Dell 30" & Dual Link

Jock

Jock

Jock

Associate
Joined
27 Mar 2008
Posts
967
Location
Darlington
I'm buying a new system and some time in the near future I'd like to get myself a real nice setup for my monitors but havent quite decided. Its either a case of buying one 30" dell and using a small 24" I already own for my second monitor, or instead to get two 27" dell.

Now the problem is I want to make sure that whatever hardware I buy in the new computer will be compatible with my choices and so far i've been looking at either the 680 or 7970. I've noticed on the 30" dell it says that to get the full resolution you need to have dual dvi. Now excuse my ignorance but does that mean i need to ensure the card has two dvi slots?

The monitor is mainly for work and will be great for that, though when i game on it will I hot problems due to the large resolution?

Thanks
 
A resolution over 1920x1200 can only be done over dual-link DVI and displayport and theoretically over HDMI 1.4 although I haven't seen a monitor use that.

Dual link DVI isn't two separate plugs it's just a slighty different plug with more pins, wikipedia has an image showing the differences.
 
Ah ok, so its a specific port that I need to check the gfx card has then.

Thanks for the help.
 
You also need to think about GPU memory size when playing games at maximum resolution. I play BF3 on my 30" and it uses just over 2gb on high settings. I have gtx580s in SLI and they cannot quite manage ultra settings smoothly. You might need a little more punch than a single 680 if you want games to run at top spec, perhaps a couple of 670s would suit you better, depending what games you plan to play of course.
 
I was trying to stay away from sli just due to the fact it wont really help me at all for my work using 3dmax, but at the same time i will be gaming as well and youre talking about the likes of BF3, Borderlands 2 and then RTS.

What I really need is two seperate computers, one for gaming and one for work, but too short on space so will need to wait till i get an office.

Out of curiosity is it the DEll 30" youve got?
 
ive got a dell 30inch and jst about to upgrade from gtx480 sli to 7950 cf because of vram issuses,i would recomend ati for that res as i think you would run into vram probs with gtx670/680 within a year when new games are released,the 7950 are a steal at today prices
 
Yeah I've got the Dell U3011 with an i7-2700k (4.4ghz) and GTX580 3gb in SLI. High settings are fine at max res on BF3 but ultra is pushing it a bit too far. I did have 1.5gb 580s previously in SLI but the lack of VRAM was an issue.

Have a look at the 4gb nvidia cards (670 in sli or a single 690 would be more than adequate for ultra settings on BF3 but is going to cost). I'm not experienced with AMD cards so couldn't say what is any good, but I'm not sure why you'd have any VRAM problems in years to come with a 4gb card.
 
derv said:
perhaps a couple of 670s would suit you better, depending what games you plan to play of course.
Click to expand...
The 660Ti is (or soon should be) a lot cheaper and offers almost the same performance, a lot if not all manufacturers are discontinuing their 670 cards in favour of the 660.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom