In our prior Eyefinity article , we took you inside of AMD’s new multi-screen technology, implemented throughout the ATI Radeon HD 5000-series GPU line. We examined the output pipelines within Eyefinity-enabled cards, touched on the use of passive and active dongles, introduced DisplayPort connectivity, and saw the many ways in which Eyefinity display groups can be configured with AMD’s Catalyst driver software.
That’s all a necessary first step, but Eyefinity technology doesn’t work in a vacuum. We cringe at using the marketing buzzword “ecosystem,” but that’s really what something like Eyefinity requires—an ecosystem of hardware manufacturers and software developers taking the Eyefinity idea and fleshing it out with things you can actually use and interact with. Of course, that begins with the graphics card, including everyone from Asus to XFX. AMD has gone out of its way to promote triple- and six-display Eyefinity configurations, but there’s more to consider than monitor counts.
At the top-end (as of this writing), there’s AMD’s own ATI Radeon HD 5870 Eyefinity 6 card, featuring six Mini DisplayPort connectors sitting pretty in a row down the length of the two-slot card’s edge. At the mainstream, you’ll find cards like Asus’s EAH5750, another two-slotter, but this time with only one full-size DisplayPort connector sandwiched between an HDMI port and two DVI ports. The trick is to watch the specs, because cards like these will only output to three ports despite having four physical connectors.
In fact, buying a mid-range card doesn’t guarantee Eyefinity support. Recall that Eyefinity requires the use of at least one DisplayPort connection. It makes sense that cards in the 5400-series might omit DisplayPort, both for price point and target demographic reasons (low-end card buyers typically aren’t setting up three or more screens). The same also seems to be true in the 5500-series. Most cards here still don’t support Eyefinity—yet—despite the presence of other performance features, including premium cooling.
Nevertheless, there are now dozens of Eyefinity-enabled cards on the market. For the rich and infamous, there are the dual-GPU HD 5970 juggernauts, such as the $749 HD597F2GDGC from HIS. At the opposite extreme, a few, like PowerColor’s AX5450, slide in under $50. We’d never recommend this card for gaming, but if your needs are focused on using Eyefinity for productivity, it doesn’t take much to get up and going.
That begs the obvious next question: Once you decide on a card, what exactly does it take to get up and going with an Eyefinity rig? That’s what we’re going to explore in the following pages.

You aren't using FF + ADblock Plus?
Can't wait until all the kinks are worked out!
It's right above the comments section, to the right of "Share," amongst a ton of tiny little icons
If you compare a $200 TN w/out DisplayPort to a $500 IPS w/ DisplayPort, you are comparing apples to oranges. The Amazon price of $220 for a TN w/ DisplayPort is more representative of pricing.
I am not sure if this is limit on DELL only, but as far as I read neither ati 4xxx or 5xxx grapahic card and neither any widely available LCD supports more then that which is quite pitty.
Even more disapointing is that DHCP working only over single DVI link (1920x1200 max) on DELLs and probably others as well.
ckim2116
From the article: http://support.amd.com/us/eyefinity/Pages/eyefinity-software.aspx
Alas, I'll be waiting on the next-gen cards and monitors in hopes that prices drop and availability increases. I'd also like to see the proposed standards mentioned within this article actually go into effect, as well as see adoption of display port grow and the technology itself mature.
Lastly I hope stands adopt a standard that supports landscape-landscape-landscape, portrait-portrait-portrait, and any combination in-between. Having to go out and buy 3 cheap VESA mounts, some metal tubing and round-bar, then get to cutting, bending, and welding my own stand together sounds like a fun project, but I'd rather just buy a mass-produced one.
Edit: I meant portrait-portrait-portrait...
Two questions remain for me that I couldnt filter out from these articles by skimming through them:
1. Why do we need a display port again? I thought the whole point of HDMI was to introduce a digital standard that works with everything TVs Digital signal processors, PCs. Now that most monitors, graphics cards and even some motherboards are starting to support HDMI they come out with a new format... (dot dot dot)
2. Why does the 5800 series need a display port? why couldn't it have 3 DVI-Ds? So far I haven't even seen a single monitor that has displayport.
the TDMS streams that the card can currently push is 2... That is for what I have heard some timing reason between 3 cards and that each TDMS stream supports 2560x1600p. If there was a way to trick the card and go over 1920x1200 then in the future, if you could plug in an adapter that said I will only output in 1920x1200 and lower, then the extra bandwidth of not supporting 3 displays at the 2560x1600 goes away and if you do the math, that leaves enough timing open to allow you to plug in a displayport to single output DVI and run three cards without an active dongle..
As it says in the article display port can support touchscreen signals, usb, 7.1 audio and rapid changes in resolution,refresh rate and colour depth and a higher resolution than HDMI due to higher bandwidth. Think of HDMI as 4inch Goodyears on an Aston Martin, and Display port as 12inch Pirellis.
You aren't using FF + ADblock Plus?
Careful on using car analogies, last time i did that the nerds got angry.