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Tuesday, January 18, 2005
PowerPoint’s “Presenter View”
To give an effective speech, you need great content and a lively delivery. But it also helps to have the right technology. I typically use PowerPoint. But I also rely on my notes to expand on the slides and a wristwatch to keep track of the time. Until today, these were not integrated in my presentations. I had to fumble between my presentation my notes, and my watch. It doesn’t sound like much, but sometimes it can prove distracting and take your focus off your message.
Today, I had a minor breakthrough. I made a major presentation to a group of investors. As I was connecting my laptop to the projector, the AV tech showed me how to make use of PowerPoint’s built-in “Presenter View.” This enables you to display your slides through the projector as usual while simultaneously viewing the slide on the projector, your upcoming slides, your notes, and a timer—all on your laptop. It took about 60 seconds to setup. Here’s how I did it:
- I right-clicked on the desktop and selected Properties. I then clicked on the Settings tab. I clicked on the second monitor (the one with the “2” on it). This enabled the “Extend my Windows desktop onto this monitor” setting. I made sure this setting was checked (as below). I clicked on OK.
- I set-up PowerPoint to make use of the dual monitors. In PowerPoint, I selected SlideShow | Set Up Show. Then, under the Multiple Monitors section, I selected Display slide show on Monitor 2 and checked Show Presenter View. The dialog box looks like this:
I clicked OK to save my settings. - I then opened my slideshow and pressed F5. PowerPoint displayed my slide on the projector. It displayed the special “Presenter View” on my laptop. It looked like this (click to enlarge):
Note that I could see the slide that was currently on the projector (top center), my notes (bottom center), my upcoming slides (left), and various controls (middle and right). There’s even a timer right above my notes, so that I could tell how long I had been talking.
I haven’t tried this on any other machines, so you may have to futz with it a bit to get it to work, but, based on my experience, it was a small investment for a big payoff.
January 18, 2005 at 10:15 PM in Microsoft PowerPoint | Permalink
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Comments
You forgot to add that you need to set it up in PowerPoint, "SlideShow > SetUp Show..."
Really really cool tip.
Posted by: Ayende Rahien | Jan 19, 2005 2:51:57 AM
While most laptops have dual monitor capabilities, most desktop PC's do not, unless they have a video card specifically made for dual monitor output.
My company purchased Gateway 3200/3400's that have a video card and video output from the motherboard. I could not get dual monitors to work with it even though I had two video output plugs. When I called Gateway about it they said that they disabled, by default, the motherboard video whenever a videocard (on the AGP slot) is in use.
They did this to reduce the amount of calls to their help center. Someone in marketing missed an opportunity to sell dual monitor capability.
Posted by: MarcV | Jan 19, 2005 7:01:02 AM
Ayende,
Good catch! I forgot about this step. Thanks to you, I went back and modified the post.
Thanks,
Michael
Posted by: Michael Hyatt | Jan 19, 2005 7:17:56 AM
Thanks, this is a fantastic tip and I will be using this as I have to runn something like ~600 people through training in the next few months.
Posted by: fixedgear | Jan 19, 2005 8:55:13 AM
I've been using this feature for quite a long time, however I think that it lacks the possibility to change the notes fonts, because they are too small to be correctly read ~1m from the screeen, so bad for a such good feature.
Posted by: Syl20 | Jan 19, 2005 7:18:46 PM
What a great tip. I get asked this question a lot and I've never had an answer prior to this post. It's a very elegant solution and, I feel, sheer genius.
Posted by: Hani | Jan 19, 2005 9:35:25 PM
I don't usually use this feature because I like to stray from my laptop from time to time and the remote that came with my projector (InFocus LP540) doesn't advance the slides in Presenter mode. The remote works fine in normal mode, just not in presenter. Odd.
Posted by: Ty | Jan 20, 2005 1:30:28 PM
Another miscellaneous problem that probably won't affect you business types. But as a youth worker who used to use PowerPoint a lot, it's worth noting that video playback is seriously degraded in presentation mode. (I now use MediaShout more than not for lyrics and videos, still use PowerPoint for message notes)
Posted by: Daniel Koster | Jan 21, 2005 10:44:36 AM
wow, michael - unbelievable, i've been using ppt for years the traditional way...
i can't wait to try this out the next time i need to present...
i'm a technologist, most of my decks need to be supported by my notes, which i normally read from hardcopy...
the method you've outlined here will be much more effecient...
i bet you could also take notes on each slide - transparent to the audience as well...
Posted by: mike dunn | Jan 22, 2005 8:25:46 PM
Yes, your notes will appear for each slide.
Posted by: Michael Hyatt | Jan 22, 2005 9:32:42 PM
Great tip Michael.
I have played around with this before. One drawback I have noticed is that for those of us who use Tablet PCs, I do not think you can "ink" a slide in Powerpoint's Presenter View.
If anyone knows how, please spill the beans.
Posted by: Mike Gallmeyer | Jan 23, 2005 7:29:44 AM
I have tried this on numerous occassions wiith different laptops but for some reason this does not work with all types of laptops. I knew of the feature in PPT but to this date have not been able to use it. But this article reminds me to try it out one more time with some other settings :-)
Posted by: Frank | Jan 23, 2005 5:00:31 PM
The laptop has to have a video card capable of two distinct feeds in order for the presenter view to work (and the 'Expand desktop' option that is part of the instructions). A few years ago it seemed rare to find a laptop that could support it (ATI video cards seemed to be the only ones at the time), but now I can hardly find a laptop that doesn't. NVidia, Intel, and all the major graphic cards I have run into all seem to support the feature.
If your laptop isn't up to speed, there is one alternative to buying a new one. There are a few companies out there that make VGA PCMCIA cards that will give you that ability. I investigated it about a year ago when I was helping someone whose laptop did not have it built in. We opted not to buy one because a new machine seemed a better investment and the expansion cards really couldn't handle full motion video. But if you want to spend as little as possible and just shoot Powerpoint slides without video, it may be something to consider.
Posted by: Daniel Koster | Jan 26, 2005 2:19:52 AM
Every time I try to use the presenter view option Powerpoint generates a memory fault and closes the program.
I am using a Gateway M675 and the second (presentation) monitor is a wide screen TV through the S-Video port. I have a 3.4G processor and 1G of ram. It works fine if I don't use the presenter view option.
Any suggestions??
Posted by: Randy Timblin | Feb 2, 2005 11:55:38 AM
Excellent post. This is a fantastic tool. I often find myself with about 60% of what I want to say in my head so I end of going from memory for sevaral slides only to find a newly added slide or one that the information I want to convey doesn't immediately come to memory. Because of the fact that I had been going through slides from memory, I often have not flipped the corresponding pages in my notes makeing it an awkward fumble to find the correct page. This alleviates the proble all together. Elegant page.
Posted by: Maxx | Feb 3, 2005 2:26:57 PM
I also recently stumbled across this feature of PowerPoint. I was giving a three-hour workshop and using my new Mac PowerBook. I attributed this cool view of my slides, notes and timer to my Mac. So thanks for the detailed instructions!
Posted by: Debbie Weil | Feb 23, 2005 3:40:14 PM
I tried this feature, and it's great. How can I increase the size of the notes pane so that I don't have to scroll up/down to see the complete text? Thanks!
Posted by: Mike Marks | Jul 17, 2005 7:19:15 PM
In presenter view, how is the timer triggered? I tried a few things, but doesn't seem to work.
Posted by: Mike Marks | Jul 17, 2005 10:08:26 PM
The Presenter View has been very useful in my presentations.
Is there a way to change the settings on the presenter view so that only the speaker notes and the verticle slide pannel show? I don't need the slides when it is already being displayed on the big screen. Thanks for any information you can share.
Posted by: Ada Szeto | Sep 25, 2005 10:38:31 AM
Does anyone know how use precenter view with a remote mouse?
Posted by: Steve Lemmon | Feb 20, 2006 11:00:44 AM
Hi!
I cannot make work the "Presenter View" in PowerPoint. When I start the show in this mode, I just get the first slide to the projector et noting in my first monitor. I even have to stop PowerPoint with CTRL ALT DELL to close the show. I tried this feature with 2 differents destops with ATI Radeon graphics card and with a HP laptop, still th same problem. Your help would be great.
Posted by: Marc | Feb 21, 2006 3:55:12 PM
I used to use Presenter View, then I discovered PowerPoint's Dual Monitor mode, which has none of its drawbacks and many other advantages.
I wrote an brief article explaining Dual Monitor mode at:
http://accelerating.org/articles/beyondpresenterview.html
I hope it is helpful to this community.
Posted by: John Smart | May 19, 2006 11:32:45 PM
Most laptops this will not work on. You need a dual head video card that can split the presentation into two seperate monitors. Most laptops will only mirror each other.
Posted by: Christian Armstrong | Jun 8, 2006 12:59:42 PM
Thank you!! this is some great information to keep in mind... and it definitely helped me present!!!
Posted by: Nisha Makhijani | Aug 28, 2006 9:30:45 AM
For people who are asking about changing the size of the text in the presenter view, I've found now way in powerpoint 2003, however the beta2 of 2007 does have this functionality - which is great news, but most people will have to wait.
Posted by: Jon Wilkins | Oct 20, 2006 5:59:21 AM
thanks a lot! I had been fiddling with this trying to get it to work for hours!
Posted by: Lea | Jan 28, 2007 9:43:33 AM
I just recently started using Powerpoint Presenters View. Great feature...only drawback is on slides where I have a link to another site. I am usually always running the internet as I do my presentations. When I get to a slide with a link for further reference, Presenters View will not automatically take you to it on the internet. It's like the link becomes disabled. Has anyone else run into this problem? Did you come across a solution? I am still looking for one. Anyone, please help! Thanks!
Posted by: Raquel | Apr 2, 2007 3:57:33 PM
