2 Video Cards at one time, (ATI and NVidia)

[Lord Banshee]

I got to know, who has got dual graphics cards working form different companys to work with one monitor on each card.


For example:
A PCI-E Nvidia Geforce 6800 series and a ATI X800 series

Even with Two of the same type 6800 and 6800 for example (NOT SLI), how do you specify which card/monitor goes to what screen? Do you still apply a primary monitor?

This is what i want to do, i want to run my CAD programs on my AGP 6800NU->QuadroFX and want to run my games on (either a 7800GT or X1800XL(depending on result)). Just do not know how windows will take advantage of this.

I guess it would be easier to just set the 7800GT/X1800XL montior as the primary and just move my CAD application to the 6800->Quadro monitor as Games are usally full screen and Application are windowed.

Do you agree or have any thought about this?

 

[Lord Banshee]

*bump*

wow nobody has tried this?

 

[aatf510]

It should be ok if you are using cards from the same company. ATI and Nvidia drivers don't tend to work too well when installed together at the same time.

 

[rbV5]

I've done it many times with AGP+ PCI, and you simply pick which card drives what display in the drivers or display properties. I don't know why 2 PCIe cards would be any different.

I'm using the Xpress200 + X800XL in PCIe and it works the same way. My MB only has a single PCIe slot, so you would need at least 2 PCIe slots and the 2 PCIe graphics cards to really give it a try...which I don't presently have.

 

[geofftate]

those cards are both ATi, however... have you done AGP/PCI with one nVidia and one ATi card? My primary AGP card is a 9800 Pro and I'm now looking to throw in a second card, which would need be PCI. the 5700LE seems to be the best PCI card still avail, but would the nVidia drivers conflict with my ATi? the best PCI ATi card I can find is only a 9250, which is even worse, so I'd prefer the 5700LE, if it'll work. thanks

 

[sheElf]

I believe u can only do it with motherboards with nforce4 pro chipset, these motherboards have nforce 2200 and 2050 and each chip has it's own pci-e, review from gamepc. just to brief you a little bit, it is a dual-cpu workstation motherboard, to enable secondary chipset (2050) u need to have two opteron processors, it requires registered RAM and eps12 with 24 pin PSU.

there are only two mothereboard i have seen with this chipsets one from tyan (k8we) as link above and another from supermicro wich is only for oem. for k8we, stuff that are connected to secondary chip are the second pci-e, a set of usb2 and slave nic.

and yes i have one of these k8we and love it, but i have 2 gtx so i dont have any experience with 2 different cards from different vendors.

 

[sheElf]

http://www.gamepc.com/labs/view_content.asp?id=thunderk8we&page=5

sorry, it wont let me edit previous post

 

[geofftate]

thanks for the reply, but you're describing an SLI PCIe config while we're talking about a much more simple setup of two monitors with one card per display. the original poster was inquiring about a setup with two PCIe cards (nVidia+ATi), while I'm asking about an older AGP & PCI setup (nVidia+ATi).

btw, I've been searching and finding many reports of successful ATi+nVidia pairings. sometimes it's a little hit or miss with which cards play well together, but overall I don't seem to be finding many driver conflicts. I'm referring to AGP+PCI, not the original question re two PCIe cards; I'm not sure if that would be different, but I don't see why from a software perspective.

thanks again