advice on setting up quad or 8-monitor computer for dad

[satyan]

my dad needs 8 monitors for a show he's going to, and he wants each display to be playing a 1 minute long video clip on repeat. he has the option of renting 8 monitors w/dvd's built in, but would prefer to buy a setup that works best for him.

can someone give me some advice on where to look to find a pre-built (or at least MOSTLY pre-built - i'll do whatever extra is needed, like adding a 2nd video card or whatever) system at a reasonable price? there are "trading systems" out there, which are more expensive that i'd like to pay. if you dont have any ideas, can someone suggest a not-too-expensive computer that i can modify by adding the proper video cards, and what video cards would those be?

ideally, i could find a computer (or 2 computers if necessary) from dell or something that i can purchase, that can output to 8 monitors without lag issues. obviously, ill look for the 8 monitors and corresponding stands.

THANKS SO MUCH!

 

[skittle]

what resolution are you running the monitors at?

you can get a PCIe card, and 3 older PCI cards
and run 2 monitors from each card.

 

[satyan]

they can run pretty low, could prob run at 640x480 each honestly. just want to show a video in full screen on each of them.

so that setup you're talking about - it means buying some dell desktop, and then installing 3 PCI video cards into it as well, for a total of 8 outputs? would i run into lagging issues with the different videos playing at once?

 

[SpeedyVV]

Hey satyan, take a look a Digital Tiger: http://www.digitaltigers.com/index.shtml

You can look at the Stratosphere workstation's details to get an idea of how to put together such a setup.

good luck

 

[skittle]

lag? i wouldnt expect there to be any lag... 640x480 is pretty easy on a cpu... just make sure you get a modern computer.... a PIII might not do the trick.