DisplayMagician: Automate display/audio/app changes with a single desktop shortcut

Hi!

Do some of your games require that you use your triple monitors individually, yet other games require you use a single NVIDIA Surround or AMD Eyefinity screen? Do you get as frustrated as I do with having to modify your display settings when changing from one game to another?

Well I do! Or I did.

That's why I developed the free and open source DisplayMagician. I wanted to click a single desktop shortcut (or press a keyboard shortcut), and have DisplayMagician do the following for me:
  • Change my display settings to what the game needs (and change it back when done)
  • Change my audio speaker settings to what the game needs (and change it back when done)
  • Change my microphone settings to what the game needs (and change it back when done)
  • Pre-start a few applications BEFORE it starts the game (e.g. SimHub, CrewChief)
  • Wait patiently while I play my game
  • Revert everything back to the way it was automatically when I exit my game!
And that's what I built. I started with the incredible HeliosDisplayManagement software by Soroush Falahati, and then spent the next year or so developing new features and making something that would be easy to use, yet hide itself away when you didn't need it.

DOWNLOAD DISPLAY MAGICIAN NOW!
(It's free and open source code)

DisplayMagicianMainScreen.png


I've written this to scratch a programming itch I've had for a while, and to make my simracing life easier. I'm a big believer in letting software do the work for you, so I hope at least some of you find this useful!

Current features
DisplayMagician lets you set up the following information for each game or application:
  • Create and save a Display Profile to be used within future Desktop Shortcuts
  • Save a Game Shortcut that will automatically change to a different Display Profile and start your Game when you double-click on it.
  • Run your Game Shortcut using a keyboard shortcut (Hotkey).
  • Or start your games by right-clicking on the DisplayMagician Notification Tray icon.
  • Choose which Audio Device you want the shortcut to use. Like using the wireless headset when driving? This lets you with a single click.
  • Add one or more programs to pre-start before your game or application
  • Works with the following Game Launchers:
    • Steam
    • Ubisoft Uplay
    • Origin (Electronic Arts)
    • Epic Games
    • GOG.com
  • Optionally rollback to your previous Display profile once the game or application has closed.
  • Or maybe just create a Shortcut that permanently changes to a different Display Profile! The options are endless.
  • Also comes with a Shell Extension that allows you to change to a different Display Profile by right-clicking on the desktop background!
  • Supports NVIDIA Surround setups, AMD Eyefinity setups and standard Windows multi-desktop views.
  • Supports many different connection types including HDMI, DisplayPort, USB and Wireless.
  • Supports SuperDisplay and SpaceDesk android-tablet based monitors
To use:
  • Download and install ‘DisplayMagician’.
  • Run ‘DisplayMagician’, and click on the ‘Display Profiles’ button
  • Use ‘Windows Display Settings’ or ‘NVIDIA Control Panel’ to configure your display(s) exactly as you would like them (AMD EyeFinity is NOT currently supported).
  • ALT-TAB back to DisplayMagician, and you should see the new display configuration shown in the Display Profile window.
  • Click the ‘Save As/Rename’ button so that DisplayMagician will remember the current Display Profile so you can use it in your Shortcuts. You will need to do this for each different display configuration you want to use in any of your games or applications.
  • Click ‘Back’ button to go back to the Main DisplayMagician window.
  • Now that you have some Display Profiles set up, you can create some shortcuts that will use them!
  • Click on the ‘Game Shortcuts’ button.
  • You will be shown your Shortcut Library window. This is where all your Shortcuts live, and where you have to go if you every want to edit them. Click the ‘New’ button to create a new Shortcut
  • Choose the Display Profile you want to use with the Shortcut. Make sure it matches what the game expects :).
  • Click on the ‘2. Choose Audio’ tab and select any audio changes that you would like to set for this shortcut.
  • Click on the ‘3. Choose what happens before’ tab to choose as many applications as you'd like to start before the main game or application. Examples include SimHub or Crew Chief.
  • Click on the ‘4. Choose Game to start’ tab, to choose the main game or application that the Shortcut will start up and then monitor. DisplayMagician will then pause until you close the main game or application.
  • Choose the Game from the list shown, or if it’s not listed there then select the game or application executable. You can also choose to not start anything if you want to permanently change to a different display profile. NOTE: If your game isn't listed, then please launch the game at least once directly via game library (e.g. through Steam). DisplayMagician only detects games that have been run at least once.
  • Click on the ‘5. Chose what happens afterwards’ tab, and choose if you want to rollback any display changes you make while starting the game, or if you want to keep them. If the ‘auto-suggest name’ option is enabled then a Shortcut Name will be entered in automatically for you. Feel free to change the name if it's not quite right.
  • Once you're ready, click the ‘Save’ button to save the Shortcut to the Shortcut Library. If you can only see the outline of a button rather than the word Save, then the shortcut isn't valid yet. You probably have some missing fields you need to fill in. The Save button only shows if you have a valid Shortcut set up. The minimum requirement is to select a Display Profile, and select a main game or application.
  • Once you’ve saved the Shortcut, it should appear in the Shortcut Library.
  • To create a Desktop shortcut file from your Shortcut, select the Shortcut from the list in your Shortcut Library, and click the ‘Save to Desktop’ button. This will then write the Shortcut to your computer, ready to use!
DisplayMagicianShortcutOnDesktop.png

You now have 4 different ways you can start your shortcut:

  • You can double-click on the Desktop shortcut you just saved to the Desktop to start your game; or
  • You can right mouse click on the desktop background, and select the Game Shortcut from the DisplayMagician pop-up menu to start your game; or
  • You can right mouse click on the DisplayMagician notification tray icon, and select the Game Shortcut from the DisplayMagician pop-up menu to start your game; or
  • (optionally) If you've set a Hotkey for your Game Shortcut, you can press the Hotkey keyboard shortcut whenever DisplayMagician is running and your Game Shortcut will run.

The Desktop Background menu that allows you to change your display profiles with a single click is shown here:

DisplayMagicianShellExtension.png


If you find this useful, let me know. I'd love to hear what you think of it, or if there are any features I can improve or add to make your lives easier!

Thanks
Terry



More screenshots:

DisplayMagicianDisplayProfiles.png


DisplayMagicianShortcutLibrary.png








Enjoy!
 

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I just started using Display Magician and while it's extremely convenient I have a weird issue.

I have a desktop with 2 monitors (1 HDMI and 1 DP to USB C) and a sim rig with 3 monitors (3 DP).
Switching from desktop to rig works flawlessly.

However when I go from rig back to desktop, my left monitor keeps switching on and off every couple of seconds. I need to reboot every time to fix the issue. I have tried switching the cables between the DP and HDMI, the left monitor stills has the same issue.

Is there any log I can send you?
 
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I just started using Display Magician and while it's extremely convenient I have a weird issue.

I have a desktop with 2 monitors (1 HDMI and 1 DP to USB C) and a sim rig with 3 monitors (3 DP).
Switching from desktop to rig works flawlessly.

However when I go from rig back to desktop, my left monitor keeps switching on and off every couple of seconds. I need to reboot every time to fix the issue. I have tried switching the cables between the DP and HDMI, the left monitor stills has the same issue.

Is there any log I can send you?
That's unfortunately sounds like a display monitor or driver problem. DisplayMagician is a video driver settings recording/playback software, and so won't be able to change this.

That said, is the left screen connected to USB-C or to the HDMI?

Thanks
Terry
 
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That's unfortunately sounds like a display monitor or driver problem. DisplayMagician is a video driver settings recording/playback software, and so won't be able to change this.

That said, is the left screen connected to USB-C or to the HDMI?

Thanks
Terry
Hi Terry I have tried with both HDMI and USB-C and same issue. I will update the drivers and see how I go.
Thanks you.
 
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I just installed DisplayMagician 2.4.1.14 on a brand new machine, and when I launch it, there is no button to create a new display profile. How do I fix this?

dm.png
 
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I just installed DisplayMagician 2.4.1.14 on a brand new machine, and when I launch it, there is no button to create a new display profile. How do I fix this?
This is just a warning message when you install and launch it for the first time. If you haven't found it already, you can close that window if it pops up, you can launch the program from the taskbar (bottom right corner) or through the start menu as usual. It took a few seconds to launch for me for the first time aswell.
 
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This is just a warning message when you install and launch it for the first time. If you haven't found it already, you can close that window if it pops up, you can launch the program from the taskbar (bottom right corner) or through the start menu as usual. It took a few seconds to launch for me for the first time aswell.

Thank you, this made me realize what was going on. I am embarrassed to admit I totally missed that...

It works like a charm now. Thank you @terrymacdonald for all the hard work you put into to making this incredibly helpful app!
 
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Hi Terry, having an issue with my Displaymagician install which I'm assuming is some sort of conflict on my end. The main app will crash instantly upon loading meaning I'm unable to set up any shortcuts of any kind. I'm able to right click the desktop and create a new display profile from the context menu that pops up however this appears to be the only part of the app that works. I can create profile shortcuts and the profiles work (have to try them a few times), but thats it. No game shortcuts etc.

I've had the software working previously, have tried uninstalling and reinstalling a few times but no luck.
 
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DisplayMagician v2.5.0 released!

DOWNLOAD DISPLAY MAGICIAN NOW!

DisplayMagician v2.5.0


WINDOWS 11: DisplayMagician v2.5 works with Windows 11. Just remember that you will need to recreate your Display Profiles when you move from Windows 10 to Windows 11! This is REALLY important, as Windows 11 has different display settings to Windows 10, and your old Windows 10 Display Profiles won't work. You must delete the old Display Profiles and create new ones for DisplayMagician to run properly.

DisplayMagician v2.5 adds a raft of new features. First and foremost, it adds the ability to select an application from a list of those installed in Windows without needing to find the executable manually. This speeds up application selection greatly! This change also opens up the ability for DisplayMagician to run Microsoft Store UWP Apps, but please note due to Windows permission restrictions DisplayMagician is only able to start UWP Apps, not monitor them until they are closed. This means if you make a Game Shortcut for a UWP App DisplayMagician will think that it has closed straight away (even though it opened successfully), and it will revert the screens back. There is nothing I can do about this until I migrate DisplayMagician from .Net Framework 4.8 to .Net 7, and that will take a few months to do.

DisplayMagician v2.5 also now comes with a built-in FOV calculator! This reuses logic from Markus Ewert 'dinex86' FOV calculator here: https://dinex86.github.io/FOV-Calculator/. A massive thanks to Markus for letting me reuse his logic.

DisplayMagician v2.5 also brings with it a few bug fixes. DisplayMagician v2.4.1 was very, very reliable, but there were a few edge cases and upstream changes that came along over the last few months that needed some tweaks. DisplayMagician now shows screen rotation correctly in NVIDIA, AMD and Windows drivers. DisplayMagician now supports the latest Steam file format released in December 2022, so all your Steam games should show up again. Image grabbing now detects when an exe doesn't have an icon in it and instead uses a default DM icon. Steam client upgrades should now happen while DisplayMagician is running. And losing the DisplayMagician window after a screen layout change should be a thing of the past with some new DisplayMagician window positioning logic that will recenters it on the primary display after a display profile change (screen coordinates change after a display profile changes which may mean DM is off the screen, so it needs to be moved). And lastly the Desktop Background menu should be working again!

Thank you for using DisplayMagician
I've been working on DisplayMagician for the last 3 year solidly. I really do love adding features and hearing about how the software has helped you, so feel free to post messages in the RaceDepartment Forum Thread. And if you feel like DisplayMagician is worth it, I’d always appreciate a donation!

Credits
I’m so very thankful for the help of the following people, who make DisplayMagician possible:

  • Sean at SimCraft (Thank you so much for your generous donation!)
  • Domenic (Thanks for the solid month of troubleshooting help and the monthly sponsorship!)
  • Frcooper (thanks for the monthly donations)
  • Miiinttt (thanks for the monthly donations)

Also big thanks to:

  • Dmanzano1 (Thank you for your donation)
  • Yohan (Thank you for your donation)
  • Guennid (Thank you for your donation)
  • RBZL (thanks for the past monthly donations)
  • Davedontmind (Thank you for your donation)
  • Hmalatian (Thank you for your donation)
  • Nielssoeth (Thank you for your donation)
  • Markus Ewert 'dinex86' (Thanks for letting my use your FOV logic)
  • Dogy007 (Thanks for the sponsorship)
  • Ceramed (Thank you for your donation and your help troubleshooting SuperDisplay and SpaceDesk screens)
  • Bjorg (Thank you for your donation)
  • MichaelDWheeler (Thank you for your donation)
  • Frank (Thank you for your donation)
  • Dan Clark (Thank you for your donation)
  • Fonzmonster (Thank you for your donation)
  • Logozo (Thank you for your donation)
  • 5th (Thank you for your donation)
  • Patrickdiezi (Thank you for your donation)
  • Fifowole (Thank you for your donation)
  • Brett Horton (Thank you for your donation)
  • Patrickdiezi (Thank you for your donation)
  • NoDepth (For your bug report)
  • Chris5gd (For your bug report)
  • JabberJon (Thank you for your donation)
  • Sikhalv (Thank you for your donation)
  • Friedobaer (Thank you for your donation)
  • PanthaRhei (Thank you for your donation)
  • Matthex (Great help testing multiple display adapter bugs and 7 different screens! And for your donation!)
  • NudeNull (Thank you for your sponsorship)
  • 20vmki (Thank you for your sponsorship)
  • Lazerwolf22 (Thank you for your sponsorship)
  • Spmac (Thank you for your sponsorship)
  • Mcdbergh (thanks for the bug report)
  • JSchoonbrood (Great help testing multiple display adapter bugs and SuperDisplay Android Tablet support)
  • Outerspacejunky16 (Thanks for testing AMD support)
  • Matthex (Great help testing multiple display adapter bugs and 7 different screens!)
  • Dev1981 (Great help testing multiple display adapter bugs and DisplayLink USB)
  • Domenic (Thanks for the solid month of troubleshooting help and the sponsorship!)
  • Gretzer (thanks for the cool idea)
  • Erbkaiser (One of the most impressive testers with an amazing eye for detail)
  • SneakingJ (Major props for the help getting cloned display profiles to work)
  • Scowling (Again, without you, AMD support wouldn’t exist AT ALL! )
  • Slippery-silvia (Again, thanks for the testing help for Mosaic cards with v2.1)
  • Mobeeuz (Your thorough testing logs really helped!)
  • S4b0tage (Thanks for the testing help and the donation!)
  • Gpo123 (thanks for the bug report)
  • Whitestar127 (thanks for the bug report)
  • Frcooper (thanks for the sponsoring)
  • Stringfieldmark (thanks for continued sponsoring and the testing help)
  • Bossebossebosse (thanks for the donation)
  • Sk666 (thanks for the donation)
  • FormelLMS (thanks for the continued sponsoring and the testing help)
  • Neilperson (thanks for the cool idea)
  • DragRedSim (thanks for the bug report)
  • Original HelioDisplayManagement project created by the amazing Soroush Falahati
  • Various icons made by Freepik from www.flaticon.com

There have been some absolute rock stars who have helped do a lot of troubleshooting for me in order to iron out a large collection of bugs with the new video libraries, and I’m forever indebted to you. DisplayMagician is only as good as it is thanks to your help!

Terry

v2.5.0 RELEASE NOTES
  • Added ability to select an application from a list of those installed in Windows
  • Added ability to start UWP Apps installed from the Microsoft Store (IMPORTANT: DM cannot detect when these are stopped due to Windows Permissions Restrictions. This will only be fixed when DisplayMagician is upgraded to .Net 7 which will take months to do)
  • Added FOV calculator using Markus Ewert 'dinex86' code (Thanks for saying yes when I asked Markus!)
  • Fixed DisplayMagician so that screen rotation is shown correctly in NVIDIA, AMD and Windows drivers
  • Fixed Steam library parsing so that it works with the new Steam file format released in December 2022
  • Fixed Image grabbing now detects when an exe doesn't have an icon in it and instead uses a default DM icon
  • Fixed freeing Steam files after parsing them that was preventing Steam client upgrades while DisplayMagician was running
  • Fixed DisplayMagician window positioning so that it recenters itself on the primary display after a display profile change (screen coordinates change after a display profile changes which may mean DM is off the screen, so it needs to be moved)
  • Fixed Desktop Background menu not working
  • Upgraded libraries to the latest versions
 
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Hi Terry, having an issue with my Displaymagician install which I'm assuming is some sort of conflict on my end. The main app will crash instantly upon loading meaning I'm unable to set up any shortcuts of any kind. I'm able to right click the desktop and create a new display profile from the context menu that pops up however this appears to be the only part of the app that works. I can create profile shortcuts and the profiles work (have to try them a few times), but thats it. No game shortcuts etc.

I've had the software working previously, have tried uninstalling and reinstalling a few times but no luck.

Hi Smidgey,

Based on your information it's a bit tricky to say. My guess is that the config files from an earlier install are causing issues here. I suggest doing the following:
- Uninstall DisplayMagician
- Open up Windows File Explorer
- Go to C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\
- Delete the DisplayMagician folder
- Reinstall the latest DisplayMagician v2.5.0 that was just released today

You will have to configure everything again, but that will be the best way to be sure that only the newest settings are in use. DIsplayMagician v2.5.0 also fixes a few bugs that may have also been involved in the issue that you're seeing.

Hopefully everything goes back to normal once you've done the above. Please report back here when you've done the above actions so I know it's all working!

Thanks
Terry
 
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Hi Smidgey,

Based on your information it's a bit tricky to say. My guess is that the config files from an earlier install are causing issues here. I suggest doing the following:
- Uninstall DisplayMagician
- Open up Windows File Explorer
- Go to C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\
- Delete the DisplayMagician folder
- Reinstall the latest DisplayMagician v2.5.0 that was just released today

You will have to configure everything again, but that will be the best way to be sure that only the newest settings are in use. DIsplayMagician v2.5.0 also fixes a few bugs that may have also been involved in the issue that you're seeing.

Hopefully everything goes back to normal once you've done the above. Please report back here when you've done the above actions so I know it's all working!

Thanks
Terry
Cheers Terry,

I did read through the GitHub and noticed an issue with the new steam beta causing problems? Looks like something that’s being fixed in the next version?

Rich
 
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Hi Terry. Still loving the app. I had an issue upgrading to 2.5 where by simply following the prompts to upgrade the process failed with an error (I regret I didn't copy it down sorry). I then couldn't find any mention of Display Magician on my PC (didn't appear as an installed app anywhere) and feared the worst as losing all my profiles is a real pain.

I manually downloaded 2.5 and installed to default path (which didn't actually exist previously - I checked) and thankfully all my old profiles appeared upon first launch!

So I'm happy. Really the only pain I've had with the app is losing profiles when I've upgraded (I appreciate win10 -> win11 was unavoidable, but I've had two other instances of losing profiles for some reason) as recreating them is a right pain because the alignment of the multiple displays inside the nvidia control panel for bezel correction has to match the ingame settings and vice versa.

Therefore a suggestion for v3 (and I don't know if it's possible as I'm not clear where and how profiles are stored) could you add backup profiles feature? Either to a network path or google drive or something? Could just be manual to start with but perhaps could be automated in time.

What would be really clever is if DisplayMagician could also backup the ingame monitor settings as the other part of the puzzle. Given that for many games these values are in editable text files it seems doable.
 
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Hi Terry. Still loving the app. I had an issue upgrading to 2.5 where by simply following the prompts to upgrade the process failed with an error (I regret I didn't copy it down sorry). I then couldn't find any mention of Display Magician on my PC (didn't appear as an installed app anywhere) and feared the worst as losing all my profiles is a real pain.

I manually downloaded 2.5 and installed to default path (which didn't actually exist previously - I checked) and thankfully all my old profiles appeared upon first launch!

So I'm happy. Really the only pain I've had with the app is losing profiles when I've upgraded (I appreciate win10 -> win11 was unavoidable, but I've had two other instances of losing profiles for some reason) as recreating them is a right pain because the alignment of the multiple displays inside the nvidia control panel for bezel correction has to match the ingame settings and vice versa.

Therefore a suggestion for v3 (and I don't know if it's possible as I'm not clear where and how profiles are stored) could you add backup profiles feature? Either to a network path or google drive or something? Could just be manual to start with but perhaps could be automated in time.

What would be really clever is if DisplayMagician could also backup the ingame monitor settings as the other part of the puzzle. Given that for many games these values are in editable text files it seems doable.

Hi @danclark,

I do try REALLY hard to avoid any profile changes, but unfortunately there are times that the existing profiles just won't work with the new version of DisplayMagician. This is typically only happens when I add a brand new feature into the display profile, such as NVIDIA DRS settings or Windows Display scaling support. In those situations there isn't an easy way with v2.5 to handle that difference in config, and no way for DM to know what settings to add to the existing profiles, so instead we make everyone recreate their profiles. Its really the only way to be sure that the profiles are valid.

I am trying to make a way of making it faster to update any existing Game Shortcuts if you ever need to recreate your display profiles. My idea is to have a check when deleting a display profile if there are any game shrotcuts using that display profile, and if there is, then ask the user to select another profile to use instead. That should speed the process up considerably!

I also have exactly the same issue when I upgrade as you do, so I'm looking to make my upgrade process as easy as possible too!

Please keep suggesting new ideas, as any and all suggestions are taken seriously.

Thanks
Terry
 
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Hey Terry, wondering if you have any ideas on this little issue I have. I've been using your software for about a year now and love it. Makes my situation so convenient and easy, I love it.

My only issue is when switching from my desk to my rig I usually need to hit the hotkey twice. First time will start to flick over, then it comes back to the desk. 2nd time works fine. Not sure if it's the software or something else stopping it on the first attempt.

Just a minor inconvenience, but I've just setup a game profile with a hotkey finally and I'm wondering if it's going to work properly (haven't tested this yet).

Thanks mate!
 
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Hey Terry, wondering if you have any ideas on this little issue I have. I've been using your software for about a year now and love it. Makes my situation so convenient and easy, I love it.

My only issue is when switching from my desk to my rig I usually need to hit the hotkey twice. First time will start to flick over, then it comes back to the desk. 2nd time works fine. Not sure if it's the software or something else stopping it on the first attempt.

Just a minor inconvenience, but I've just setup a game profile with a hotkey finally and I'm wondering if it's going to work properly (haven't tested this yet).

Thanks mate!
Hmmmmm, tricky. This could be an issue with the video card driver not liking part of the configuration it is sent, and only applying some of it the first time, then it being fine with the whole configuration the second time? It's hard to say without logs.

Can you please log a new issue at https://github.com/terrymacdonald/DisplayMagician/issues/new/choose and then create a Support ZIP File (its a button under Settings) and then upload your log files to the new issue. That will let me have a detailed look at what is going on.

Thanks
Terry
 
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