Running two accounts

I'm thinking of getting a second acct...Can i run two screens?

Like in TSO I had upto 4 screens at once and in There.com I got two but it was laggy

I have 8 meg of bandwidth now so I am curious if and how good is 2 screens in SL?

cant think of a single reason WHY but Im sure I will so once I suss it out.

I seem to remember you used to be able to change the shortcut to something like "newview.exe -multiple"

Dunno if that still works. Haven't tried it in recent months

I just tried Kris's suggestion and it worked!

Just right-click on the Second Life icon in your Start Menu and choose "Explore..."

Then copy and paste the Second Life shortcut into the same folder - it should now be "Second Life (2)"

Right-click the new icon and choose properties

Change the Target to: "C:\Program Files\SecondLife\SecondLife.exe" -multiple
(i.e. just add -multiple with a space before it)

Run both icons

Of course I can't vouch for performance, damage to your system or accounts, etc. blah blah blah.

Holy moly!

It does work! I can't get the screen to migrate to my second monitor but I have two open windows with two alts on one screen and it works great.

My setup is a little different since I use a separate SL icon for each alt that bypasses the login screen all I did was add -multiple to the end of the target (for the second window I opened) and it worked.

"C:\Program Files\SecondLife\SecondLife.exe" -login Alt Name PASSWORD -multiple

Spaces are important

Can the same be achieved on a MAC anyone?

That was my reaction as well, I was using VNC to connect to second machine on my home network that I don't have a monitor for, and your addition of the username and password is even better!

I have run 3 windows at one time but it laaaaaags badly. It can be kinda cool but if you have a lack-luster computer setup, the lag monster will get you even with just two and you will likely need a reboot to clear things up.

Color me stupid, but I don't get it.

Here's a couple pics, I don't see what you're talking about. I'm not sure what I need to copy.

Second Life icon on your desktop.

1. Right click icon and copy and paste creating a second icon resulting in two icons on your desk top.

2. Right click and select "Properties." In the "target" field add a -multiple after the .exe" for each icon.

3. The "target" should read something like this C:\Program Files\SecondLife\SecondLife.exe" -multiple
IMPORTANT! There has to be a space between .exe" and -multiple.

4. If you want to skip the log in screen you can do this C:\Program Files\SecondLife\SecondLife.exe" -login Alt Name PASSWORD -multiple

Be sure to keep the spaces and your alt name and pasword must be exactly as you type it in the log in screen. You can make an icon for each avatar you have. Be sure to leave a standard icon on your desktop (no -login) for updates. Use it to log in first after an update and download the update with it, afterward the other desktop icons will work (unless LL changes Secondlife.exe to something else)

You can, but it is VERY glitchy, and hard to do. My friend did it when he was here with his account and mine. When I did an action on my account, lets say clicked an object and it said " Hello there", it would show up on his acount.

HAHAHA Thank you! Now that is how the stoopid need instructions! Especially with the crayon directions

^ See above -- SL can get very strange due to using UDP instead of TCP as far as tracking which traffic is going where. This is actually the same problem you will see when running 2 instances of SL behind a NAT. You may get some strange results from things like IMs and responses from actions going to the wrong viewer.

Sorry, I absolutely did not intend to be condecending with the instructions, I just happened to have my Wacom hooked up and did the examples very quickly. I made this simply because I ran into the same problem trying to use Josie's instructions myself. Having to explain to both my in game wife and sister, it can be very confusing to those not very familier with computers.

Here is an example on how to set up so you can skip the log on screen, no crayon this time.

Yes, sorry. Rereading over my own instructions I realize that it was very techie-oriented. Thanks for simplifying it Kathmandu.

No, it was perfect, the crayon instructions were perfect! It was comforting and non-scary

I know it works on a MAC since the guy who was stalking me with several accounts did so on his MAC.

To avoid the weird UDP packets issues, one of the icons can use a different port. So you can also add "-port 13000" to the shortcut. Here's what mine looks like:

"C:\Program Files\SecondLife\SecondLife.exe" -port 13000 -login Driftwood Nomad mypassword -multiple

And for those who are curious, my password is NOT "mypassword"

Just copy the SL application to another folder and launch it, in addition to your usual one.

It's as simple as that.

Ran fine on a dual processor G5 with 2Gb RAM and a 256Mb graphics card, though I did start to get little graphic flickers occasionally - not sure what was causing that and I haven't tried it lately.

It's good for when you need a hug and only your alt is answering the phone

Found a way to run two fullscreen instances of SL on one computer with an Nvidia card and two monitors. I hadn't been able to do it originally with the standard duel view setup with the windows desktop extended to the extra monitor. When I tried to migrate an SL window across to the second monitor the screen would freeze(didn't affect what went on in the game). It would unfreeze by simply sliding it back on the original desktop.

After experimenting with the Nview utilities included with the drivers I found I could run two screens, one on each monitor by "Horizontal Spanning" which is essentually making the two monitors into one large desktop(this stretches the desktop background horribly btw) I can then place a windowed instance of SL on each screen and it works quite well. I set this as a profile that I can quickly switch to when I need it and another default profile for normal use.

To fix the desktop picture to look closer to normal you can use Photoshop or PSP to resize the image. Turn off "maintain aspect ratio" and resize the picture to 1/2 its horizontal width. For example if your desktop picture is 1024x768 resize it to 512x768, it should look fairly squashed. Put it up as your background and it will be close to right. You can put two different backgrounds by putting two different pictures (or the same one twice) squashed to 256x768 side by side on a 512x768 canvas. Sounds hard but its easy once you see how it works.

thanks all, I forgot how so I'm posting so I can come back to look lol