Maximum No. of Monitors per Card - Query

[titchard]

Hi everyone,

Currently in the process or replacing my machine however one of my caveats is several monitors, however the question I am trying to find the answer to doesn't seem to be answered (or, I am just asking the wrong question!)

is there generally per card a maximum amount of monitors that can be attached? is it purely limited by the ports on the card itself, or is it limited by the maximum resolution of the card spread over however many monitors?

I know this may seem like a really simple question but I haven't been able to find a straight forward answer.

For reference, I am looking to have 3-4 monitors attached as I do a lot of word / code based work, and this is mainly what it would be for.

Thanks in advance for your help/advice!

R

 

[This never ends well]

You should be able to run 4 monitors, but it does depend on what card your getting as it may not have 4 ports, if not you can use a splitter.

 

[drunkenmaster]

Pretty much the advice of what to get depends on if you are looking for gaming/compute performance as well(ie you need a 290 or higher level card or can do with a 7450 level card) and what type of displays you have.

There are say 6 output cards kicking around, more older generation(may be newer ones that aren't well advertised), say 7870 type cards. These 4+ output cards are usually display port or mini display port. You can daisy chain display port outputs so you an have say 3 screens off one output, but you need afaik monitors (more professional type models) with a DP output as well.

For lower res, say 1080p/60hz then a 6 mini dp card with several cheap passive adaptors(if you don't have display port screens) is a cheap way. If you need higher res or higher refresh rate then you get into active adaptors and a higher price.

Shouldn't be any problem tbh buying 2-3 low power £50 cards and using all the outputs. It really depends on what connections your screens have, what refresh rate and how much actual gpu power you need.

 

[JasonM]

For multi monitor dev work you need Nvidia Mosaic.

Having a bunch of monitors connected is no good unless you can manage desktops and span applications over multiple screens, this is what the Mosaic + Nview software does for you!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_p1fR_jUf1U

http://www.nvidia.com/object/nvidia-mosaic-technology.html

2 Quadro cards would give support for 4 monitors.

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-044-PN

Above can be found cheaper second hand however, search the bay!!

 

[drunkenmaster]

Buy two expensive cards with only two outputs each just to use professional software that other software can do cheaper. I would take it as someone who does programming myself that the OP uses several monitors for different applications and having them all open and visible at the same time. Nview(like much other software) can treat them all as one panel and potentially sync them up(I think that is a separate thing but not sure) is more for video walls where you have a single video showing across all panels and smooth usage as a single screen is important. None of that seemed overly necessary here. Multiple monitors are absolutely NOT useless without application spanning. I have one IDE or another on my main panel, a browser, a pdf or two and a document file with say 2 per screen. Having one of these applications spanned across all the panels would defeat the purpose. Many more people run multiple screens without applications spanned across their screens than with.

Honestly there are just too many options, OP has an itx case, needs to be a single gpu. OP's monitors have DP output, daisychaining off a single card and single DP port is simple, all vga, super cheap £20 old gen cards x 2, couple dvi-vga adaptors and you get 2 outputs per card. All dvi, bit harder, you get some dual dvi or dvi + DP cards starting around the £50 mark, is there hdmi to dvi adaptors. Honestly there are so many choices the place to start is what the monitors are, how many cards the case can deal with.

 

[Quartz]

Is this going to be a box on which you will play games? If so, be advised that GPUs often kick into high gear if 3 or more monitors are attached even when you're not gaming.

 

[JasonM]

Buy two expensive cards with only two outputs each just to use professional software that other software can do cheaper.

What software? I tried AMD's software as an alternative to Nvidia nView and it's just terrible.

The nView software was originally produced for financial traders, it's a very stable solution. Also the drivers are not caught up with games drivers, Nvidias own words NVS and Quadro solutions are for people who make money from their computers.

The ability to span is very useful if your running monitors the same res/size. I can run run Premier Pro over 3 screens and see huge video timeline. I code using Visual Studio spanned over 3 screens also.

With nView I can press one key, and replace my Development environment with email, browser, skype etc. Press one key again and the development environment is back. Plus as everything is unified I can tweek one colour profile to change colour profiles on all displays.

Also it's not expensive, the OP can get some NVS 310's for £25 each clean pulls of the bay, these come with display ports. Plus these cards are low powered so very quiet in use. If these cards were expensive I would agree with yourself for another solution, but otherwise a cheap NVS/Quadro setup makes sense.

 

[titchard]

Hi Everyone, thanks for your advice. The majority of things that would be ran on it won't be gaming, however the occasional thing would by that isn't too taxing.

I'll have a look at some of the 4 port cards, every one that I have seen appears to be 3, unless I went down the SLI route.

Thanks again!

R