Simviation Forum - 3 Monitor Setup

Aug 15^th, 2005 at 2:04pm

The_Mickmeister Offline
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I'm trying to put together a 3 monitor setup, with front view and two 45 degree views. Here's the system I'm considering:

-Gateway media center w/ Pentium D 830 GM

-1 gig SDRAM

-250 gb Sata HD

-Envision monitors

-A8N-SLI motherboard

-(2) NVidea GEForce 6600 GT gfx cards (128 mb)

Does this sound like it would give me 3 seperate 3D views with a decent frame rate? What about antialiasing? I'm also wondering why the place that's putting it together said that they can only use 128 mb graphics cards - they can't do 256. It seems odd that with all this other high tech stuff, you would use 128 mb cards.

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Reply #1 - Aug 15^th, 2005 at 2:14pm

Drumlineramos Ex Member

you would be better off checking in the 'Hardware" forum. there are quite a few people with multiple monitor experience.

Ramos

PS: scroll down

PPS: welcome to SimViation!

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Reply #2 - Aug 15^th, 2005 at 2:45pm

The_Mickmeister Offline
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Thanks...I'll try there.

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Reply #3 - Aug 15^th, 2005 at 4:39pm

NWISimmer Ex Member

Welcome to SimV Mickmeister.
Don't be fooled by more RAM equals better performance. It doesn't unless you're talking high end GFX. Put it this way, i'll be upgrading my 9550 256mb card for a 128mb 6600gt any day soon... Wink

I'm sure our more knowledgable members (congo, the_autopilot, etc) will/can explain further..

As for your 3 monitor setup goes, i'm sure if you asked in the "HomeBuild cockpits" forum you'd get some ideas..
Enjoy your time at SimV Cheesy

Rob.

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Reply #4 - Aug 15^th, 2005 at 4:58pm

The_Mickmeister Offline
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Interesting...Thanks.

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Reply #5 - Aug 15^th, 2005 at 11:48pm

ctjoyce Offline
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Basically to do three monitors to my knowladge you need two rigs as every GFX card can only support up to 2 displays. However if I am wrong please correct me.

Oh and dont buy a gateway, build yourself. Will save much time and money Wink

CTJoyce, Modding and voiding warranties since 2003&&Sheila's Specs:ASUS Striker Extreme 680i, Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 @ 3.2Ghz, Corsair XMS2 PC2-6400C4 2GB, 2x eVGA 7900GT KO, Western Digital 80GB SATA & 250GB SATAIII&&Vesper's Specs: Intel Core 2 Duo T7400, 2GB DDR2-667, GeForce Go 7950GTX 512MB, 160GB Hitachi SATA 5400RPM&&Hardware FAQ, Read it and be informed&&My little corner of the world&&Once You Know You NEWEGG&&Building a computer Part 2

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Reply #6 - Aug 16^th, 2005 at 12:21am

the_autopilot Offline
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Actually, you can have up to 4 four moniters in an SLI system if you don't run in SLI mode.

One vid card has two dvi ports. You can use 1 port for each monitor.

Using SLI mode, the two cards work together to generate 1 frame, so only 1 card's DVI ports are useful. Without SLI mode, the two cards act seperately and each of the four DVI ports can be used as a seperate display. Be advised that you lose SLI functionality meaning that each card renders seperately, so no fps boost is gained.

Setup for such a system is easy. Just build a normal SLI system and just do not enable SLI is the drivers.

Link to sig:&&Click here&&(Cannot post signature here due to current forum restrications on linked images).

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Reply #7 - Aug 16^th, 2005 at 9:40am

The_Mickmeister Offline
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Thanks for the info, Autopilot. Do you think the system I'm looking at could drive 3 seperate 3D views?

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Reply #8 - Aug 16^th, 2005 at 11:54am

ctjoyce Offline
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Funny how my lappy runs
FSX better than your
Tower
USA

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Posts: 4022

Well your setting it up for SLI, so yes it will be able to do what the AP explaned.

CTJoyce, Modding and voiding warranties since 2003&&Sheila's Specs:ASUS Striker Extreme 680i, Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 @ 3.2Ghz, Corsair XMS2 PC2-6400C4 2GB, 2x eVGA 7900GT KO, Western Digital 80GB SATA & 250GB SATAIII&&Vesper's Specs: Intel Core 2 Duo T7400, 2GB DDR2-667, GeForce Go 7950GTX 512MB, 160GB Hitachi SATA 5400RPM&&Hardware FAQ, Read it and be informed&&My little corner of the world&&Once You Know You NEWEGG&&Building a computer Part 2

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Reply #9 - Aug 16^th, 2005 at 7:40pm

the_autopilot Offline
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Yes, I think it should work.

Keep in mind though that a 6600 gt may not be able to render two scenes at once at the highest settings with decent frame rates. I suggest a dual 6800 gt setup at the minimum. Remember, without SLI enabled, the cards work seperately, so its not true SLI, so no fps boost.

Link to sig:&&Click here&&(Cannot post signature here due to current forum restrications on linked images).

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Reply #10 - Aug 16^th, 2005 at 7:48pm

JBaymore Offline
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MickMeister,

AutoPilot's comment above about possible framerate issues is why on your question in the "Homebuild Cockpits Forum" I mentioned that most pit builders experience I have seen have shown that issue when trying to run three exterior views.

That's why most use FSUIPC and WideView to do that.

best,

.................john

Intel i7 960 quad 3.2G LGA 1366, Asus P6X58D Premium, 750W Corsair, 6 gig 1600 DDR3, Spinpoint 1TB 7200 HD, Caviar 500G 7200 HD, GTX275 1280M, Logitec Z640, Win7 Pro 64b, CH Products yoke, pedals + throttle quad, simpit

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