally Posted by EWSupportGuy

I've also seen driver issues with when you have two nvidia graphics cards that aren't the same model.

That be the issue then. One card is a 9600GT and the other is a GT240, both PCIe 16x 2. We run the control from the 9600 and the FOH and Foldback from the GT240.

For us, having the resolution all the same is fine because our projectors and screens are all letterbox (4:3) anyway. I can see how this issue would effect other churches though. I'll be sure to advise in the future that the video cards be the same model if NVidia.