3 monitors. Not surround.

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kuhla

Limp Gawd
Joined
Nov 21, 2005
Messages
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I realize that SLI is required for Nvidia Surround to work but....

  • What about just on the desktop? That would not be part of nvidia surround as far as I understand.
  • What actually happens if you plug in 3 monitors to the 2 DVI + 1 mini HDMI? Explosions?
  • If you plug in all 3 can you toggle one of the inputs or something?

I've tried searching for this but every review I've read just states the already well known "you need SLI for surround" line. I currently have 2 LCD monitors and 1 LCD TV. I would like to keep all 3 plugged in but realistically if I'm using the TV then I'm not using one of the monitors. As it is right now, I keep the TV and one of the monitors plugged in but it's really kind of a pain in the ass.

I'm planning "soon" to buy one of Nvidia's newer cards so disregard the GTX-285 in my sig. However, this issue alone might actually push me to an AMD card when I get around to upgrading in a month or so.
 
You need SLI for the same reason that Eyefinity needs displayports. HDMI/DVI signals can not support anything more than two monitors. Displayports circumvent this problem. Or two GPU's circumvent this problem because the second card's output foes not interfere with the first cards output. For a single card solution, you can not use Nvidia.
You may think the problem can be solved by using two DVI and one HDMI, but the reality is, the HDMI and DVI signals are incredibly similar, hence the conflict. DVI is essentially HDMI minus the audio.
 
DOOMHAMMA said:
You need SLI for the same reason that Eyefinity needs displayports. HDMI/DVI signals can not support anything more than two monitors. Displayports circumvent this problem. Or two GPU's circumvent this problem because the second card's output foes not interfere with the first cards output. For a single card solution, you can not use Nvidia.

You may think the problem can be solved by using two DVI and one HDMI, but the reality is, the HDMI and DVI signals are incredibly similar, hence the conflict. DVI is essentially HDMI minus the audio.
Click to expand...

You are not really answering my question.

Eyefinity is the spanning tech as far as I understand turning 3x (1920x1200) into 1x (5760x1200). As far as I understand, this is what Nvidia Surround does too. I'm not trying to create one big, spanning desktop resolution.

Now if you said, the top mini-HDMI port shares the output of the top DVI port (I'm not sure if that is the case?) then that would make sense and I would understand the problem.

....but really, has anyone actually tried to plug in 3 displays to see what happens? ....perhaps there is a toggle to send signal over the HDMI instead of whichever DVI or whatever?
 
What, you think there is a magic formula to overcome the two monitor limitation? Or Nvidia said "No you can't connect three monitors. Oops, just kidding"? No Nvidia consumer level card supports three monitors over one video card. Period.

I am sure nothing is going to "explode" if you plug in all three monitors. No idea whether you can just toggle active monitors within Windows.
 
Kuhla I answered your question, don't be thrown off by the fact that I used the word "eyefinity" ;p
You simply can not use a single card nvidia solution for 3 or more monitors at the moment.
 
Currently the 3 displays I have run 1920x1200, 1920x1080, 1680x1050.

What if I replaced the 1680x1050 display with a 1920x1080 display and used a DVI splitter? It would display the same image on both of the 1920x1080 units (I imagine) but that would be fine. Any issues with the display information being sent to the video card (acronym is escaping me right now)? Anyone have experience with DVI splitters?
 
are there any infos on new gen gf nvidia's that will support triple display?
anything to be released soon after ces 2011?
right now, I'm sold for the Sapphire HD5770 flex with its quad display output, its just that adobe stuck with nvidia's cuda for gpu acceleration which is so badly needed...
 
can't you just throw in a second crappy video card to drive the third monitor?

I run three displays in non eyefinity with a 4870 driving the primary, and a 4350 driving the two secondary displays.
 
aaronearles said:
can't you just throw in a second crappy video card to drive the third monitor?

I run three displays in non eyefinity with a 4870 driving the primary, and a 4350 driving the two secondary displays.
Click to expand...
i could but for an inferior result price-wise, temp-wise and space-wise....
Right now i can get the 5770 flex for 140euros and it supports 4 displays, is cooler and less power hungry, eats two slots.
Getting the gf 460 1Gb which is the lowest of the series supported for adobe cuda (and not even officially but through a hack, instead of the official 470)
will set me back 180 euros and i need a second nvidia 70+ card (gx 260 and over?) so they share same drivers, which will eat another two slots...
...sure I could try mixing both the 5770 + 460 together but its a totall overkill for now and dunno if it'll work under win7 64...
 
no, just pick up a low end crap card, my second card was $40 and it's passively cooled so I doubt the power consumption or heat are anything to be concerned with.
 
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