So I dropped the Radeon HD 5870 into my primary production PC. While I was pretty intrigued by its potential 3D performance in games, I was more intrigued by its ability to support three displays.
I know a number of power users (who are not financial analysts or programmers) who use three displays. But using more than two monitors had several requirements I considered problematic. You either had to have two graphics cards, a special workstation card (that wasn’t always a good 3D card) or some type of DVI or VGA switcher, like Matrox’s TripleHead boxes.
All those introduced complexities I didn’t like. I just wanted one card with good 3D gaming performance that supported more than two monitors – and wasn’t a dual GPU card. Now I’ve got it.
There’s been a lot of copy written in the past month on ATI’s Eyefinity capability. Eyefinity is a combination of hardware and software to enable multiple displays. The key feature ATI has been touting is using multiple displays – up to six – as a single, large surface, what ATI dubs “SLS” or “Single Large Surface”. That’s all well and good, but it’s not quite the panacea ATI makes it out to be.
Consider the setup I just built.
Three Monitors, Different Orientations
Strategies for Three Display Setup
What you see is a Dell Ultrasharp 3008WFP in the center, surrounded by two Gateway FPD2485W monitors. The Dell has a DisplayPort connector, which is a critical component to this setup. More on that in a moment.
The strategy I used is what probably many users will do. Most people won’t go out and buy three brand new displays, although you’re starting to see the occasional three monitor package deal. What most users are likely to do in a similar situation is to buy a DisplayPort equipped monitor, then sub in one or two displays they have in their homes already.
In my case, I’ve had the two Gateway monitors for several years. These are actually pretty decent, S-PVA panels – a cut above what Gateway is selling these days. I’d been eyeing the Dell 3008WFP, but didn’t want to pay the full $1699. Recently, Dell had a $300 off special, so I pulled out my tired credit card one more time and sprung for it.
I did make one compromise: I swapped out my rather bulky AudionEngine 5 speakers for a set of Creative Labs Gigaworks T3′s. The T3′s, with a little tweaking, sound almost as good as the A5′s — and do offer deeper bass.
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Michael Hughes says:
October 5, 2009 at 2:52 pm (UTC -7 )
If I had the cash, I would craft a very similar set-up. That looks insanely productive. Having just one monitor sucks.
David Johnston says:
October 5, 2009 at 3:31 pm (UTC -7 )
In Windows 7 are you able to able to adjust the pixel orientation of “ClearType” independently on each display? I had a similar setup with Vista, but abandoned it as I couldn’t stand the blurry text on the portrait monitor. The “ClearType Tuner” (designed for XP but functional on Vista) allowed the weight of the text to be changed but not the pixel orientation, let alone the pixel orientation for each monitor independently. The Gnome Desktop allows the pixel orientation to be changed, but again not for each monitor independently (as far as I could tell).
Loyd Case says:
October 5, 2009 at 3:53 pm (UTC -7 )
Yes, you can adjust ClearType on a per-display basis.
David Johnston says:
October 5, 2009 at 5:47 pm (UTC -7 )
Sorry Loyd I wasn’t very clear. The ClearType Tuner has always worked on a per-display basis, but there was no option to change the pixel orientation.
ClearType exploits the fact that an LCD pixel will always have its vertical elements in the order of: red, then green then blue. (Apparently some monitors will have: blue, then green, then red.)
[R][G][B]
When a monitor is rotated clockwise the pixel elements will lie horizontally and the pixel orientation is then:
[R]
[G]
[B]
Or anticlockwise:
[B]
[G]
[R]
Or even through 180 degrees (not likely to be ever needed—one could imagine mounting a non-swivel monitor to the underside of something):
[B][G][R]
In either case the assumption made by ClearType about the location and orientation of the three colour elements of each pixel of the display is incorrect if the monitor is rotated away from the first landscape position.
I’m sorry that I’ve harped on about this, but this lack of support wasted a few hundred dollars and many hours of my time. I’d be so happy to know that ClearType now acknowledges the orientation of the monitor.
YS says:
October 5, 2009 at 6:38 pm (UTC -7 )
I just want to say, a 20″ 4:3 at 1600×1200 monitor works almost perfectly in portrait orientation with a 30″ monitor. It has the same resolution height that way (1600 pixels) and *almost* the same physical height.
Reading what you wrote though; does that mean to enable 3 monitor gaming, I have to let Windows’ Taskbar span the entire 3 screens? I’m not too keen on having the Start Button on the far left…
Loyd Case says:
October 5, 2009 at 7:12 pm (UTC -7 )
I’m not entirely sure; the ClearType tuner on Win7 does make the text on the portrait displays considerably less blurry, if that helps.
Loyd Case says:
October 5, 2009 at 7:13 pm (UTC -7 )
That’s my understanding of how it works — if you treat three displays as a single surface, the task bar spans all three. I haven’t hooked up three displays of similar resolution to the 5870 to see how it hangs together with their software. IIRC from their demos, the start button is to the extreme left.
Jeffrey Obney says:
October 5, 2009 at 9:49 pm (UTC -7 )
I can spot my twitter icon from across the room. Thanks for taking the time to help me while you were busy.
CarrellK says:
October 6, 2009 at 12:01 am (UTC -7 )
I hate to say I am green with envy, but I am. I have all this stuff at work, but haven’t had the time to build out something for me to use. At some point I need to stop and smell the roses. Or pixels as it were.
David Johnston says:
October 6, 2009 at 5:32 pm (UTC -7 )
Thanks for you help Loyd.
You sure are living the dream there!
David.
Alejandro Hernandez says:
October 7, 2009 at 12:32 am (UTC -7 )
I use dual displays for few years now, but this is what I always want, normally I use 2 LCD monitors on the 2 DVI ports of my card and a tv on the component add-on, ofc never could have the 3 displays at the same time, but when I want to use a big screen I swap the secondary display for the TV. but this is like what I need.
Wich port is the primary on that card?, one of the 2 dvi, that display port or the HDMI?. Another question do cards loose performance when use more than one display?.
Josh Youngberg says:
October 7, 2009 at 8:47 am (UTC -7 )
I first heard you talk about running multiple monitors in portrait mode on the TR podcast. Looks like it turned out great for you. I’m really jealous right now.
Loyd Case says:
October 7, 2009 at 9:43 am (UTC -7 )
The DisplayPort connector seems to be the primary connector. I don’t see a performance loss in 2D; in 3D (games), I just use the center display.
Mike Lin says:
October 7, 2009 at 2:52 pm (UTC -7 )
I have a similar setup with Dell 3007WFP and 2x 2209WA. All IPS. 20″ side monitors would be ideal, but I couldn’t find a current, in-production 20″, 1600×1080, pivoting display – that isn’t a TN panel. The (lack of) vertical viewing angles with TN panels become more of an issue when they are pivoted into portrait mode, as the colour shifts across the horizontal plane become more apparent. MVA or IPS is really the way to go.
http://picasaweb.google.ca/mikelin88/TripleMonitor#5311773953410714722
The 30″ is run off a ATi 4850 and NV8800GT for the 22″‘s. I’m shocked how well Win7 (build 7100) handled the cross-branded video cards, two sets of drivers, no problems whatsoever.
A physical tweak I use is to tier and overlap the side monitors slightly behind the main screen, so I only “see” one set of bezels.
Tim Verry says:
October 7, 2009 at 4:20 pm (UTC -7 )
Interesting idea Mike, i would have never thought to do that!
YS says:
October 7, 2009 at 9:10 pm (UTC -7 )
Mike, the Dell 2007FP should still be available. It’s a 1600×1200 20″ monitor. I’m using its predecessor 2001FP in that manner.
I also know there’s an LG 20″. Not sure if it pivots though.
Mike Lin says:
October 8, 2009 at 8:38 am (UTC -7 )
Interesting – I hadn’t thought to look at a 4:3 monitor, with everything pretty much widescreen these days. 1600×1200 would provide even more real estate.
Lloyd – do you think there’s any cpu/graphics card combos that could run h.264 1080p movies fully stretched out across all 3 monitors at full frame rate? That sort of thing brings my system to its knees, but I don’t have the latest and greatest stuff.
Loyd Case says:
October 8, 2009 at 9:11 am (UTC -7 )
All the displays would need to be the same resolution, so you can group them into a single surface. But why would you want to? The bezels would be annoying. (Though for a video wall, that could be interesting.)
I think the newer GPUs, plus a good CPU, can handle it… but haven’t tried it.
Max Heim says:
October 13, 2009 at 5:42 pm (UTC -7 )
Heck, I used to run 3 monitors on my Mac Quadra 700… bonus if you can remember what year that came out…
David says:
October 18, 2009 at 9:20 am (UTC -7 )
I am considering the ATI 5870/5850 and will be running 3 HP LP2475W monitors. I am wondering if I can use the middle monitor as the main monitor and the other two monitors as extended desktop space? Is it possible to just use this new ATI 5870/5850 with 3 monitors in normal extended desktop without grouping the monitors into one large display? I really just need the capabilities of 2 normal graphics cards, but would love a single card solution.
Thanks,
David
PS. When you maximize windows on a normal extended desktop, do the windows just maximize to the screen they are on? What I am hoping is that I will have the option to just use extended desktop, where the applications will maximize just to the screen they are on, and as well, when I want to use a “single” large display spanning the 3 monitors for google earth, photoshop or other programs , I can easily switch over to Eyefinity.
David says:
October 18, 2009 at 9:41 am (UTC -7 )
Also, with the new 5870/5850 does anyone know if this card along with Windows 7 will allow independent ICC color profiles to be assigned to a total of 3 monitors. My assumption is that only one ICC profile will be applied to the primary monitor and that profile will be shared with the other two monitors. If in fact it is possible to use three separate ICC profiles at the same time, then I could calibrate all three monitors which would be really cool…having one color calibrated display is enough, but it’d be a nice perk if the new cards can manage this…
Loyd Case says:
October 18, 2009 at 12:06 pm (UTC -7 )
Yes, you can use three monitors in standard Windows extended desktop mode. In fact, that’s how I originally set up the three display system in the article.
When you maximize a window (when you’re running in extended desktop mode), it simply maximizes to the current display. If you’ve got them grouped into a single surface, it maximizes across all three.
There’s a secondary consideration — ATI’s Hydravision software, that allows you to configure multiple desktops. I need to explore that a bit more.
Loyd Case says:
October 18, 2009 at 12:07 pm (UTC -7 )
I believe you can have separate profiles for separate displays, though that seems to confuse Photoshop a bit.
David says:
October 21, 2009 at 4:59 am (UTC -7 )
Hi Loyd,
I just spoke with ATI GPU support, and they told me that the new 5000 series cards have 3 DACs with 3 LUTs, so they have the ability to load an independent ICC profile for up to 3 monitors. He mentioned that the older generation ATI cards supported Dual LUTs, and now the new generation cards are moving forward with that in mind.
Would you be able to confirm that these new graphics cards are supporting 3 LUTs by successfully loading an independent ICC profile to each of your 3 monitors?
Many Thanks,
David
Tamra Redic says:
October 28, 2010 at 1:05 am (UTC -7 )
very good article and Nice support article.
james cortez says:
December 17, 2010 at 8:29 am (UTC -7 )
im doing 3 monitor just have to wait for the hdmi cable i ordered and ill have two 17in monitors with a 19 inch:D
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