both my older and brand new Sapphire 5770 come with two DVI, a DPI
port , a HDMI . So you are saying use one of the DPI ports with an
adaptor to power the third monitor . so now I guess I could support
up to six 24 monitors. I never thought of this. I always thought
three large monitors need three cards.
At 11:50 AM 3/19/2011, you wrote:
Unless something has changed, the last I knew, xfire mode disables the
second card's outputs.
well back in 8/08 when I built this I had two Asus 4970s which had
terrible fans. The first 4970 fan died in six months, was replaced by
Asus and died in 48 hours, was replaced by ASUSand died in week. (
all of this taking a couple of months) After that I gave up with ASUS
and used a third party cooler but by then the chip had over heated so
many times the card died before a year was out. I replaced it with my
first 5970 in 11/09. The second 4970s fan died shortly after that,
and that one I immediately put my own Masscool fan on and it has been
OK. But it runs hot and is too large in the case and gets in the way
of everything. I needed two 4970s for three DVI ports and when both
4970s were running, I occasionally used crossfire for gaming. I was
told they had to be the same chip and I had to use the dongels.
When I got the 5770 to replace the bad 4970 I didn't realize it would
support three monitors. Which is why, last week when I saw I could
pick up a second 5770 up for 95 bucks I bought it thinking it would
run cooler, take up less space and allow me to use all three monitors
in gaming. I am not by any stretch of the imagination a gamer, but I
thought it might be interesting to try.
If I use a single 5770 for three monitors I assume I would use the
two DIV ports, and a DPI port with a DVI adaptor for the third
monitor? This would have enough processing power for three desktops?
If I go ahead and install the second 5770 card, I could then dongle
them for xfire to run three monitors for single view 3
monitor gaming ... correct? But it is a hassel to switch the desktop
back and forth, which is why I thought dual booting, one standard use
and one xfire use.
and for HDMI output to my TV I could do that off both of the cards?
So Windows 7 as a second boot is going to do better in Vista for
three monitor gaming?
How exactly would you set this up Greg
Thanks
The 5770 should have 3 digital outputs by itself
though (DP and 2x DVI is the reference design), so I'm not sure why you
would even bother using a second card just to handle mundane output. You
could then, however, xfire the two 5770's together, and even use eyefinity
for games that don't explicitly support multi-monitor.
Dump Vista.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email protected] [mailto:hardware-
> [email protected]] On Behalf Of Winterlight
> Sent: Saturday, March 19, 2011 1:32 PM
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: [H] Gaming in Vista or Win7..does it matter?
>
>
> I have a 3 monitor setup.... one 30 and two 24. I run Win7 Pro 64 bit. My
> previous OS was Vista 64 and when I upgraded to 7 I did a clean install,
but
> kept Vista on a separate partition and now I dual boot. I always like a
second
> OS in case something goes wrong. It makes it very easy to tell if I have a
> hardware or software issue, or if things go south I can keep working until
I
> have the time to deal with it.
>
>
> I have been running a Sapphire 5770 for the 30 inch and a ASUS 4970 for
the
> two, 24s. I just picked up another Sapphire 5770 so now I have two near
> matching video cards. I am not going to change anything in my primary
setup
> other then to replace the too big, too hot 4970, but I am thinking about
my
> Vista setup as Crossfire. That way I can boot into it to play games, and
> hopefully, I can play across the three screens... or is this not doable? I
am not
> a gamer particular but this might be interesting.
>
> Is Vista 64 just as good for multi monitor gaming, or just gaming in
general, as
> Windows 7 Pro 64? Or would I be better off removing Vista and installing a
> clean Win7 64 Pro?... or maybe 32 as more compatible?
>
> Does anybody know if I still have to use the connecting dongle(s) to
support
> Crossfire in a 5770 setup? thanks
