Hi all,
Long time reader / first time poster. My question is partially answered in a LOT of posts, but never exactly, so I'm hoping someone can help me out.
I'm spec'ing a system primarily for coding, video, and graphics work, but will also use it for gaming. I have a Precision T7600 on order with 2x E5-2630s. The RAM, SSDs, and graphics are to be ordered from NewEgg.
My current setup has 7 monitors connected to a Radeon 5770, 5450 and a USB to DVI adapter. Of course I want to keep all 7 on the new setup. For gaming I only use my 2560x1440 primary monitor (with Windows desktop extended across all).
I went with ATI on the old machine because they had better multi-monitor support back then, but now to my understanding NVIDIA should be OK for this config.
For gaming performance, would I be better off with 2 cards in SLI with all 7 monitors between them, or a single higher end card with just the primary monitor connected, plus two additional low-end cards to drive the 6 ancillary monitors?
To be clear, what I'm calling the "primary monitor" will be the only screen used for 3D rendering/gaming, and will also happen to be the Windows desktop main display. The other 6 only have the requirement to display text/2D graphics.
Or, overall will NVIDIA not play nicely with this setup, and if not should I stick with ATI? (The only reason I'm going for NVIDIA is that they seem to have a better price/performance ratio).
Any other thoughts or recommendations are appreciated. I'm looking to spend $500 ($600 tops) on graphics hardware.
Thanks in advance,
Scott
Edit: In case anyone was curious, this is before I got the 1440 screen:
Long time reader / first time poster. My question is partially answered in a LOT of posts, but never exactly, so I'm hoping someone can help me out.
I'm spec'ing a system primarily for coding, video, and graphics work, but will also use it for gaming. I have a Precision T7600 on order with 2x E5-2630s. The RAM, SSDs, and graphics are to be ordered from NewEgg.
My current setup has 7 monitors connected to a Radeon 5770, 5450 and a USB to DVI adapter. Of course I want to keep all 7 on the new setup. For gaming I only use my 2560x1440 primary monitor (with Windows desktop extended across all).
I went with ATI on the old machine because they had better multi-monitor support back then, but now to my understanding NVIDIA should be OK for this config.
For gaming performance, would I be better off with 2 cards in SLI with all 7 monitors between them, or a single higher end card with just the primary monitor connected, plus two additional low-end cards to drive the 6 ancillary monitors?
To be clear, what I'm calling the "primary monitor" will be the only screen used for 3D rendering/gaming, and will also happen to be the Windows desktop main display. The other 6 only have the requirement to display text/2D graphics.
Or, overall will NVIDIA not play nicely with this setup, and if not should I stick with ATI? (The only reason I'm going for NVIDIA is that they seem to have a better price/performance ratio).
Any other thoughts or recommendations are appreciated. I'm looking to spend $500 ($600 tops) on graphics hardware.
Thanks in advance,
Scott
Edit: In case anyone was curious, this is before I got the 1440 screen: