1) & 2)
Direct interlaced output is not something thats going to ever work very well in a PC. PCs work on progressive RGB frames, to convert to RGB, you basically need to deinterlace first, or all sorts of problems might show up with chroma.
A PC doesn't really know the difference between interlaced and progressive frames. It's just a computer. A GPU, well that's a different issue. Using a pro video card such as the Quadro FX3800
and with software written to handle interlaced frames, a PC can certainly do true true interlaced video. We do this all the time in the TV broadcast industry. Most effects systems these days are PC based.
Also note that this is a dual monitor system. Unlike some lower cost dual monitor video cards, the FX3800 has two discrete output channels. The desktop is totally independent from the SDI output which can also be used as a DVI or HDMI output. So the second output can be interlaced while the desktop remains progressive, even at a different resolution.
Now if OTOH JRiver only works in progressive frames, then that's the problem here. So I guess you are saying I need to setup JRiver ROHQ to do IVTC and set my graphics card to output 1080/24P? So it can easily output progressive to the desktop and interlaced to the second output. Both at different resolutions as well.
I also acknowledge that IVTC is difficult to do well in software considering the limited horsepower of PCs. That's why I like to use the hardware based Teranex processor to do the IVTC, which it does very well. But if RO is doing a mediocre job on the IVTC by default, then the Teranex is not going to fix it after the fact.