What's a decent cheap dual monitor pci x16 graphics card for office use?

pandaking

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Feb 9, 2008
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Hi,

I'm looking for a cheap passive cooled style pci express x16 graphics card for office use that will support a dual monitor setup. There will be no gaming, just web browsing and word processing.

Both monitors are currently VGA however I might upgrade to a pair of DVI monitors in the near future. Ideally I would like to support this now, so perhaps a monitor with dual DVI ports which I use VGA adapters on for now?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapphire-11166-02-20R-5450-DDR3-Graphics/dp/B0036DD4CO/ref=sr_1_2?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1380059346&sr=1-2

I spotted the above card on amazon, which seems very popular. I'm not sure it will support the dual VGA or dual DVI setup however? Looking around these forums there's mixed reports on this matter.

Alternatively, this appears to be the cheapest card I could find which lists AMD's Eyefinity technology, so I would assume this one would work:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapphire-11190-02-20G-HD6450-Retail-Graphics/dp/B004WYV8Z6/ref=sr_1_2?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1380060110&sr=1-2&keywords=6450

Any suggestions would be very gratefully received.
Many thanks.
 

Pallimud

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Nov 30, 2010
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That 5450 will work fine but you'll need an adapter to make the HDMI into a DVI or the VGA into a DVI. They aren't expensive on amazon though.

So what you'll do is have one DVI cable going from the DVI of the card to Monitor 1. Then get an HDMI cable from the card into Monitor 2 (with an adapter). That'll work just fine.