Named for the mythological Greek monster with nine heads, Appian's HydraVision software is designed to control every aspect of multi-monitor computing (unfortunately, if you lop off one of your monitors, two won't grow back in it's place – sorry, we tried). When we first received word that ATI had obtained license for a third party's application, we feared that the tightly woven integration seen with their Multimedia Center would disappear. However, the contrary was indeed the case, and Appian's HydraVision software seemed as tightly woven into the RADEON VE's suite as one of ATI's own titles.
The first useful feature of HydraVison is the ability to re-arrange two monitors to suit your viewing needs. Matrox's G450 offers this same capability, and it has proven useful on many occasions. In addition, HydraVision can also dynamically reassign Primary and Secondary status to either display without rebooting - useful if you'd like top watch a DVD on a television (which must be on the primary screen) and work with a spreadsheet on an analog CRT simultaneously. In Windows 98, independent refresh rates and resolutions can be set, making it easy to connect displays with differing sizes. Unfortunately Windows 2000 does not support this feature, as it lacks from not only the RADEON VE, but the Matrox G450 and NVIDIA GeForce2 MX as well. One bug we have uncovered in Windows 2000 is the inability to set certain displays above 60Hz while using HydraVision - a problem that has manifested itself on three of our test systems. Additionally, default Windows 2000 display controls interfered with HydraVision's settings, so manipulating the color depth on the properties page would throw off display resolutions, and so on. A quick reboot revealed that the last used display properties were not saved, and rather than two independent displays we were greeted with two "cloned" displays.
Per-application settings are another feature of HydraVision. An example of this would be if you always wanted Outlook Express to open full-screen in your secondary display or Excel always opening windowed across both screens. Even the positioning of dialog boxes can be controlled! The little red box shown in the picture below offers all of the control settings supported by each application. As you can see, access to these settings is simple and well laid out.
For those who anticipate keeping numerous applications open, the RADEON VE offers multiple desktops (up to nine can be maintained at a time). We still have not grown accustomed to this feature, but it does seem an effective alternative to filling up the task bar with unrelated applications.
Hot keys can be assigned to most of the functions provided by HydraVision, including moving applications or windows to specific monitors, accessing HydraVision controls, Opening applications with a keystroke, and zooming your view onto specific areas of the desktop. Again, we have not grown accustomed to assigning HotKeys yet, but it may eliminate sifting through a cluttered Start menu.
Overall, the features added by HydraVision are a perfect match for the VE, making the package very easy to use and equally powerful.