Anyone know of a motherboard that runs amd-k8 and has more than 2 x16 slots? I.E. doing >4 monitors, not SLi. The only ones I can find reference to are built by intel :-/
Well, you can have two pci-e graphics cards in your computer, and not run them SLi. That way you can have 4 monitors Also, you can get yourself a couple of pci cards if you just want lots of monitors
Sorry if I wasn't clear enough: I was wondering about ways of doing *more* than 4 monitors. T'would be nice if all of them were DVI, too. I have heard vague reference to people putting more than two pci-e graphics cards in one box, and I was wondering if anyone knew what motherboard they were doing it with. I say pci-e because its a lot easier to find cards that have dual dvi and support 16x12 lcds than for plain old pci
Well, dual SLI isnt out yet, so it might be hard to get that. But of course there are ways. Nothing that I can help with tho.
afaik dual sli would still only run 4 monitors in non-sli mode--- are you referring to dual-core sli where they piggyback 2 cards together for each of the sli pair?
If you want lots of monitors, forget about SLI, that currently supports only 1. If you run the 2 cards in normal mode you can get up to 4 monitors. If you want more, add PCI grafic cards.
The Quadro NVS440 that Mr. Tad mentioned is quite pricey at $429.00 . Especialy when you are needing 2 to give you 8 VGA outputs. (4x DVI to 8x VGA via adaptors) Another option for $419.00 is the ATI FireMV 2400, with 4x DVI outputs. But it is PCI. I would ask if you really need more then 4 DVI monitors. I mean if you are running only 2D graphics there are specialized solutions commonly found at banks and brokers, but be aware that both of the cards mentioned are workstation cards and really not intended for gaming. If you are not interested in gaming then a card from Matrox might be what you are looking for. Just another option.
you can pick up the quadro NVS cards on ebay for peanuts, I got my NVS280 for a mere £35 If you want more than 4 screens capable of gaming on, youll be restricted to a handful of boards that have >2 PCI-E x16
Gigabyte quad-royal is the only 'desktop' board that I know of, with 4 slots. Plenty of server boards have a few x16 slots, but youre looking at serious money
Well after hunting around, I really wasn't able to find any server class motherboards with 4 x16 slots. And those with 2 x16 slots are pricy enough, although very sexy. The gigabyte quad is the only one I could find easily, and after looking at a few reviews it might not be the way I would go. I'm still not sure why the OP would need so many screens and is set so solidly on PCIe. I'm very familiar with the "I just want to" mentality, but the gigabyte board doesn't seem like a very stable way of setting up 8+ screens, even using ultramon. If I were dead set on going this route, I would have to decide if gaming was a priority or just the "I have 10 monitors" was. For gaming I would have to stick with the Matrox solution, as it allows your graphics card to just see one really big monitor (3840x1024) and the triple head takes care of splitting the resulting image between the 3 screens. Get 2 and you have 6 screens. But if you are staying away from gaming then the standard workstation cards designed for multi-monitor are perfect, even if they are PCI or VGA. Especialy using Ebay (which I neglected to search, sorry Mr Tad) if the prices are that low. 70 pounds for 2 of these cards is a steal. The truth is, everything over 4 monitors is going to move you into a hard place as far as price point is concerned. High quality 2D hardware for multi monitor is expensive and so are the screens. Move up to full 3D and it just gets ridiculous.
