Software Configuration
Following ATI tradition, AMD uses the Catalyst Control Center (CCC) rather than a separate utility for configuring and managing all Eyefinity operations. Let’s say that CCC auto-detects that you have three monitors attached. These will show up in a row along the bottom area of the UI as disabled displays until you enable them. When you right-click a disabled display, you’ll have options to use that screen as a clone, make it the new active display in place of another, or extend a desktop onto it. Alternatively, pulling up the properties for a desktop group lets you select the total desktop resolution, color bit depth, rotation, and the refresh rate. The possible resolutions shown as options are based on the resolution modes for your monitors as detected by the driver.
One of your first tasks will be to create a display group by going to the CCC’s menu bar, clicking Graphics, choosing Desktops & Displays, right-clicking on the main display shown and picking Display Group > Create Group. If you want a group in portrait orientation, you’ll have to begin by rotating your initial display, then creating the group.
When you have three or more displays in a group, use the Select Layout option to pick a display group configuration. AMD’s drivers are smart enough to only display configuration options that are possible for your number of attached monitors. The CCC has a nifty shortcut in that if you pick a group configuration that matches the number of available displays, the drivers will automatically select all of the screens and lump them into a group for you.
In AMD’s marketing, you’ll find that all of the monitors shown in a display group are the same model. In the real world, this isn’t likely to be the case. You’ll probably have a mix of new and old displays you want to leash into a group and/or extended groups. You can use monitors with different resolutions, but Eyefinity will force all monitors in a display group into the lowest common resolution and orientation. Extended groups can be different resolutions, but obviously your main display group is the chief concern. Because you’re having to work with the lowest common denominator between the screens, this is why it’s always best to have your main display group comprised of identical screens.
If you’ve ever set up a multi-monitor config in the past, you know what a headache it can be to figure out which screen plugs into which port that’s seen as a given screen number by the driver, all of which you have to track so you can play musical monitors in the UI until the screens flow in the order you want. Eyefinity remedies that mess with a new wizard that runs for each new display group. In the UI’s main area, you’ll see a grid representing your monitor configuration. Your displays will black out, then the wizard will turn one blue. Just click on the grid cell for the highlighted monitor. The wizard does the rest, and you have a fully configured group in just seconds.
On the off chance that you need to regularly change your multi-monitor arrangement, be sure to create and save a profile for each configuration. You can even create a hotkey macro under the Activation tab to toggle between profiles.
