Playing movies using VLC on external display

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Level 1

8 points

Playing movies using VLC on external display

My Macbook Pro is connected to my TV through the DVI port. There is a side-by-side arrangement, not mirror displays. Everything is working perfectly, sound and video.

Sometimes I try to use VLC to play a movie on the TV screen, while I do work on my Macbook screen. Many times it will easily work, no problem. But sometimes, when the movie opens up I cannot get it to move into the external screen. But ONLY the VLC movie will have this problem (sometimes iTunes too). All other applications will move into the external screen fine, but the VLC movie will not go past the boundary of my Macbook screen.

I am using VLC as opposed to other applications because some of the movie files can only be recognized by VLC.

Please help! I'm sure there is a Preferences option that can correct this seeing that sometimes it works fine.

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.7)

Posted on May 7, 2012 3:47 PM

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Answer 1

Courcoul

Level 6

18,726 points

May 7, 2012 5:25 PM in response to B.E.F.

When the external display is up and running, open System Preferences / Displays and make sure display mirroring is not enabled. The Displays preference pane should then show an image of the Mac and the external display. Click & drag the external display (square without the white menu bar) and place it in the same arrangement as you have on the desk: left, right, top, etc. That way OS X knows where it is in relation to the Mac's screen and lets the cursor jump logically from one to the other. It will also let you drag app windows from one to the other.

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Answer 2

X423424X

Level 6

14,271 points

May 7, 2012 5:44 PM in response to B.E.F.

I assume you specified the screen in vlc's video preferences and that screen is enabled when you play the video. I'm guessing it's probably a bug (yet another bug) in vlc 2.x which I also assume you are using. I long since gave up on vlc 2.x and stuck with vlc 1.1.12 which never has problems selecting my desired screen for full screen display (my TV).

I suggest you look at and possibly post this problem to the vlc mac forum.

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