Eyefinity - multimonitors from ATI (done right)

[Lonyo]

Eyefinity:

• ?Up to 6 displays from one card.
  ?Driver alignment correction (adding pixels to account for bezels)
  ?Span or individual monitors
  ?Option to set up groups of monitors (e.g. 2 monitors as one "screen" and 4 as another)
  ?If a game pulls resolutions from Windows, then it should be supported in-game.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3635

AT's preview of the new feature from AMD/ATI is up, and boy am I surprised at how it operates.
I've been waiting for something affordable and sweet like this since I started spanning across dual monitors with my 7800GT, and the last place I expected it to come from was ATI.
Both NV and Matrox have had (to a degree) almost solutions with DualView and Dual/TripleHead2Go, but ATI seems to have hit the nail on the head for me, especially with 3 monitor support from a single card.

Basically ATI has me sold on their new cards just through this feature, and if it works as easily as AT implies, then it's horribly horribly sweet and horribly overdue, but much welcomed by me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzGtxlaPQqY
Video of it in action.

http://www.brightsideofnews.co...mpixels-7680x3200.aspx

http://www.brightsideofnews.co...a-single-computer.aspx
24 monitors hooked up to a single PC

http://www.brightsideofnews.co...finity-technology.aspx
Sweet 5760x2160 6-monitor display setup that may be coming to a store near you before the end of the year.

 

[Tempered81]

"resolution being rendered at is 7680 x 3200; WoW got over 80 fps with the details maxed"
"I played Dirt 2, a DX11 title at 7680 x 3200 and saw definitely playable frame rates."


geez.... CFX 60,000P vantage, 43 fps Crysis 1920 4xaa, 16xaf, dx10 veryhigh, and now WoW max details 7680 x 3200 80fps....

 

[SlowSpyder]

Originally posted by: Tempered81
"resolution being rendered at is 7680 x 3200; WoW got over 80 fps with the details maxed"
"I played Dirt 2, a DX11 title at 7680 x 3200 and saw definitely playable frame rates."


geez.... CFX 60,000P vantage, 43 fps Crysis 1920 4xaa, 16xaf, dx10 veryhigh, and now WoW max details 7680 x 3200 80fps....

Definitely sounds like there is some horsepower under the hood. :Q

 

[Idontcare]

I'm loving the prospects of 6 monitors driven off of one graphics card, but the geeky loven starts on page two and we all know the first application isn't going to be video games - not that AMD cares who in particular buys their first holodeck products:

Carrell believes that in seven years we can have the first generation Holodeck up and running. For those of you who aren't familiar with the Trek reference, Carrell believes it'll take seven years to be able to deliver a 180 degree hemispherical display (you're not completely surrounded by displays but at least your forward and peripheral vision is) with positionally accurate and phase accurate sound (both calculated by the GPU in real time). The GPU will also be used to recognize speech, track gestures and track eye movement/position.

(hint: adult entertainment industry)

 

[Bateluer]

This is the coolest thing I've seen all day. Might have to replace my 4870 512M with one of these and pick up a few more panels while I'm at it.

 

[alyarb]

there are a lot more important barriers to that technology other than simply processing capacity(@ Carrell).

 

[fleshconsumed]

I wonder if this works in both D3D and OpenGL, or if it matters at all. Would be nice to get 360 degree FOV in FPS games with three 24" monitors. No one will ever be able to sneak up on me again. Too bad most online servers restrict FOV settings.

 

[MarcVenice]

Wow anandtech really went all out on the preview. I must say they showcased Eyefinity a lot more in the US then they did in London. I wonder how every1 in the US responded when those 24 monitors were shown. I know there were quite a few oo's and aa's when they pulled the cloth from the 6 monitor-setup in London.

For me, I'd prolly be picking up 1/2 more 20/22" monitors. I wonder if it'll play nice with my HDTV though.

 

[Idontcare]

Marc what was your impression of the visual presence of the LCD frames bisecting the image horizontally in the 6-screen setup? From the photos it looks annoying to me, but maybe real-life impression is different.

 

[OCGuy]

I thought 2 monitors was a niche, but more than 2?

 

[aka1nas]

LCDs aren't that expensive anymore, most of the reasons setups like these are niche still is due to lack of good software support.

I use triple display setups at both work and home, it's quite usable.

 

[MarcVenice]

Originally posted by: Idontcare
Marc what was your impression of the visual presence of the LCD frames bisecting the image horizontally in the 6-screen setup? From the photos it looks annoying to me, but maybe real-life impression is different.

In my own article I mentioned problems with the hud, that can sometimes end up at the bezels, so it will stretch over 1/2 screens. That's a bad thing, but AMD said they'd be working on that with gamedevs.

As for the bezels, the screens shown in London had 7mm bezels, so times two thats 1,4cm. From a distance it looked okay, up close I think it could get annoying. I only flew around for a couple of minutes though. Some pressguys quickly agreed that three screens might be the sweet spot, or well, maybe 4/5 screens in a row. But 3x2 might indeed suck because of the bezels.

 

[ElFenix]

i wonder if it works with mismatched monitors? say a 24" in the middle and 2 20s on the side?

 

[MarcVenice]

Originally posted by: ElFenix
i wonder if it works with mismatched monitors? say a 24" in the middle and 2 20s on the side?

Don't qoute me on this, but I think it is, yet AMD didn't want to go into detail. I think it'll get messy and it'll be a bit harder to get working properly. Thing also is, you can go full screen with 2 20" and 1 24", because the 24" is much higher, so it will no longer work. You should be able to have 3 diff images on all three screens though.

 

[aka1nas]

Originally posted by: MarcVenice

Originally posted by: Idontcare
Marc what was your impression of the visual presence of the LCD frames bisecting the image horizontally in the 6-screen setup? From the photos it looks annoying to me, but maybe real-life impression is different.

In my own article I mentioned problems with the hud, that can sometimes end up at the bezels, so it will stretch over 1/2 screens. That's a bad thing, but AMD said they'd be working on that with gamedevs.

As for the bezels, the screens shown in London had 7mm bezels, so times two thats 1,4cm. From a distance it looked okay, up close I think it could get annoying. I only flew around for a couple of minutes though. Some pressguys quickly agreed that three screens might be the sweet spot, or well, maybe 4/5 screens in a row. But 3x2 might indeed suck because of the bezels.

I already do triple screen gaming with Softth, the bezels aren't that big of an issue. You start tuning them out after a few minutes of gaming. For some games (i.e. space shooters, flight sims, mech' games) it just looks like part of a cockpit and blends in just fine.

Edit: Not sure how ATI will handle this, but Softth lets you optionally program in the bezel width in pixels so that the image doesn't appear to "jump" from display to display. I.E. I have 3x 1920x1200 displays, so my combined resolution is 5760x1200. If I add the bezel padding (say 120 pixels), then my effective resolution would be 6240x1200.

 

[vmsein]

After watching Eyefinity technology demonstrated in the following Youtube video, I am totally blown away by the possibilities awaiting an average consumer in just a few short weeks! It seems that ATi will be delivering something truly exciting to the graphics arena well ahead of the competition, and I think this will be very well received by enthusiasts all around. Kudos ATi!
Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzGtxlaPQqY

 

[thilanliyan]

Damn it where are the 58XX benchmarks!!!??? Don't tell me this event was just to launch this Eyefinity thing. :|

Was this the event on the aircraft carrier?

 

[imported_Shaq]

Matrox will lose a bunch of money with this. No need to spend $300 on a triplehead2go that only outputs to 3 monitors and needs software support.

I hate all the bezels blocking the image. I would rather have a 50" 1080P 120hz LED TV with at least 2x2 supersampling (3840x2160) mounted on the wall. It would be much more immersive. For non-gaming it would be okay though. I wonder if it would be better if the bezels were broken off. Is there any screen blocked out by the bezels like with CRT's?

 

[WelshBloke]

:shocked:Holy shit.

This is what I've been crying about on forums for years now. If this works the way they say then thats my new card.

 

[plonk420]

Originally posted by: Tempered81
"resolution being rendered at is 7680 x 3200; WoW got over 80 fps with the details maxed"

i wonder if that's with shadow quality high or not, also in Dalaran or at LEAST IF/Darn or Ogr/UC or even Outland. FML i haven't even see Northrend yet.

Originally posted by: thilan29
Damn it where are the 58XX benchmarks!!!??? Don't tell me this event was just to launch this Eyefinity thing. :|

Was this the event on the aircraft carrier?

effing seconded. i'm getting pissed and antsy.

Originally posted by: OCguy
I thought 2 monitors was a niche, but more than 2?

if you've been using 2 monitors as long as i have, 2 seem normal and second nature. 3 i've briefly used, but haven't gotten used to yet.

 

[ShadowOfMyself]

Originally posted by: Shaq
Matrox will lose a bunch of money with this. No need to spend $300 on a triplehead2go that only outputs to 3 monitors and needs software support.

I hate all the bezels blocking the image. I would rather have a 50" 1080P 120hz LED TV with at least 2x2 supersampling (3840x2160) mounted on the wall. It would be much more immersive. For non-gaming it would be okay though. I wonder if it would be better if the bezels were broken off. Is there any screen blocked out by the bezels like with CRT's?

Yeah I hate it too, totally ruins the idea... They should make special monitors for this kind of thing

 

[dflynchimp]

The mockup of the merged six monitor setup at the end of the article looks promising, but couldn't they just completely remove the bezel in between the monitors and just have a ring of bezels around the thing?

Another thought is that a single LCD monitor can use up to 100W of energy, so with 6 of these things we have 600W powerdraw. Add to that the electricity needed to run a rig with enough horsepower to run this baby and you have some serious juice being drawn out of the outlet.

 

[Hauk]

I'm thinking of what's to come. Recall the original Alien movie.. remember the size of the room where they went to interface with "Mother?" Instead of useless blinking lights, imagine screens angled all around you with a powered chair and hands free (retina scanning or the like) controls.

What's in the box is cool, what it can do is much cooler. This is great stuff..

 

[nitromullet]

Originally posted by: plonk420

Originally posted by: thilan29
Damn it where are the 58XX benchmarks!!!??? Don't tell me this event was just to launch this Eyefinity thing. :|

Was this the event on the aircraft carrier?

effing seconded. i'm getting pissed and antsy.

Agreed, while Eyefinity is cool, it's a massive let down when you're expecting an actual launch. Eyefinity would be just as cool in addition to benchmarks and details about the new ATI cards.

 

[aka1nas]

Originally posted by: dflynchimp
The mockup of the merged six monitor setup at the end of the article looks promising, but couldn't they just completely remove the bezel in between the monitors and just have a ring of bezels around the thing?

Another thought is that a single LCD monitor can use up to 100W of energy, so with 6 of these things we have 600W powerdraw. Add to that the electricity needed to run a rig with enough horsepower to run this baby and you have some serious juice being drawn out of the outlet.

LED-backlit screens can alleviate both of those issues.