Three monitor question...

[samene]

I plan to buy a socket 775 motherboard and add a PCIe video card (not sure which yet). I need to drive three monitors. I tried this with my last (AGP) mobo and ended up putting in a second vid card (PCI). Does anyone know of a combination where a video card (perhaps the X1650PRO or the 7600GS) will drive two monitors without messing up the on-board video? Or is preserving the onboard video controller a waste of time? I don't do any graphics-intensive gaming (although I have a LOT of pixels to manage for video and photoshop and such).

Thanks

 

[vhx]

It depends on the motherboard. Some motherboards will have an Auto feature that will autodetect any card on the machine. Some will only let you choose 1 primary graphics adapter and may encounter conflicts if you leave the onboard on. And... sometimes with some newer computers, it will automatically disable the onboard video card as soon as it detects a new card in the machine. I'd check your BIOS or motherboard manufactuerer.

If it doesn't work you will have to use a PCI card with the PCIe.

 

[samene]

So you're saying that you have no knowledge of any specific motherboards and no knowledge of any specific cards? Since I have not selected a mother board nor have I selected a card I guess checking with the manufacturer could take quite a bit of legwork

 

[samene]

Anyone have any specific information?

 

[Slugbait]

Actually, I believe it's most (or all) current motherboards will auto-disable onboard video when dropping in a card. I think they're all jumper-less now.

Most AGP boards (older computers) also disable onboard video automatically, while some require setting jumpers to disable it. The vast recommendation was that you should disable to avoid conflicts, and/or enable hardware acceleration on the card.

And if I remember correctly, nearly all PCI boards required setting the jumpers to disable.

 

[rbV5]

ATI and Nvidia both have onboard solutions that support additional graphics card without disabling the onboard graphics. I use a MSI RS480M2-IL myself and have driven a 17 LCD with the onboard RS480 grahics (cut down X300 level DX9) and any PCIe dual head for the other 2 monitors. (I tried several ATI cards, all worked fine)

With my particular MSI solution the onboard is anlog only (VGA), the LCD runs in a reduced graphics mode (16bit color at native resolution) which I use for web browser, coding ect. The additional PCIe graphics runs as any dual graphics to drive a pair of monitors.

There are newer solutions that support DVI via the onboard, ATI also has an older chipset that supports additional graphics with AGP rather than PCIe. Nvidia solutions started with the 6100 chipset IIRC.

Manufacturers will enable some or all of the feature set, so shop carefully. I was disappointed with my RS480's inability to drive the 17" CRT at 32 bit color at native resolution, and that it would not support onboard VGA + TV out concurrently which limits its use as an HTPC solution.

 

[samene]

Thanks all