[Guide] Dual Monitor setup [Noob Friendly]

Nixxe’s Dual monitor setup guide

This is my first guide and i hope that someone finds it usefull, so lets get going!!
Check your display settings right click desktop and select “Display settings”

For this guide we will be setting up our secondary screen to the right side.
If you have the second monitor on the left side (2 - 1) just drag it so it matches the picture below!
((The monitor dosent need to pysicaly be on the right side on your desk))


Now take note of the resolution on both screens by simply clicking on the screen number and scroll down untill you see (Display Resolution)

Now you should have both screens resolution for this tutorial il use my resolution.
⦁Main Screen 2560x1440
⦁Second Screen 1920x1080

Now we need to config Citra!
Hit the “windows key + r” and type %appdata% hit enter!
Navigate to Citra/config now open qt-config with a text editor. Scroll down to Layout section!
((should looks somthing like the picutre below! Ive painted a red box in what parameters you should be editing!))

Here you only need to edit the things that i have marked in red!!
So here we go!!

layout_option=0 change it to 1
custom_layout=false change it to true
⦁ Change all custom_xxx_xxx\default=true to false
((Should look like in the picture below!))

Now we enter our resolution using my resolutions as an example!!
⦁ Main Screen 2560x1440 = custom_top
⦁ Second Screen 1920x1080 = custom_bottom

custom_top = to the top screen of the 3ds!! aka main monitor!!
⦁ custom_top_left=0 -set this to 0
⦁ custom_top_top=0 - set this to 0
⦁ custom_top_right=2560 - Horizontal resolution of main monitor!
⦁ custom_top_bottom=1440 -Vertical resolution of secondary monitor!

custom_bottom = to the bottom screen of the 3ds!! aka second monitor!!
⦁ custom_bottom_left=2560 -Set it to the top monitor Horizontal resolution!
⦁ custom_bottom_top=0 - set this to 0
⦁ custom_bottom_right=4480 -This is the sum of both horizontal resolutions (2560+1920)
⦁ custom_bottom_bottom=1080 -set this to the vertical resolution of your second monitor!

Save changes and close the document!

Download the program “borderless gaming” from github or google “github Borderless-Gaming”

once it installed launch Borderless-Gaming then launch Citra!
once in citra go to View and make sure Singel Widow Mode is not on! Or this will not work!
Start a game of you liking, then go to the Borderless-Gaming window!
Click the Citra Nightly | HEAD-XXXXXXX then click the arrow pointing to the right to add it to favorites!
Now on the favorties side right click on Citra Nightly | HEAD-XXXXXXX “select favortie screen” and select SuperSize!
Now right click again and select “No Size Change”
Then right click it yet again and select “Set Window Size”
Awser NO when the ask you if u want to set size with mouse!

When asked for Pixel X location
⦁ 0
When asked for Pixel Y location
⦁ 0
When asked for Window width enter the sum of both monitors horizontal resolution
in this case its (2560+1920)
⦁ 4480

When asked for height it should be the highest resolution of the two displays! (Wich should be you main monitor in most cases)
⦁ 1440

Close Citra and borderless gaming…
Now when you start this you want to first start Borderless-Gaming then Citra in that order!
You need to repeat this process inside Borderless-Gaming if you update Citra!!

Please if you have any questions feel free to ask!

Hey, thanks for this awesome guide! It all worked perfectly EXCEPT… in my case my “Main Monitor” is a laptop screen and my “Secondary Monitor” is a big TV which is above the laptop. So really I want my Secondary monitor to be displaying the Top Screen of the 3DS, and my Main Monitor to be displaying the Bottom Screen. This is the reverse of the usual arrangement. I tried some different settings but no luck. Any ideas?

Thanks again!

I figured it out, haha. I had to go into my computer’s display settings, pull the number 2 screen over to the LEFT of the number 1 screen, and then set number 2 as my main monitor (still in my computer’s display settings, not Citra settings).

Ah im happy you managed to solve it!! <3


Seriously, how cool is this!
Thanks again for the guide :slight_smile:

I followed everything step by step, yet when I open citra and OOT in my case, only 1 Monitor is used and I can’t seem to get citra on the second monitor

I have no clue how OOT works. sorry i cant help you there. =(

I had this working previously on an old version of Citra (see previous post) but I had to reinstall Windows (upgrade from 10 to 11). Despite copying over my appdata\roaming\citra folder I couldn’t get it to work the same.

My current version of Citra is 1841 and I have a 4K 3820x2160 & another 1920x1080 monitor.

Since this guide was made more options in the config have been added. My Layout now reads:
[Layout]
render_3d\default=true
render_3d=0
factor_3d\default=true
factor_3d=0
pp_shader_name\default=true
pp_shader_name=none (builtin)
filter_mode\default=true
filter_mode=true
layout_option\default=false
layout_option=1
swap_screen\default=true
swap_screen=false
upright_screen\default=true
upright_screen=false
mono_render_option\default=true
mono_render_option=0
custom_layout\default=true
custom_layout=false
custom_top_left\default=true
custom_top_left=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\0\0)
custom_top_top\default=true
custom_top_top=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\0\0)
custom_top_right\default=false
custom_top_right=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\xf\0)
custom_top_bottom\default=false
custom_top_bottom=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\bp)
custom_bottom_left\default=false
custom_bottom_left=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\xf\0)
custom_bottom_top\default=false
custom_bottom_top=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\0\0)
custom_bottom_right\default=false
custom_bottom_right=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\x16\x80)
custom_bottom_bottom\default=false
custom_bottom_bottom=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\x4\x38)
custom_second_layer_opacity\default=true
custom_second_layer_opacity=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\0\x64)

Even if I change my layout to:

[Layout]
render_3d\default=true
render_3d=0
factor_3d\default=true
factor_3d=0
pp_shader_name\default=true
pp_shader_name=none (builtin)
filter_mode\default=true
filter_mode=true
layout_option\default=false
layout_option=1
swap_screen\default=true
swap_screen=false
upright_screen\default=true
upright_screen=false
mono_render_option\default=true
mono_render_option=0
custom_layout\default=false
custom_layout=true
custom_top_left\default=false
custom_top_left=0
custom_top_top\default=false
custom_top_top=0
custom_top_right\default=false
custom_top_right=3840
custom_top_bottom\default=false
custom_top_bottom=2160
custom_bottom_left\default=false
custom_bottom_left=3840
custom_bottom_top\default=false
custom_bottom_top=0
custom_bottom_right\default=false
custom_bottom_right=5760
custom_bottom_bottom\default=false
custom_bottom_bottom=1080
custom_second_layer_opacity\default=true
custom_second_layer_opacity=@Variant(\0\0\0\x85\0\x64)

When I run citra it changes all the values to @variant. Running these settings as-is only works on my main screen where I can see the top screen of the 3DS fully but my second screen just shows the Windows desktop.

Just after I posted this I got it working, I think the config error for me was having layout_option=1 but changing it to layout_option=2 worked. The reason that it only appeared on one screen was because the window size was not big enough so I had to manually stretch it across to my other monitor. After this I re-did the Borderless gaming settings from scratch and got it working.

Ain’t that just the way! Always happens to me too. Glad to hear it’s working :slight_smile:

Hey i tryed it and have the same screen

but strangly the confic change it selph back
custom_top_left\default=true
custom_top_left=0
custom_top_top\default=true
custom_top_top=0

and the second sreen shows sometimes black screen and some times the desktop backround.

could you guess help
pls