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I have a Dell U2312HM 23" screen connected to my HP Envy laptop in Extended desktop mode. Is there a way I get 2 Metro "Windows 8 Style UI" to run side-by-side, with one app on each of the screens?

My attempts to run them both on either side have been futile, Windows insists on putting the other screen to desktop mode the moment I launch a second Metro "Windows 8 Style UI" app and this behavior is driving me nuts

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  • Which version are you using? I was looking at this article earlier and it says that the CP and the RP have different MM support. theverge.com/2012/5/16/3023633/…
    – Joe Taylor
    Commented Aug 7, 2012 at 14:48
  • @JoeTaylor I'm using the Release Preview. Thanks for the link to the article, just went through it - all that's said about in the article is true - there's a start screen on each display, taskbars on each display - heck you can have "desktop" mode apps on each screen - but multiple Metro apps on either screen doesn't seen possible
    – Sathyajith Bhat ♦
    Commented Aug 7, 2012 at 14:50
  • @Sathya - You are better off testing this on the RTM build, anything before it, is not final.
    – Ramhound
    Commented Aug 7, 2012 at 15:06
  • @Ramhound I don't have access to the RTM build
    – Sathyajith Bhat ♦
    Commented Aug 9, 2012 at 4:07

2 Answers 2

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I do not believe this is possible. While, starting in the Release Preview, you could move apps that run in the interface formerly nicknamed Metro, from monitor to monitor, Windows 8 still, by design as I understand it will only run that interface in one monitor and all other monitors will default to desktop mode.

While a reading of the Building Windows 8 blog seems to hint at how you can use these apps on any monitor, you will notice that in all of the examples shown, the interface formerly known as Metro only ever shows up on one monitor and the other(s) all show desktop mode.

Paul Thurrott has an article which elaborates on this a little bit more.

Note: Microsoft has announced that Windows 8.1 will have the ability to run Metro apps on multiple screens at once. Windows 8.1 will be a free upgrade to Windows 8, and is planned for release this fall.

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  • I don't really think so. The "Metro" interface shines at it's best on a tablet, which will always have just one screen and which will allow you to use "Metro" apps (if they are properly designed) side by side if you need to move data between them. In a multimonitor environment such as many PCs have, the desktop environment is at home and the "Metro" interface suffers a bit from the lack of touch control and interaction. I'll admit it takes some getting used to, but I've been using multiscreen on my dual monitor setup at home and I've actually grown to like it quite a bit.
    – BBlake
    Commented Aug 7, 2012 at 18:43
  • BTW, I really have to doubt the statistics the blog quotes on the number of PCs that have multiple monitors. Almost every person I know uses at least two monitors and a couple have 3 or 4. But then, most of us are developers or otherwise involved in tech. The only ones that don't all use Macs, those poor souls.
    – BBlake
    Commented Aug 7, 2012 at 18:46
  • don't get me wrong, I love Metro on a tablet & on a single-display desktop PC. I also love that you can "dock" a Metro app side-by-side to the side strip. I tend to have a supplementary application ( generally Super User Chat, twitter] on my laptop screen while I'm browsing / gaming / working / watching a movie on my big screen. With the inability to run Metro apps on both display would mean I'll need to hunt for desktop apps - and doing so, I don't get the benefit of the Metro environment
    – Sathyajith Bhat ♦
    Commented Aug 7, 2012 at 19:20
  • FWIW, adoption of multiple devices in places such as my country is quite rare.
    – Sathyajith Bhat ♦
    Commented Aug 7, 2012 at 19:21
  • +1 for "the interface formerly known as Metro" :)
    – Tex Hex
    Commented Aug 7, 2012 at 19:54
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The answer to this question is 'what you want is not possible in Windows 8 RTM'.

Using Windows 8 RTM, it is not possible to use two Apps side by side with this exception:

Two apps can be launched if one of the apps is in Metro-Snap mode. You can see this by opening a metro app, dragging the app by its top border to the left or right side of the screen. After this is snapped (we call this metro-snapped), you can hit the lower-left hotcorner on the monitor, open the start screen again (or just press Control+Escape). you now see the start screen, and you can launch another metro app. After this you will have two apps, one snapped small, and one snapped large.

We recently released RetroUI Pro v3 (RetroUI.com), which users the ability to run Apps in resizable windows. We have also integrated support for running multiple monitors using Windows 8. So you can run apps and move them between monitors in resizable windows. With that said, what this user has requested is not possible due to the architecture of Windows 8 RTM.

In RetroUI Pro v3, we released new technology called SuperSize, which allows a Metro app to be spanned across an array which is made up of of multiple-monitors.

Not attempting to hijack this topic, but thought I would shed a bit of light on the topic because I think we understand it pretty well.

To view a demonstration of our SuperSize technology: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldaycb3RUOI
Technical information on SuperSize (Whitepaper)

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