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Review created December 19, 2003. Revised on August 14, 2005, for the 2.0.14 release.
MaxiVista from Bartels Media is software which enables you to use a laptop or other PC as an additional monitor for your main system.
A 14-day trial version is available for download, a single license costs between US$ 29.95 and 49.95. The Mirror Pro edition for $49.95 was used for the review.
If you have a laptop and free desk space, this is an inexpensive way to add an additional monitor.
How it works
Your main system (called the server) needs to be connected via a network to your laptop or other PC (the viewer) which you want to use as the additional monitor. The network can be a standard LAN, direct connection via cross-over cable, wireless LAN, FireWire or any other type of network.
The server needs to be running Windows 2000/XP or later, the viewer at least Windows 98 SE/NT4.
On the server system, you'll have an additional monitor in Display Properties:
The MaxiVista server program automatically searches the network for a viewer. Once one has been found, you can then enable the viewer and the contents of the MaxiVista monitor will be shown on the viewer PC's monitor.
Settings for the MaxiVista monitor can be adjusted in Display Properties, resolution and enabled/disabled can also be changed through the MaxiVista menu. The following screenshot shows the MaxiVista menu on the server (right-click on the system tray icon):
Test setup
The server was a Dell Precision 470 with 2.8 GHz Intel Xeon (hyperthreading enabled), Intel E7525 chipset, 512 MB RAM, Windows XP SP2. Video card was a PCI Express ATI Radeon X600, driving two 15" LCDs (1024x768 resolution).
Viewers were a Dell Latitude X300 laptop with 1.2 GHz Intel Pentium-M, Intel 855GM chipset, 640 MB RAM, Windows XP SP2, 1024x768 display resolution, and a Motion M1400 tablet with 1.1 GHz Intel Pentium-M, Intel 855GME chipset, 512 MB RAM, Windows XP SP2, 1024x768 display resolution.
The server and laptop viewer were connected via a 100 Mbps LAN, the tablet viewer via 802.11g 54 Mbps wireless.
MaxiVista version 2.0.14b was used.
Performance
Overall performance is very good, with only a very minor impact on system performance, but with some applications performance was noticeably lower than on the ATI-powered monitors.
I noticed lower performance when scrolling large images or moving image windows in Photoshop Elements. Switching between layouts in Publisher is also slower.
With other applications there is no noticeable loss of performance, for example browsing websites with Internet Explorer or typing in Word.
Main applications used for testing were Internet Explorer, Office 2003 (Access, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, Word), Photoshop Elements.
I did all testing at the maximum quality setting. Performance did improve when using the maximum speed setting, but at a considerable loss in image quality.
3D and video applications
There is no support for 3D and video overlays on the MaxiVista monitor. What this means:
- fullscreen Direct3D applications such as Unreal Tournament 2004 and the Moire screen saver don't work. Windowed Direct3D applications will still work, but will be a lot slower
- OpenGL applications using hardware acceleration won't work because rendering is done by the video card's OpenGL driver
- some DVD players won't work, because they require either video overlays or 3D acceleration
- fullscreen video playback may be slow and low quality if scaling is required (the video is smaller than the screen size)
Adding more than one monitor
The Professional and Mirror Pro editions support adding up to two additional monitors, for a total of 3 MaxiVista-powered monitors. Here's how Display Properties looks like with two MaxiVista monitors installed:
The laptop was used for monitor 3, the tablet for monitor 4.
Mirroring
The Mirror Pro edition supports mirroring (also called cloning), this option can be activated via the configuration menu.
Please note that only the primary monitor can be mirrored, and only on the primary viewer (Maxi_Vista_DriverA). Secondary viewers don't have a mirroring option.
Remote Control
The Professional and Mirror Pro edition optionally can be used in remote control mode instead of extended desktop mode.
This means that you can use the keyboard and mouse connected to the server PC to control the viewer PC, without the viewer PC being a part of the extended desktop.
Remote Control only works with the primary MaxiVista viewer (Maxi_Vista_DriverA).
Issues
- disabling MaxiVista monitors via Display Properties doesn't work if the 'Auto-connect on startup' option is selected
Various
Hibernation and standby work fine with MaxiVista installed/running, both on the server and viewer PC.
The MaxiVista monitor can be used as the primary monitor.
There is no support for color management (no color management tab under advanced display properties).
More information
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