I just configured an older Dell laptop for a neighbor so he could connect to his HDTV via HDMI and it gave me fits.
Turns out that the thing runs dual graphics chips; one Intel and one NVidia. The Intel handles the laptop screen and has WiDi (wireless HDMI) as it's second output. The NVidia chip handles the physical HDMI port.
It was a minor pain but I got it working. The problem was that doing a straight dual display setup would not work. I could extend the display but not duplicate which is what was wanted. The system would see three displays with one and two being from the Intel with number two actually being the WiDi option. The third display was the NVidia output. I could extend from display one to three but the only option to duplicate was one and two. I solved by disabling the second display which made the NVidia HDMI now number two. From there I could duplicate.
Has anyone else ever seen a setup like this?On hindsight I could have made it a lot easier by just un-installing the WiDi drivers which would have made the Intel chip a single output. In the future I would do just that unless the person wanted to possibly use WiDi. The problem is that hindsight does not kick in until you are already done.
By the time I figured out what was actually going on I already had it working...
