4 or more monitors

Fisheagle · July 27th, 2002, 01:27 AM

I plan on getting into some serious day trading and would like to build a system that can handle 4 to 8 monitors.

Can anyone tell me what VC can handle up to 8 monitors.

Fish

Kruzin · July 27th, 2002, 01:36 AM

Matrox makes the best multi-monitor cards around, but nobody makes a single card that will drive 8 monitors.
Their new Parhelia AGP card will run 3 CRTs or 2 DVIs.
G200MMS and G450MMS PCI cards are available in 2 or 4 monitor configurations. G450MMS is not available yet, but should be out in the next month or 2.

With a combo of a Parhelia+G200MMS, you could get 5-7 displays, or a couple of MMS quads will do 8 (and more can be added, if you ever need more displays).

http://matrox.com/mga/buy_matrox/buy_mms/home.cfm

Fisheagle · July 27th, 2002, 01:43 AM

Thanks Kruzin,

I like the MMS dual quad idea.

Fish

I just found this site:
http://www.multiplemonitors.org/Page...o%20cards.html

Peter M · July 27th, 2002, 09:28 AM

Yes, while it CAN be done with four dualhead Radeon 7000 too, you'll be better off (especially in Windows) with as few cards as possible. G200MMS should be fine.

Watch for Windows 2000 quirks when you attempt that - this OS has some odd restrictions on multi-head operation.

regards, Peter

Fisheagle · July 27th, 2002, 09:52 AM

Thanks Peter M.

Kruzin · July 27th, 2002, 11:20 AM

Yes, Win2K had some issues with dualhead cards. But that is only with single-chip, dual output cards. Matrox fixed those issues in their drivers, and to date are still the only dualhead cards that work properly under 2k.

But these issues do not apply to multiple cards, or cards with multiple chips. Matrox MMS cards are multi-chip (one G200 chip per output..basically 4 cards built onto one PCB), so those issues with win2k never affected the MMS cards.

Stone17 · July 27th, 2002, 11:29 AM

Fisheagle,

I have 1 question?? Why in the hell would you want 8 monitors for?? Hahahaha!!!! I, myself, think that 2 is enough, and even then that may be too much. Just my opinion. Whatever pulls your trigger!!

Kruzin · July 27th, 2002, 11:38 AM

He told you in his first post why he wants multiple monitors.
Daytrading.
Most daytraders use 4 or more displays, in order to keep a keen eye on all that's constantly happening in the market.

Fisheagle · July 27th, 2002, 02:47 PM

I have been told that daytrading with multiple monitors is almost as good as sex. I can't wait... But I sure have a lot to learn first.

I think I just wiped out Amazon's daytrading book section.

Fish

July 27th, 2002, 03:19 PM

Right now I'm on my built last night computer with 2 15" LCDs on a G450. Matrox is very good, but with XP pro I'm still working out a refresh rate difficulty. The monitors support 75 Hz, but they want to default to 70 Hz. XP seems to have issues with refresh rates, so it seems. The Matrox software wanted to spread the desktop across both monitors as one screen. I used the native XP support for multimonitors to have it more like NView.

If you can, I'd suggest using LCD flatpanels. Expensive, but worth it.