Review created June 14, 2004.

This review takes a look at the multi-monitor features of Symantec pcAnywhere 11, both on the local and remote system.

Setup

Both the local and remote system have 3 monitors, and run under Windows XP SP1.

The remote system uses an Nvidia Quadro NVS 280 video card for 2 monitors, and UltraMon™ Virtual Display for the 3rd monitor. Other specs: Intel P4 2.4 GHz, 512 MB RAM.

The local system uses two Nvidia GeForce4 MX and a GeForce2 MX video card. Other specs: dual Intel Xeon 2.4 GHz, 1 GB RAM.

pcAnywhere version is 11.0.1.

Multiple monitors

pcAnywhere shows all monitors of the remote system, unlike most other remote control applications which only show the primary monitor.

With the screen scaling option, the remote desktop will be scaled to fit into the viewer window:

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Without scaling, you'll get scrollbars if necessary:

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If the local system has multiple monitors as well, the viewer window can also be stretched across two or more monitors:

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The fullscreen option hasn't been designed for multi-monitor systems though: it is not available when the remote system has multiple monitors enabled, and the fullscreen view is always on the primary monitor, you can't go to fullscreen mode on secondary monitors.

Performance

Performance is okay, but a bit slower than with XP's Remote Desktop, even when the remote system has only a single monitor enabled. I also didn't notice much difference in performance when enabling the performance optimization options:

With the remote system optimized for remote control, visual styles and wallpapers are disabled:

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Questions or comments? Post them to the forum