Vista - Dual Monitor Locks up System - Completely

Well, I had been running dual monitor way back in XP, switched to Vista at
Beta2 and continued using it as my main system since then. About 2 weeks
ago, I started to get weird randon crashes, with no sign of why in any of the
log files. This was on a P4 3.4 Ghz system with 1.5 Gb Ram and an Nvidia
Geforce 6800 Ultra. I began to investigate the problem thinking something
might be failing hardware wise. I started checking CPU temperatures, hard
disk validation, etc. So after playing around, the system seemed only to get
worse, and since I hadn't reinstalled since the RTM came out, I figured I
would just take my finalized Vista CD and reinstall, just to see if maybe all
the software I had on it might be causing the issue. Well, after backing up
personal files and moving everything to storage drives, I reinstalled, and
started setting everything back up. Lo and behold, a fresh copy of Vista
hung also (let me describe the hang - screen goes black, system does nothing,
does not respond to RDC or file sharing). So, I figured that hardware had
seen its days, and since I had three other newer machines (two Core Duo T2600
Desktops, and One Core 2 Duo E6700 Desktop), I figured I would migrate to
some new hardware. Well after two days of frustration and reinstalling the
OS to no previal, I had about given up on vista, when I though to myself that
the only thing left in common to this mysterious crash was the keyboard and
mouse and the two monitors. After doing a little more testing, and internet
searching, I have found that dual monitors under vista is causing this system
hang. I tested this on a Intel 915 Video based motherboard, a Geforce 6800
Ultra, a Geforce 7300 GS, and a Geforce 7600 GT. I have two Samsung 215tw
and run 1650x1080 on both monitors, with windows setup to extend the desktop
to the second monitor. Also, just a note, I could run DVI to both screens,
but rather use a DVI to VGA adapter on my video card to run the VGA into a
KVM switch. So I have one running VGA and one running DVI. The lockups had
different attributes depending on the motherboard & video card combination.
On some the computer would just stop responding, but you could still see
everything, and others, you would loose video signal all together. All in
all, I wasted about three days time figuring this out, mostly because I had
no issue with Dual Monitor setups up until a couple weeks ago. Oh, and
system restore back to a previous date does not help either. All in all, I
am very frustrated, and I have a feeling it has to do the your handshaking
for content protection... Thank you Microsoft.

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http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/com...rdware_devices