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Tom's Hardware Reviews Multi-Display Gaming
MikShapi writes "Most gamers out there today own a dual-head graphics card (most of us completely neglecting the second port), and games such as X2 are offering support for this already (at least on nVidia cards, due to the "span" driver feature). Tom's Hardware did a nice rundown on the technology, complete with screenshots and benchmarks."
Meh, Seriously..... People are saying how cool this is but multidisplay gaming was being done on my Mac Quadra 840av back in 1989 or 1990 with an application galled Hornet by Graphic Simulations. We had three displays hooked up that could dynamically display front and side views as you moved the plane throughout its axis making virtual air combat much easier. Hornet was apparently written for the Mac natively, but later, when Graphsim decided they were going to write for Windows first and then port the Mac version, we lost the ability to do multidisplays even though the Macintosh had been supporting multiple displays since 1987.
Granted, at the time, a Quadra 840av with three fast NUBUS video cards and three displays were decidedly not cheap, but my point is simply that this is nothing new and when the original Graphsim creators of Hornet included this feature, they knew this was the right way to do it just like the more sophisticated simulators that pilots use for their training.
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I had multi-display gaming on my Mac ten years ago. Chuck Yeager's Air Combat. I set the second monitor to always show the rear view, so if any MiGs or Messerschmitts started tailing me, I'd see it immediately. IIRC, the game would let you put a different view on as many monitors as you had.
Hell, one of my friends managed to get DOOM working with three displays on his PC back then, too, though it took him a day or two to figure it out-- mine was just (as you'd expect on a Mac) plug and play.
I found that continually turning my head right to left to view both screens put a real strain on my neck.
I tried moving back from the screens but I really couldn't find a "sweet spot" and eventally gave up.
I always save my last mod point to mod up a good troll. You people are too serious.
My wife and I both have had dual monitor setups for quite sometime. A lot more applications have picked up on Photoshops approach and implemented the floating tool bars or break away menus, allowing you to have your controls and clutter on one desktop and your canvas on the other.
More of the programing suites are supporting this as well. Its about time games started to come around. We would buy almost any game that would supports this feature in an attempt to push the feature into the mainstream.
I think you would be wanting one of the Parhelia cards from Matrox Graphics. I'm sure some /. readers remember them. They're the company that refuses to die in the face of Nvidia and ATi, because they also sell other stuff in other markets.
Google for "Matrix Parhelia" to read the reviews.
Michael C. Hollinger
I got kind of excited when I saw the DC mockup showing extra info on the additional monitor, and disappointed when I saw it wasn't possible (I have an Nividia dual-head setup so I pretty much knew that).
But BF1942/DC could really use this, as could any FPS that involves a lot of secondary display info (maps, sensors, multiplayer chat, etc). I think that'd be a great step forward.
A triple screen where you actually get a broader field of view would be amazing, although I won't hold my breath. Plus the desk space is a pain -- I have a custom-built desk I made specifically to hold 2-3 21" displays and it still feels cramped. Unfortunately the money for 3 x 21" LCDs just isn't there.
Zaphod had 2 heads.
With the nVidia drivers allowing you to span, games like EverQuest already support multi-monitor. I play EQ in 2560x1024x32 and it works out pretty well, letting me split the character information across the screens. And, honestly, you never really look directly in front of you that often, heh, so the screen split isn't that bad.
doom -devparm -net 3 -left
doom -devparm -net 3
doom -devparm -net 3 -right
Done this a few times, works best if you have 19" monitors, roomate got seasick playing it. But he couldn't play Descent without getting nauseas either.
Atari tried to put this technology into arcades, with Race Drivin' Panorama. There were 3 and 5 screen versions, but only prototypes existed. Check some nice photos and specs here and here
I believe Tom's Hardware itself showed a photo of someone playing Quake 3 on three screens when he reviewed the Matrox Parhelia card (which can drive 3 monitors). This was in 2002. Here is the relevant page. and Here is another one
Since I got a second monitor at work, I run the programming environment (Anjuta or XEmacs) on the first screen, and the help browsers (like DevHelp, or Galeon with the apropriate web pages) on the other window.
Mail, Media player (for some music) and normal internet browsing go to virtual desktops.
I'm sure that having a second monitor to provide extra game info is probably way cool, especially with games like flight sims and driving sims. But how many people really have two monitors?
I bought 3 Hitachi 17" Flat Panel displays just for that purpose. I powered them with a Matrox Parhelia. (Screenshots here, here, and here.
For Flight Sim'ing, the experience is just OK (at best). And that's only if you turn down the settings quite a bit. The video card simply can't handle 3840x1024 resolutions with all the settings maxed out and still manage 60+ frames per second. (Though in flight siming, since the graphics don't change nearly as much as they do in a first person shooter, you only need 25-30 to get a smooth playback.)
I noticed that in first person shooters the extra monitors didn't actually add to the emersion like I thought it would. You still focus all of your attention on the middle monitor. The side monitors ARE good for camping/sniping though. You have a wider field of view so it's harder for someone to surprise you from the side. But when you are running around constantly, the side monitors can almost be more distracting than useful. But it makes for a great demo for friends. Everyone you show it to will want it.
The real problem with triple head gaming right now is lack of graphic processing power. Don't buy the Matrox card for this purpose. You definitely WILL NOT be happy with the results. I most certainly wasn't. And I bought it knowing that for first person shooters it was going to suck, but I wanted it mainly for Flight Simulators. But even in that case it just doesn't have enough power.
Maybe when PCI Express is available I'll be able to buy 3 NVidia/ATI based graphic cards that actually have the kind of power needed for this intense of a workout.
What Tom's Hardware is proposing in this article is a much more practicle use for a second (or third) monitor. Having the second monitor display map data, chat information, statistics, and so on. The second display wouldn't even have to be accelerated in that case. A spare PCI VGA card with 8MB or 16MB of RAM should be sufficient.
anybody remember these guys?
http://www.go-l.com/monitors/index.htm
last i recall, they had fraud rumors flying left and right, but then they showed up to some convention or other with an actual setup and made everyone eat their words. i still think a lot of their desktop descriptions sound like complete hogwash, but whatever. that grand canyon display still looks pretty badass.
education
That which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understanding.
~a.bierce
I do exactly that with my GeForce FX 5700. As long as you don't need to interact with what's on the second monitor (most games grab the mice, so you can't move it to the other monitor), it works just fine.
What I would really like to do is to be able to chat on the other monitor while waiting to respawn, etc. on the game. Alt-tabbing minimizes all games in full screen mode, though.
Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.
Link
Ask Slashdot: Multiple Monitor Fun
Posted by Cliff on Tue Nov 03, '98 07:09 AM
from the more-monitors-are-good-than-one dept.
A whole bunch of you have written in about multiple monitor (multi-headed) support in Linux. Is it possible? What's involved? Who supports it? These are all interesting questions, and one person made a point of noting that Windows could do it, and couldn't find out how to do it on Linux. There's also a nifty project in the works involving Linux and a "video wall"! Click below for more...
We hope that multi-display gaming will get a lot easier with the introduction of the PCI-Express interface, as it allows the use of several graphics adapters.
This is actually incorrect - contrary to most people's assumptions, there is no technical reason why a motherboard cannot provide multiple AGP slots.
Whether software is built to handle it is another question, of course...
I've had four mice on one PC, just to see it happen. It's not much use since they all use the same pointer.
Windows 98 and higher supports this. 95 may.
I haven't bothered to try Linux.
My laptop also has three pointing devices. Touchpad, trackstick, mouse. I can use any of them, and click with the wrong buttons. Just as well, as I prefer the trackstick buttons with the touchpad when the mouse isn't plugged in.
It's never too late to have a happy childhood.
My second monitor at home is a 17" LCD and was pretty cheap. Indeed, two smaller monitors will give you more screen real-estate than a single large one, for a much lower price.
If you do go down the multi-monitor route in Windows, I'd highly recommend Ultramon which adds invaluable features missing in the OS (taskbar on second monitor, maximize to dual-screen, button to flip window from one monitor to another, turn on/off second monitor, multiple profiles, etc.)
RTA. The author appears to have actually destroyed a card due to the demands put on it by dual heading.
They work great in linux, I only use linux, so it was important to me. You can set it up any way you like, so check it out.
Not to mention for video editing Matrox cards are preferred over ATI/NVidia right now because Matrox has decided to cater to that market while ATI/Nvidia fight it out over the gamer market.
If you look in any DV film-making magazine you'll find all kinds of ads for systems built for editing based around Matrox video cards.
Those old OS 7.something Macs supported "spanning" at the OS level, so if the game didn't want to fill the screen you didn't need any code to back this up. Colonization was much nicer with all the palettes off to one side and a sprawling, 20" map of the new world on the other screen.
(Mac users were the design people, is why this feature was always there. When we presented a brochure design or something, the display was one monitor or LCD, and our slide show controls, palettes and whatnot were on the other one.)
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
Second question, how does linux do with a second monitor?
:-)
:-)
Like anything with Linux, the answer is, "it depends on your distro, your [insert hardware model here] and what version of [insert relevant software here] you're running".
does it take any further customization?
Heh. Would it be Linux if it didn't?
Seriously, though, check out this HOWTO. The HOWTO's title is slightly misleading in that it covers dual head configuration in addition to Xinerama (which is lucky for us).
FYI, the Xinerama extension is what allows XFree86 to support the use of multiple monitors with one desktop (e.g., you can drag your windows from one monitor to another or have them span both, etc.). In the old days, you used to have a separate X session for each monitor. Most modern session managers (GNOME, KDE, etc.) now have good support for Xinerama, but you'll need a relatively new version of XFree86 (if you have a newer version of most distros, you should already have this).
It will also help if your monitors are relatively new. If they're not, you may have to do some Googling to get the proper modelines (search for "[your monitor model] xfree86 modeline"), but for most newer monitors, this should be an issue.
Another point of recommendation: if you want hardware 3d acceleration, try and make sure all of your cards support it. Otherwise the contents of your OpenGL app windows will not display on monitors without it. Not a show-stopper, but sometimes a little confusing/annoying when you're running Blender.
moto411.com
The first example on the article web site is a pretty good case: you don't span the main game view across two windows, you play with a full-size main view on one screen and far more of the supporting information/controls than normal visible on the other. Gives you a larger main display and more convenient access to the extras. Any RTS fan is going to appreciate that...
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
In arcade games they addressed that issue by putting one flat-screen CRT in place normally, and putting the other so the screen surface was on a horizontal plane showing a reversed image, and putting a mirror right up to the edge of the other CRT for the reversed image to reflect from so the image was as close to seamless as possible. It worked pretty well.
It was done in larger multi-player games like (IIRC) the 6-player version of "X-Men"
~Philly
Anyone who cares about a decent resolution, refresh rate and physical screen size?
Find me an LCD that will do 2048x1536 with a 22" viewable and ~90hz refresh rate. Oh, and make sure it costs about $350, since that is how much this monitor cost me.
Sig.i>
I've found that a multimonitor rig is the only way to fly when you're dealing with heavy-duty Audio and Video Editing. In the case of the former, I stick Sound Forge 6's editing window on the main monitor, and the plug-in window on the second, along with a copy of Total Commander for file mangement. Same thing goes for Nuendo: stick your mixer and plugins on the secondary, and your editing window on the first--extreme goodness.
For video editing and DVD authoring work, this is even more of a lifesaver. I'll stick Final Cut on the main monitor, and then either DVD Studio Pro or Photoshop (or both) on the secondary. Add in a Video Monitor for checks, and it fills up your desktop pretty fast, but the benefits are worth the space used. The extra 300-700 bucks you spend on a second monitor are made back on the first job you do with them, even if only in saved frustration as you no longer have to burrow through the 5 open apps on your monitor to figure out what the hell you need to be looking at.
....now if only I can come up with the $$$ for a new cinema display I'll really be ready to kick some multidisplay ass ;-).......
The same thing goes for my developement environment: Bluefish or XEmacs on the main window and Mozilla on the secondary, along with a couple of terminals for file management and a MySQL monitor. It's the only way to fly.....
Don't Panic!