Dell Vostro 3400 - two external monitors possible?

Hi

I'm thinking of buying a Vostro 3400 with an i3-350m CPU and notice that it has both VGA and HDMI outputs (for both the basic configuration running Intel GMA HD graphics as well as the NVIDIA G310 512MB graphics option).

I wonder if it might be possible to power two external monitors by connecting them to the VGA and HDMI outputs, with the HDMI output driving a 1920 x 1080 LCD TV as a monitor. If this is achievable, is the NVIDIA G310 512MB graphics option required or will the basic Intel GMA HD graphics configuration suffice?

If two external monitors can indeed be used, what happens to the notebook's own display? Still usable or disabled?

Since this combination (i3-330/350/370m with Intel GMA HD graphics or NVIDIA G310 512MB graphics) is also available for the Vostro 3300 and 3500 (and probably other Dell laptiops too), it seems these two machines will share the same attribute regarding the use of two external monitors.

I'd appreciate it if any Vostro users can confirm whether two external monitors can be powered by using both the VGA and HDMI outputs.

Thanks in advance for your feedback!

Luke

PS I undertand that HP's new Envy 14 and 17 can power two/three external monitors via Eyefinity, but they are beyond my budget.

 

1) Please don't double/cross post. Your other post has been deleted.

2) I'm pretty sure that both the integrated and discrete machines will be able to drive two external monitors. I don't think you'll be able to use the internal monitor in addition to the two externals (so it'll be disabled).

It might be possible to drive more two displays with the discrete variant (ie place one display on the integrated chip and more on the discrete), but that I'm not so sure about...

 

Sorry about the cross posting. I didn't realize there was a Vostro 3400 thread until after starting this one.

The idea about driving more than one external monitor using the discrete NVIDIA G310 output is very interesting. Perhaps an external device is needed for such a setup?

 

I would think that if it would work, it wouldn't need an external device. If you want to use an external device, you might as well get one of these USB to VGA adapters or whatnot.