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Tutorial: Use multiple monitors on a dev box

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In this tutorial, you configure a remote desktop client to use dual or more monitors when you connect to your dev box.

Using multiple monitors gives you more screen real estate to work with. You can spread your work across multiple screens, or use one screen for your development environment and another for documentation, email or messaging.

In this tutorial, you learn how to:

  • Configure the remote desktop client for multiple monitors.

Prerequisites

To complete this tutorial, you must install the Remote desktop app on your local machine.

Configure Remote Desktop to use multiple monitors

When you connect to your cloud-hosted developer machine in Microsoft Dev Box by using a remote desktop app, you can take advantage of a multi-monitor setup. Microsoft Remote Desktop for Windows and Microsoft Remote Desktop for Mac both support up to 16 monitors.

Use the following steps to configure Remote Desktop to use multiple monitors.

  1. Open the Remote Desktop app.

    Screenshot of the Windows 11 start menu with Remote desktop showing and open highlighted.

  2. Right-click the dev box you want to configure, and then select Settings.

  3. On the settings pane, turn off Use default settings.

    Screenshot showing the Use default settings slider.

  4. In Display Settings, in the Display configuration list, select the displays to use and configure the options:

    Value Description Options
    All displays Remote desktop uses all available displays. - Use only a single display when in windowed mode.
    - Fit the remote session to the window.
    Single display Remote desktop uses a single display. - Start the session in full screen mode.
    - Fit the remote session to the window.
    - Update the resolution on when a window is resized.
    Select displays Remote Desktop uses only the monitors you select. - Maximize the session to the current displays.
    - Use only a single display when in windowed mode.
    - Fit the remote connection session to the window.

    Screenshot showing the Remote Desktop display settings, highlighting the option to select the number of displays.

  5. Close the settings pane, and then select your dev box to begin the Remote Desktop session.

Clean up resources

Dev boxes incur costs whenever they're running. When you finish using your dev box, shut down or stop it to avoid incurring unnecessary costs.

You can stop a dev box from the developer portal:

  1. Sign in to the developer portal.

  2. For the dev box that you want to stop, select More options (...), and then select Stop.

    Screenshot of the menu command to stop a dev box.

The dev box might take a few moments to stop.

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