No Desktop display through Decklink HD Extreme

[Callum Mclay]

Hi Dane

The Extended Desktop display feature has been removed from our latest drivers for all systems and products, starting with the Decklink 7.3 generation of drivers.

I’d like to quote you a previous post from one of our product managers:

“There are numerous reasons why we’ve removed the extended desktop feature. The main reason is that Apple Color checks each desktop it detects for OpenGL compatibility and because the extended desktop output is not OpenGL, Color fails to launch.

Also, the way the OS enumerates the displays may sometimes cause issues which are undesirable and beyond our control.

Extended desktop was first conceived many years ago so that users can have proper TV colorspace output from Photoshop and After Effects by dragging the canvases across to the “tv screen”. However, we now have proper plugins so that users can output directly from Photoshop and After Effects so the desktop feature is no longer used much.

However, do keep the feedback coming about this and I’m certainly happy to see if there’s anything we can do or recommend.”

I hope this helps explain the situation. Of course, if this is a feature you need to use, it can still be used with the Decklink 7.2 generation of drivers. Please do not hesitate to get back to me for any further information.

Callum McLay
Technical Support Manager
Blackmagic Design EMEA

[Baz Leffler]

Callum – I spend a lot of my free time helping (advising) colleges with Blackmagic products (which I initially recommended) and I have had a flurry of phone calls recently regarding this matter, and I have told them what you explained above.

But most (if not all) have said that they do not use Color BUT always use the extended desktop feature. Couldn’t the installer have this feature as an option with the appropriate caveats? It would sure give my phone a bit of a rest!

Baz

What would I do without the ‘UNDO’ button!!!!

[Callum Mclay]

Hi Baz

Thanks for the feedback, we really appreciate finding out what our customers are doing with our hardware, and what features they do or do not need!

I’m not sure whether we will be looking to bring the Extended Desktop feature back in the future, but I’ve passed your comments onto Kristian (our Product Manager) as he is collating feedback on Extended Desktop.

I hope your phone is calming down now!

Callum McLay
Technical Support Manager
Blackmagic Design EMEA

[Simon Blackledge]

It’s a great feature..

Surely its a case of RTFM in the future and an explanation in it ?

How many people use it? hmm not sure.. how many people think about what is possible with it ?

ie I have a 2nd clone viewer from Nuke on the Plasma the client looks at.. anything I do,, even move into 3d is mirrored. Cheap Flame anyone?

It’s a massively cool feature.

I take control of the Producers iMac, Screen share, move his desktop to the plasma, Instant presentation screen..

It’s sooo useful.

If it was causing alot of support issues surely just a doc info or a ui warning when turning it on ?

s

[Ian Lewis]

I used extended desktop extensively in Windows XP (which I still use occasionally). I know that extended desktop doesn’t work in Vista or Windows 7 because of the changed driver models, but my XP install is still useful for certain things, and there I use it both as a third monitor and as a full screen HD monitor window (dragging the Premiere Pro programme monitor to fill the extended screen) when using, say, Cineform video, which does not yet run in a Blackmagic project. (Though we’ve been promised it any time now for a couple of years…)

[Tracy Peterson]

There is something related and more problematic happening that doesn’t get mentioned much:

There isn’t enough transparency in the release notes for the drivers.

I for one have been disappointed by the lack of transparency and the reticence of the development team to include actual useful notes in the release README. Most often, they simply jot in “performance improvements” instead of declaring which bugs were fixed and what functional changes were made.

I would very much like to see more information in the future, it would help users to know what the change is really going to do. I usually don’t change drivers unless it fixes an issue for me, which has always been safer, but since i’m riddled with bugs from BMD drivers and never get accurate change information from the notes, I am forced to accept whatever comes with a driver update.

As far as RTFM, this is the issue. There’s no FM to R.

Tracy Peterson
http://www.onetwomany.com

[Glen Ivey]

Desktop display is essential for us to use the BlackMagic products for broadcast. Having purchased about a hundred of these cards in the last few years it would be necessary for us to find an alternative if this feature is not retained for all future drivers and cards. It should be the default in the software.

[Joe Mustapha]

Hi all,

We have been using the Decklink HD Extreme cards for some of our broadcast clients. We are expecting to deploy to another 13 clients by year end 2010. All this while we have been using the same cards for our application which makes use of the extended desktop feature for HD output.

Our current O/S is Windows XP, and as we will move towards either Vista or Windows 7, we really require the use of Extended Desktop. Will using either O/S together with Version 7.2 work? Or is there a workaround to this? Please do let us know as this will really determine the next set of cards we will be purchasing.

[Henk Loorbach]

I used it about 95 % of the time. It is an incredibly handy feature and not having it will definitely cost more time on a daily basis to find a work around. I really hope it can become optional on future releases.

[Brent Peterson]

Just updated and am very frustrated with this missing feature now. This is too bad. Going back to a previous driver. No choice here. I’m really hoping for the desktop back in future versions.

Brent