Triple screen GPU

C14N

Well it's that time of year again. I planned on doing this last summer but only got the money at the end and at that point I was off to college again so I'm a bit out of the loop. My current card is a GTX 560 Ti and it does the job but it's starting to show it's age, especially with recent games made for the PS4 and Xbox One.

I remember being mad keen on Eyfinity/Surround when it was first unveiled a few years back but it never did seem to work very well with the tech at the time. When I was looking at setups last summer though it did look like it had improved a lot so I want to finally go in.

It seems like dual GPUs are the way to go in this case. In preparation for two cards last year I did buy myself a new Corsair 850W PSU that can handle 3 of them so I should do fine with the two. My current board is an ASRock Z77 Pro-3 which is able for Crossfire, although not SLI. I wouldn't let this affect the decision too much though, I'd be fine switching this one out if nVidia were much better.

Budget is about €600 for the two cards but with a bit of wiggle room. I don't need insanely good results on every game, I'm usually fine with 30-40 FPS and I don't mind turning it down a little on really demanding games.

It looks like the 280X is the card to get in this price range but it's hard to find any benchmarks that put two of them together for Eyefinity. They generally seem to have about 3GB of RAM, would this give me what I'm looking for?

Alternatively, which current nVidia cards measure up to this? Like I said, I'm not too pushed on keeping the motherboard if it makes sense to get a new one.

ShadowHearth

You played already in surround? Or that just something you sow/heard about, it looked cool and you want it.

Ill be honest, I really always wanted 3 monitor setup. I got myself gtx 680 back in the day, a card which was able to run games in surround with lower settings. I got 3 monitors and fired it up. Played for few hours and gone back to 3x1080p monitors with no surround. My dream that I had for years was meh.
So moral of the story: if you can, try it out somewhere before going 3 monitor setup. Its not for everyone. It sounds a lot cooler on paper then it actually is.
I had 3 monitor setup for years, but I never used surround. I started to use it a lot more lately , because I got myself g27. Racing sims in surround - Oh god yes please!

If for general gamin, then I would advice you getting 21:9 ratio monitor with 2560x1080 resolution. It gives that extra view on the sides and is not so taxing on your GPU.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-006-AO&groupid=17&catid=1120
In most games you will look only at your main monitor in surround setup, in 99% cases it will be easier to move your mouse less then an inch then move your head, lose focus, then refocus again on main monitor.

C14N

ShadowHearth wrote: »

You played already in surround? Or that just something you sow/heard about, it looked cool and you want it.

Ill be honest, I really always wanted 3 monitor setup. I got myself gtx 680 back in the day, a card which was able to run games in surround with lower settings. I got 3 monitors and fired it up. Played for few hours and gone back to 3x1080p monitors with no surround. My dream that I had for years was meh.
So moral of the story: if you can, try it out somewhere before going 3 monitor setup. Its not for everyone. It sounds a lot cooler on paper then it actually is.
I had 3 monitor setup for years, but I never used surround. I started to use it a lot more lately , because I got myself g27. Racing sims in surround - Oh god yes please!

If for general gamin, then I would advice you getting 21:9 ratio monitor with 2560x1080 resolution. It gives that extra view on the sides and is not so taxing on your GPU.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-006-AO&groupid=17&catid=1120
In most games you will look only at your main monitor in surround setup, in 99% cases it will be easier to move your mouse less then an inch then move your head, lose focus, then refocus again on main monitor.

I've seen it at a friends house and like the look of it. I get that it's really just extending the vision and the centre one is the same though. In any case though, I did want to just have 3 monitors for general use as well as games and if I decide to just use the 1 then I'll have a really cracking setup for games on that.

ShadowHearth

C14N wrote: »

I've seen it at a friends house and like the look of it. I get that it's really just extending the vision and the centre one is the same though. In any case though, I did want to just have 3 monitors for general use as well as games and if I decide to just use the 1 then I'll have a really cracking setup for games on that.

Problem is, that some games make the tits of it. Like BF3 had main monitor as you would normally and the side monitors in very stupid angle. It was completely useless. Some games make a great use of it, like racing sims or world of tanks. You get proper side view of your screen with full detail.
I found surround in most games distracting or pointless. In most cases its easier just to move mouse a bit. I found really uncomfortable to jump-view from one monitor to other as every single time eyes have to refocus. specially in fast paced games.

Having 3 monitors even if you only use one for gaming is still great. I play on one, movie/show on second one and third one for Vent and website that is handy for current game ( map for DayZ for example ). I know I will sound like a broken record now, but I would go for 21:9 ratio monitor as main and 1-2 secondary for random stuff.

EoinHef

Cant comment on the experience of surround gaming as ive never used it but as regards pushing enough pixels for that kind of resolution there are no cards out there atm that would be better than a pair of R9 290's. Should handle anything barring 4K,which is turning out to be a monster in terms of the performance needed to run graphically demanding games

A pair would be about €140-150 over your budget with delivery though,could always buy 1 and save for awhile longer for a 2nd one. Or see if you can grab a pair on special/sale to bring it closer to budget

Id go with cards with at least 3GB of vram. Higher resolutions really like a lot of vram.

280X is a decent card just not great value at the price/performance ratio there at now imo,they should be fine to run 3 screens though

Laviski

best to have triple screen plus 2 screens on top for video and the other for other stuff - maps..

jackoire

C14N wrote: »

I've seen it at a friends house and like the look of it. I get that it's really just extending the vision and the centre one is the same though. In any case though, I did want to just have 3 monitors for general use as well as games and if I decide to just use the 1 then I'll have a really cracking setup for games on that.

I have a triple monitor setup, It seemed great until I actually start playing games. Shooters or any game you need pinpoint accuracy, single monitor is so much better. Sims like racing or flighing is really immersive for that first person view and is who I'd recommend it for. Fps shooters are a no go for me, the general feel of movement just didn't feel right for most games. Also you need to use fixes to get games to work correctly.

My new 21:9 monitor is ordered and i'll finally get that wide screen feeling in FPS games without the triple monitor issues. A 21:9 monitor and a cheap or old secondary monitor for background programs. That way you get the immersion and productivity.

The Surround Gamer

If you do go with a triple-monitor setup, make sure to go with three 16:10 monitors in landscape orientation. Using three 16:9 monitors in a landscape orientation will seem too 'stretched' because of the lack of vertical real estate vs. 16:10 monitors.

deceit

ShadowHearth wrote: »

Problem is, that some games make the tits of it. Like BF3 had main monitor as you would normally and the side monitors in very stupid angle. It was completely useless. Some games make a great use of it, like racing sims or world of tanks. You get proper side view of your screen with full detail.
I found surround in most games distracting or pointless. In most cases its easier just to move mouse a bit. I found really uncomfortable to jump-view from one monitor to other as every single time eyes have to refocus. specially in fast paced games.

Having 3 monitors even if you only use one for gaming is still great. I play on one, movie/show on second one and third one for Vent and website that is handy for current game ( map for DayZ for example ). I know I will sound like a broken record now, but I would go for 21:9 ratio monitor as main and 1-2 secondary for random stuff.

If you put the screens at the angles I have them at the strange views on the side screens on bf series and other games appears natural as it appears like peripheral views then. It really immerses you in the game then.

ShadowHearth

deceit wrote: »

If you put the screens at the angles I have them at the strange views on the side screens on bf series and other games appears natural as it appears like peripheral views then. It really immerses you in the game then.

My screens are under the angle, but I dont know which one is "correct". Even so, I dont like it and it is not worth the extra hit on performance.

I did loved proper surround in World of tanks and it was really helpfull. All 3 screens show normal view and in something like WoT, you really win from such a huge field of view.

C14N

EoinHef wrote: »

Cant comment on the experience of surround gaming as ive never used it but as regards pushing enough pixels for that kind of resolution there are no cards out there atm that would be better than a pair of R9 290's. Should handle anything barring 4K,which is turning out to be a monster in terms of the performance needed to run graphically demanding games

A pair would be about €140-150 over your budget with delivery though,could always buy 1 and save for awhile longer for a 2nd one. Or see if you can grab a pair on special/sale to bring it closer to budget

Id go with cards with at least 3GB of vram. Higher resolutions really like a lot of vram.

280X is a decent card just not great value at the price/performance ratio there at now imo,they should be fine to run 3 screens though

Hmm, well I did think I might have to go a little over budget. We'll see. PSU is capable of running 3 so I could even add a third one down the line at some point when they go cheaper.

jackoire wrote: »

I have a triple monitor setup, It seemed great until I actually start playing games. Shooters or any game you need pinpoint accuracy, single monitor is so much better. Sims like racing or flighing is really immersive for that first person view and is who I'd recommend it for. Fps shooters are a no go for me, the general feel of movement just didn't feel right for most games. Also you need to use fixes to get games to work correctly.

I don't really understand, are you just saying it hurts accuracy because of the performance hit? I mean the few games I saw generally just had the centre monitor exactly the same as with a single screen setup and the two others just used for extra peripheral vision. I don't play a huge number of FPSs or anything btw, honestly these days I'm more into strategy games and Civ 5 looks pretty darn good with the extra visible map.

Regarding the monitor setup, I already have two 24" 1080p monitors and another broken one that will hopefully be fixed soon so buying a 21:9 monitor or some 16:10 monitors would be much more expensive.

In terms of nVidia cards, it seems the GTX 770 is about the same price as the 280X. Is there much of a performance difference between the two?

DERPY DERPFACE

The 280x would be better than the 770. The 770's 2 gigs of ram is not enough for surround.

C14N

Anyone have any recommendations on which brand to go for? I'm looking on Hardware Versand and there are Club3D, Sapphire, XFX, MSI and Asus all in the same range. I usually just pick the cheapest but how do you guys decide which one to get?

jackoire

C14N wrote: »

Anyone have any recommendations on which brand to go for? I'm looking on Hardware Versand and there are Club3D, Sapphire, XFX, MSI and Asus all in the same range. I usually just pick the cheapest but how do you guys decide which one to get?

I avoid the single blower fans as there usally noiser. Saphire usually are best value and features. Asus triple slot cards nice for the extra money if you got room and the cash.

EoinHef

280X or 290? Sorry not sure what card you decided to go with.

Id be looking to take into account brand reliability,noise produced by the cooler and thermal efficency of the cooler of course. The latter being quite important if you plan to run 2 in CF on air.

If money was no object then the new Sapphire Vapor-X models are getting good reviews. There is a premium attached to them though,would also work well in CF from what i read.
A decent overclock on it takes its performance well past higher priced cards.


Heres a review that encompasses both 280x/290 vapor-x's:


http://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/zardon/sapphire-r9-280x-vapor-x-oc-and-r9-290-vapor-x-oc-review/

The 290 version may be a bit over budget if you definitely want two of them but one might be enough in fairness if you manage the settings in games.

If either is not on HWVS check Overclockers.co.uk,they should have them in stock. Or alternatively use geizhals.de to see what prices are on offer. Use geizhals to have a check no matter what card you decide to go for,usually the best prices

murphthesmurf

C14N wrote: »

Anyone have any recommendations on which brand to go for? I'm looking on Hardware Versand and there are Club3D, Sapphire, XFX, MSI and Asus all in the same range. I usually just pick the cheapest but how do you guys decide which one to get?

Get the new amd dual gpu card. Think it's the 295x don't know how much they cost though

murphthesmurf

murphthesmurf wrote: »

Get the new amd dual gpu card. Think it's the 295x don't know how much they cost though

Actually, don't. I just found how much they cost. Cheapest is 1200 euro. Thats harsh

C14N

EoinHef wrote: »

280X or 290? Sorry not sure what card you decided to go with.

Id be looking to take into account brand reliability,noise produced by the cooler and thermal efficency of the cooler of course. The latter being quite important if you plan to run 2 in CF on air.

If money was no object then the new Sapphire Vapor-X models are getting good reviews. There is a premium attached to them though,would also work well in CF from what i read.
A decent overclock on it takes its performance well past higher priced cards.


Heres a review that encompasses both 280x/290 vapor-x's:


http://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/zardon/sapphire-r9-280x-vapor-x-oc-and-r9-290-vapor-x-oc-review/

The 290 version may be a bit over budget if you definitely want two of them but one might be enough in fairness if you manage the settings in games.

If either is not on HWVS check Overclockers.co.uk,they should have them in stock. Or alternatively use geizhals.de to see what prices are on offer. Use geizhals to have a check no matter what card you decide to go for,usually the best prices

I was still just looking at the 280X ones but I'm sort of just asking generally. Thanks for the tip about Geizhals.de, they have some brilliant prices. Do all the products ship to Ireland though? And is there any way to view the site in English besides having to Google Translate everything?

The 280Xs are going for about €225-240 there which is much cheaper than I initially expected.

Looking at the 290s though they are only about €325-340 though and that is tempting. I'll have to consider my options and what else I might want to buy this summer.

EoinHef

C14N wrote: »

I was still just looking at the 280X ones but I'm sort of just asking generally. Thanks for the tip about Geizhals.de, they have some brilliant prices. Do all the products ship to Ireland though? And is there any way to view the site in English besides having to Google Translate everything?

The 280Xs are going for about €225-240 there which is much cheaper than I initially expected.

Looking at the 290s though they are only about €325-340 though and that is tempting. I'll have to consider my options and what else I might want to buy this summer.

Ive normally just used HWVS but through geizhals,mindfactory should deliver here if my memory serves me,there usually quite close to the top of the list also. One of the lads here bought 2 290's off them awhile ago i think. As regard the language barrier,not much i can help you with there unfortunately,it is a pain but the savings can be quite significant. Do you know anyone who speaks german?

Imho go for the 290 but just one,idea being that as prices come down and new cards are released you can pick a second one up down the road if needed,and really you might not need to. The 290 is designed for higher resolutions which is exactly what you are looking for,heres a benchmark that tests the 290 at higher resolution and triple 1080p monitors for games that support it,look for the benchmarks labelled 5760x1080,thats the resolution you would be running with 3 monitors

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/R9_290/1.html

Keep in mind the settings on the games,there mostly turned up in these benchmarks and with reducing a few you can get back some performance
and increased framerates. Also this review is from 5th November 2013 and is a reference design card,you would be getting an after market card so performance could be up to 10-15% better,especially if you buy one with a good branded cooler.
Also drivers have improved a lot since then for the 290 so there would also be a gain there also.

All in all its a great value card imo

C14N

EoinHef wrote: »

Ive normally just used HWVS but through geizhals,mindfactory should deliver here if my memory serves me,there usually quite close to the top of the list also. One of the lads here bought 2 290's off them awhile ago i think. As regard the language barrier,not much i can help you with there unfortunately,it is a pain but the savings can be quite significant. Do you know anyone who speaks german?

Imho go for the 290 but just one,idea being that as prices come down and new cards are released you can pick a second one up down the road if needed,and really you might not need to. The 290 is designed for higher resolutions which is exactly what you are looking for,heres a benchmark that tests the 290 at higher resolution and triple 1080p monitors for games that support it,look for the benchmarks labelled 5760x1080,thats the resolution you would be running with 3 monitors

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/R9_290/1.html

Keep in mind the settings on the games,there mostly turned up in these benchmarks and with reducing a few you can get back some performance
and increased framerates. Also this review is from 5th November 2013 and is a reference design card,you would be getting an after market card so performance could be up to 10-15% better,especially if you buy one with a good branded cooler.
Also drivers have improved a lot since then for the 290 so there would also be a gain there also.

All in all its a great value card imo

Good point, this does seem to mostly be able to pull out decent frames even with 3 screens by itself. I suppose even in worst case scenario I can drop to 1080p which it seems to have zero problems with. Still tempted to go all in though, I tend to do most of my gaming in summer since I usually don't have time when I'm in college and they probably won't release the next line until winter at least and that way I can still boost performance again by buying a 3rd card down the line (seems like multiple cards tend to give a bigger boost for multiple monitors).

I was planning getting the best prices from Mindfactory (they're also selling the monitor I want at a better price) because I thought their delivery is €30 like HWV but it's actually €30 "per package" and my order has 3 packages apparently so with €90 delivery it's looking less worth it. I'll check around a few of the Geizhalt websites and see what works best. I do know a bit of German myself but not much, the Google translation will get me by, it's just that it takes a few seconds on each page.

EoinHef

You would need more than the PSU you have now to run 3 cards,the TDP(Thermal Design Power) of the 280X is 250W but overclocked it will consume more. In some scenarios it could be drawing over 300W and you need to make an allowance for the other components in the system,especially if your overclocking the cpu.

Best case scenario 3 x 250=750W plus at least 100W for the rest of the system. That adds up to the rated capacity of your PSU thus you would be having issues,you need some headroom. Worst case scenario because of the res your supporting the cards draw more than 250W and you would be over the PSU rated capacity with just the gpus. Once under load the PSU would struggle badly. Overtime it would degrade and eventually fail.

The TDP for the 290 is even higher at 275W per card so that also would have to be only a dual gpu system,keep this in mind when making your decision.

NTMK

in my experince a 3rd card isnt worth the money the gains are fairly poor id use that money and go up a GPU tier or if your already thinking 290s just keep it

C14N

EoinHef wrote: »

You would need more than the PSU you have now to run 3 cards,the TDP(Thermal Design Power) of the 280X is 250W but overclocked it will consume more. In some scenarios it could be drawing over 300W and you need to make an allowance for the other components in the system,especially if your overclocking the cpu.

Best case scenario 3 x 250=750W plus at least 100W for the rest of the system. That adds up to the rated capacity of your PSU thus you would be having issues,you need some headroom. Worst case scenario because of the res your supporting the cards draw more than 250W and you would be over the PSU rated capacity with just the gpus. Once under load the PSU would struggle badly. Overtime it would degrade and eventually fail.

The TDP for the 290 is even higher at 275W per card so that also would have to be only a dual gpu system,keep this in mind when making your decision.

NTMK wrote: »

in my experince a 3rd card isnt worth the money the gains are fairly poor id use that money and go up a GPU tier or if your already thinking 290s just keep it

Ah right, guess it might be unreasonable so. I wouldn't worry about it though, two should be plenty for now!

Senanman

If your thinking 290s overclockers have 2 in clearance stock only £319.
Would get them quick.

C14N

Senanman wrote: »

If your thinking 290s overclockers have 2 in clearance stock only £319.
Would get them quick.

Thanks for the tip but just bought some yesterday off Mindfactory. They were €330 each which was even better. Surprised I got such a low price on them. Also came with 3 free games which was nice.

vibe666

I just got myself a Sapphire R9 290 TRI-X OC for £319 off amazon.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00HFA44YQ/

Skatedude

i've used both nvidia and amd for triple screen, and i found nvidia to simply work better for me. kept getting microstutter ,vsync and tearing issues with amd.

I wouldn't recommend dual chip cards as they have limitations over single chip cards. Bus bandwidth been the main one as well as gpu scaling with multiple cards as it can see each dual chip card as a crossfire/sli setup.
Dual cards is the best compromise as you can run with pcie gen 3 x16. adding a third card means you will be running one of the cards at 8x instead of 16 which again can cause microstutter.
Just my two cents.

EoinHef

C14N wrote: »

Thanks for the tip but just bought some yesterday off Mindfactory. They were €330 each which was even better. Surprised I got such a low price on them. Also came with 3 free games which was nice.

You bought a pair? Which model did you go for?

Nice price for all that performance:)

C14N

EoinHef wrote: »

You bought a pair? Which model did you go for?

Nice price for all that performance:)

I got the pair of XFX Double Dissipation 290s in the end. I checked out some reviews and they all said they got normal temperatures but were very quiet. Thanks for all the advice, I'll post up with how they perform once I get them for anyone else looking to go down this route.

EoinHef

Cool man,best of luck with them.

You bought at a great time,there was a shortage of those gpus due to crypto currency mining and AMD cards being better at it were being bought up all over the place leading to increased prices. Only a few days ago AMD announced they are now in a position to meet demand so were probably seeing the first signs of the prices cooling off a bit on the r9 series.

Link with the story for anyone interested:

http://www.maximumpc.com/amd_gets_handle_production_pricing_radeon_r9_graphics_cards_no_longer_inflated_2014

vibe666

some dude over at techpowerup posted a *rough* benchmark of Crossfire vs SLI on the 780Ti/780/290X/290 in SIngle/Dual/Triple/Quad configs at 4K (well, UHD but you know what I mean).

http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/crossfire-vs-sli-780ti-780-290x-290-x-dual-triple-quad.195818/

might be handy for anyone looking for multi-gpu configs to use at higher resolutions.

C14N

vibe666 wrote: »

some dude over at techpowerup posted a *rough* benchmark of Crossfire vs SLI on the 780Ti/780/290X/290 in SIngle/Dual/Triple/Quad configs at 4K (well, UHD but you know what I mean).

http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/crossfire-vs-sli-780ti-780-290x-290-x-dual-triple-quad.195818/

might be handy for anyone looking for multi-gpu configs to use at higher resolutions.

That is actually useful. UHD is a good bit higher than 1080p Eyefinity/Surround so if it runs well on UHD then it should be fine for me.

vibe666

I was thinking of going triple landscape with 24" screens or even 5 portrait (in the next couple of months anyway), but then I saw this bad boy and it's top of my list now.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-106-LG

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnrxNfxRK_4

significantly lower GFX requirements to run games well than a 4K/UHD screen (although, some older games might not run well (or at all) without tweaking) BUT almost as much real estate as you'd get, plus it's nice and wide, so you wouldn't need more than one. vertical screen size seems to be comparable with a 29" 16:9.

anyway, I'm in love so expect to see it here whenever they're actually available (which should be any day).

jackoire

vibe666 wrote: »

I was thinking of going triple landscape with 24" screens or even 5 portrait (in the next couple of months anyway), but then I saw this bad boy and it's top of my list now.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-106-LG

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnrxNfxRK_4

significantly lower GFX requirements to run games well than a 4K/UHD screen (although, some older games might not run well (or at all) without tweaking) BUT almost as much real estate as you'd get, plus it's nice and wide, so you wouldn't need more than one. vertical screen size seems to be comparable with a 29" 16:9.

anyway, I'm in love so expect to see it here whenever they're actually available (which should be any day).

I received mine on Friday and a very happy with it. It scratches my eyefinity fix without the hassle of bezels and fish-eye effect. It reminds me of the apple display without the glass finish.

I think 3x 1440p portrait or 21:9 1440p is the way to go. I don't know if I can go back to non widescreen gaming now.

I don't think I'd be happy with a 4k TN panel after trying 21:9.

ShadowHearth

jackoire wrote: »

I received mine on Friday and a very happy with it. It scratches my eyefinity fix without the hassle of bezels and fish-eye effect. It reminds me of the apple display without the glass finish.

I think 3x 1440p portrait or 21:9 1440p is the way to go. I don't know if I can go back to non widescreen gaming now.

I don't think I'd be happy with a 4k TN panel after trying 21:9.

That my next monitor too. 4k maybe more detail, but 21:9 is just more practical. I am in love with this new resolution and that size of minitor since that video launched.

799£ is a bit steep for me right now. I will have to wait until it drops in price or alternatives come out. Fair ****s to you for getting one of these bad boys!

vibe666

jackoire wrote: »

I received mine on Friday and a very happy with it. It scratches my eyefinity fix without the hassle of bezels and fish-eye effect. It reminds me of the apple display without the glass finish.

I think 3x 1440p portrait or 21:9 1440p is the way to go. I don't know if I can go back to non widescreen gaming now.

I don't think I'd be happy with a 4k TN panel after trying 21:9.

Where did you get it? everywhere seems to be pre-order.

jackoire

vibe666 wrote: »

Where did you get it? everywhere seems to be pre-order.

I got it on Amazon.de from Office Partner. They are the only ones that would deliver without extortionate pricing on .co.uk or .de.

Note : It came with an EU 2 prong plug, lucky I had an old plug with the right connection into the power brick (not the standard kettle lead).

C14N

vibe666 wrote: »

I was thinking of going triple landscape with 24" screens or even 5 portrait (in the next couple of months anyway), but then I saw this bad boy and it's top of my list now.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-106-LG

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnrxNfxRK_4

Ah well, I've got the monitors shipped now anyway. I was hoping to hang on to them for a few years until 4K becomes standard and then maybe jump to that. Sure we'll see over time.

vibe666

jackoire wrote: »

I got it on Amazon.de from Office Partner. They are the only ones that would deliver without extortionate pricing on .co.uk or .de.

Note : It came with an EU 2 prong plug, lucky I had an old plug with the right connection into the power brick (not the standard kettle lead).

feck it anyway, doesn't look like they have it at all now. I guess I'll just have to wait like a good boy!

C14N

Got it all setup anyway and it works well for the most part So far only tried out a few things with Eyefinity turned on and settings on max.



Civilization 5 works brilliantly. I just get some extra screen but it's nice to have more of the board in view.

Dirt 3 runs well but I can't seem to get it out of windowed mode. I never played it before getting these cards though so not sure who to blame there.

The Walking Dead Season 2 doesn't use the external monitors except during menus, runs fine though.

Bioshock Inifnite worked fine although I did notice some horizontal scan lines on the left and right monitors.

Tomb Raider 2013 looks great and feels really immersive, it's run smoothly with the settings maxed out. The only problem is that the cutscenes are kind of messed up. Ordinarily, it's supposed to give an option of "5750x1080 (Eyefinity)" in the resolution list but for some reason, when Crossfire is enabled this isn't available. The result is that while the game looks good, the HUD is missing and the in-game cutscenes are scaled for what looks like a 6-monitor setup so I only see the bottom half. Apparently this is a recurring problem in Eidos games and I'm not sure what the fix is.

By the way, does anyone know any free benchmarking software? Just something so I can see my FPS stats after I play.

EoinHef

C14N wrote: »

By the way, does anyone know any free benchmarking software? Just something so I can see my FPS stats after I play.

Looks good man:)

Fraps can be used for this.

I usually use the "eyeball" benchmark,as in have the framerate displayed in the corner of the screen and just keep an eye on it if i notice performance drops.


http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/benchmark-troubleshoot-game-performance-fraps/

This article has a good rundown of the benefits of fraps and how it works

C14N

EoinHef wrote: »

Looks good man:)

Fraps can be used for this.

I usually use the "eyeball" benchmark,as in have the framerate displayed in the corner of the screen and just keep an eye on it if i notice performance drops.


http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/benchmark-troubleshoot-game-performance-fraps/

This article has a good rundown of the benefits of fraps and how it works

I gave Fraps a go. Once again, I set all games to max settings running at 5888x1080 (with bezel correction) with AA set to 4x.

Battlefield 3 gave me no problems, managed to stay fixed at 60fps the whole time.

Tomb Raider varied from around 50-60 fps, dropping to about 40 during the cutscenes and shortly afterward. I contacted Eidos about this and I was initially basically told "tough shiite" but then they followed up asking for Dxdiag and msinfo files as well as screenshots to send on to their Montreal development office so maybe I'll get it working soon.

I ran the Bioshock Infinite benchmark and got an overall average of 57 fps. The min was 12 and the max was 358 :rolleyes: Fraps was giving me 50s and 60s the whole time though.

Anyway it seems that if anyone else was thinking of going down this route, this pair of cards should do the job nicely. One thing I have found is that while using Eyefinity, vertical sync tends to make the game look a lot smoother. With it disabled, while fraps was giving good numbers, the game still looked a little stuttery, but with it turned on everything was completely smooth.

EoinHef

The newly released beta 14.6 AMD drivers are supposed to bring improvements to eyefinity

Heres a link detailing the release notes