3x PCI-E x16

[rooch84]

Hello,

I'm in the processes of putting a display wall together. Ideally I want to power 15 monitors from three Eyefinity 6 6870 cards. I don't *think* I'll benefit from Crossfire, so my questions is...

Can I use the ASUS Crosshair V Formula 990FX and have all three cards run in x16 mode?

If not, what are there any motherboards that will let me? I'm not restricted on processor type.

Many thanks.

 

[vrumor]

Dont believe it works that way. If you have multiple vid cards in your system, cept for running a physx card, theyll need to be crossfired or SLIed. Cant use 3 cards for 5 displays apiece if that makes sense.

 

[simon12]

That board can run 3 cards at 16/8/8x which is fine but not all 3 at 16x. I am no expert but I think you are correct you need 3 x infinity 6 cards not in crossfire and you can run up to 18 monitors. I don'y think this will work for gaming or anything as some games have trublr with the drivers/software for 4 monitors, but if you need them for something else it should be fine. Out of interest what are you planning to do with them. Also there are Eyefinity 12 cards that exist which may be a better option and if you can live with only 12 monitors I think it will work better, especially has I don't see how 15 monitors in 3 sets of 5 really works.

 

[rooch84]

Dont believe it works that way. If you have multiple vid cards in your system, cept for running a physx card, theyll need to be crossfired or SLIed. Cant use 3 cards for 5 displays apiece if that makes sense.

Thanks for the reply. My understanding is the Crossfire is used for for using multiple cards for rendering graphics, a 2nd crossfire card may not necessarily output to a monitor.

I understand that I'll have 3 Eyefinity virtual displays (one for each card), but will performance be reduced if I'm running 16x, 8x, 8x?

What about this card?

http://www.ebuyer.com/243948-asus-crosshair-iv-extreme-rog-edition-890fx-socket-am3-extended-atx-motherboard-crosshair-iv-extreme

Cheers

 

[rooch84]

That board can run 3 cards at 16/8/8x which is fine but not all 3 at 16x. I am no expert but I think you are correct you need 3 x infinity 6 cards not in crossfire and you can run up to 18 monitors. I don'y think this will work for gaming or anything as some games have trublr with the drivers/software for 4 monitors, but if you need them for something else it should be fine. Out of interest what are you planning to do with them. Also there are Eyefinity 12 cards that exist which may be a better option and if you can live with only 12 monitors I think it will work better, especially has I don't see how 15 monitors in 3 sets of 5 really works.

1. Ill want to run a Unity3D application, but I can accept it will either only run on one display group, or I'll try something like SoftTH (http://www.kegetys.net/SoftTH/). I may also run multi-window desktop applications or custom made OpenGL apps in CGLX or VRJuggler.

2. Something like this:

22233
11133
11133

So display 1 will be a tidy 3x2 arrangement.

3. I saw in an Eyefinity 12 card in posts dated 2010, but can't find anything on the market.

Cheers

 

[simon12]

That board can run all 3 at 16X I was looking at the 990FX version but there is almost no performance hit running them at 8X. Thats about all I can tell you. Good luck with it though.

 

[rooch84]

Best answer selected by rooch84.