Widescreen Gaming Forum

Hi all, this forum was recommended to me as the place to find out all about various multi-screen set-up, so I thought I'd run a few ideas by you all. I do mainly audio and video work and would like a three monitor eyefinity set-up that would also do for light gaming.

For this I'm planning to get the Asus HD 6670 Silent Edition card and 3 x Samsung SyncMaster E2220N monitors. My main concern with this set-up is that the card has 1 HDMI, 1 DVI and 1 VGA output and the monitors only have a single VGA input. I propose to use 2 adapters to convert the HDMI and DVI outputs to VGA.

Will I be able to use a simple HDMI to VGA cable for example to achieve the necessary conversion?

Some brief research has told me it not be as easy as this and that it might be simplest to get a a monitor with the right inputs but the Samsung is exactly what I'm looking for and is a great price, is there a reasonable way to make this set-up work?

How much light gaming? E.g. what titles?

In my rig, my OC'd 6850 has issues with many recent titles @ "only" 5200*1050. DX9 titles can be run fairly high, but many recent titles need cut down graphics to keeps framerates decent. Your proposed setup would have a less powerful GPU, in addition to another 1/2 megapixel or so monitor space to render.

If in your financial cards, I would consider at least a 6800-series GPU brick for *1080p Eyefinity. One way or another you'll need to sacrifice game graphics quality for increased FOV.

Hey, thanks for the reply. I only really own 3-4 titles including GTA4, Half Life Orange Box and Fallout 3 as my current card is just a HD4670 (PASSIVE). Any card I get would need to be passive and I know that limits my gaming a little but like a I say my needs are reasonably light. I wouldn't mind running newer games on just one screen if needs be, the 3 screens are more for my audio/video work in which screen real estate is a big help. Just wondered if it would do for a few games as well.

I'm more concerned about the adapters and various inputs needed to make this work well.

hum.... i'm not sure about the HD6670. But the High end Cards like HD6970 can only run TWO Displays from DVI, VGA and HDMI. Outputs!
So you need to put the third monitor with an Adapter from Displayport output.

IDK how they made it with the HD6670 because it has no Display port. guess it has 3 outputs and 3 display pipleines behind so it should work without a problem.

The adapter problem is when you have a Displayport to HDMI adapter! Because if you have an Passiv adapter. the GPU gives already a HDMI signal out of the Graphics card and not a Display port signal! so you cant use HDMI port anymore. But i think you don't have this problem here becaus there is no Displayport Output ;)

I Guess it should work. But no guarantee.

_________________
We gonna send it to outa space!

Interesting, I do think the Asus HD6670 is a bit odd as it one of only a few I've seen with eyefinity but no display port output. There is also the HD5450 from XFX:

http://xfxforce.com/en-gb/products/graphiccards/hd%205000series/5450.aspx

Their product details seems rather contradictory though as the card has 1 VGA, 1 HDMI and 1 DVI but then lower down it states that at least one display port is needed for eyefinity to work. So I have no idea why a card which is capable of eyefinity would be released with no display port?

I'm not sure how that would work. You would be better off going with a slightly higher card, and make sure it has the right outputs. Also, the 6600 series is going to be a bit low for gaming. I really think the 6790 is where you should start for Eyefinity. What is your reason for picking this specific card? Any, why are you choosing those specific Samsung monitors with only VGA inputs? Why not pick a monitor with at least a DVI or HDMI connector?

I've gone for the HD 6670 as it's one of the highest performing passive cards I could find at a reasonable price. The samsungs were just chosen on price and size, the next ones up are £30 more each, which is almost £100 more for 3 of them. I'm still puzzled about the range of cards that offer eyefinity without displayport though, I've emailed a few of the companies that stock them so I'll hopefully get an answer back soon.

EDIT

It seems that after talking to a few of the sellers of these cards that a lot of them are mistakenly listing these cards as eyefinity capable when there are not, just the series of card generally is. It's looking more likely that I'll need something with display port and an an adapter.

there is no 6670 FLEX version ? i thought there was a low budget Flex arround.... was it the 5770 ? or the 6790 ?

(Flex version of AMD Cards are capable of giving out 3 Monitors with 2xDVI + HDMI and you don't need Displayport)

_________________
We gonna send it to outa space!

I can only find a 6770 FLEX card

or a 5770:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/1gb-sapphire-hd-5770-flex-pci-e-21-(x16)-4800mhz-gddr5-gpu-850mhz-800-cores-2x-dvi-hdmi-dp

There don't seem to be any passive ones though.