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ATI Eyefinity technology to drive six screens and 7,680x3,200 resolution

by Tarinder Sandhu on 11 September 2009, 09:44

Tags: ATI Eyefinity, AMD (NYSE:AMD)

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It's now common knowledge that AMD is going to debut its next-generation graphics-card hardware imminently. Resuming a leap in architecture 15 months after the release of the Radeon HD 4K series, it is safe to assume that the high-end DX11-compliant cards will be helluva fast. We expect multi-teraFLOP performance and more memory bandwidth than you can shake a big stick at.

AMD, though, has another trick up its sleeve with the new cards and it may just change how we view the output. Welcome to the world of Eyefinity. Catchy name, huh?

The premise behind Eyefinity is to enable users to push a single card's output - be it 2D or 3D - to a maximum of six screens, simultaneously, and up to a resolution of 2,560x1,600 pixels each. Do the math and that's 24.5MP of gorgeous resolution, per card.

High-end next-generation cards will all be plumbed with ability to internally process up to six digital signals, be they HDMI, DVI, or DisplayPort, although only three will be physically outputted through the rear on most models. The likely combination will be dual DVI and HDMI, we imagine.

Special-edition cards - more of a proof of Eyefinity technology - will have six DisplayPort outputs that can each drive a 2,560x1,600 monitor, giving the requisite 24.5MP output - 7,680x3,200px of eye-poppin' detail.


DisplayPort heaven.

From what we saw at a press event recently, Eyefinity will provide independent scaling on monitors with differing native resolutions, thereby bringing real multi-monitor support to the fore and making them genuinely handy in the workstation/graphics market.

Could you drive six high-resolution screens from a single card and still play the latest games on them? AMD demonstrated the upcoming DX11 DiRT 2 on a triple-monitor setup, running rather smoothly at an insane resolution.

The question then arises as to whether ultra-high-resolution support is available for a wide variety of games. The answer, AMD says, is governed by ensuring that Windows sees the bank of monitors as a single source - the games generally take their cue from Windows' resolution settings. AMD's made the necessary driver-level optimisations in the latest Catalyst Control Centre.


Six monitors from a single card.

Is it a gimmick or does it make real sense? Considering the cumulative price of, say, three 22in, 1,680x1,050-capable monitors, to the tune of £350, we reckon that it provides a relatively cheap method of attaining high-pixel outputs if you can ignore the visual interference caused by monitor bezels. Increase the monitor count and the fiscal attractiveness diminishes in the face of rising costs for DisplayPort-equipped screens.

Learn more here.

Hmmm. GeForce 3D Vision or ATI Eyefinity. How about combining both, folks?

HEXUS Forums :: 17 Comments

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Posted by vdbswong - Fri 11 Sep 2009 09:54
article
Special-edition cards - more of a proof of Eyefinity technology - will have six DisplayPort outputs that can each drive a 2,560x1,600 monitor, giving the requisite 24.5MP output - 7,680x3,200px of eye-poppin' detail.

That the normal consumer will never see on sale ? :D (like the famous Platinum Edition cards :P).
Posted by AGTDenton - Fri 11 Sep 2009 10:25
With the thick black borders in between the monitors, AMD should have sided with LG and their new borderless TV:

http://lifestyle.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=20068


Hopefully this card will somehow translate into good gaming machines for the single monitor user.
I occasionally use a dual monitor for work, especially when writing manuals, but im ok with just the 1 monitor for gaming.
Posted by j.o.s.h.1408 - Fri 11 Sep 2009 11:21
lol crazy but how many people are really going to wire up 6 monitors for one image?

even if you had enough money, you still wouldnt want the monitor borders dividing up your screen lol
Posted by Big Adam - Fri 11 Sep 2009 11:24
AGTDenton
With the thick black borders in between the monitors, AMD should have sided with LG and their new borderless TV:

http://lifestyle.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=20068

Except “borderless” for LG refers to wireless transmission of data rather than any edgeless screen technology.

Multiscreen setups are already pretty affordable for non-gaming applications. I just picked up 3x nearly new Dell 1908FP screens on ebay for £205. Combined with with a £20 USB DVI/VGA graphic adapter from eBuyer and a secondhand Ergotron LX stand, I now have a (in my eyes) beautiful 3840x1024 setup with very narrow borders connected to an ordinary business laptop docking station for £300 all in.

Windows XP handles the display management just fine and having a central primary screen with two peripheral monitors works really well for the type of work I do. It also means that I don't have a screen bezel directly in front of me (as you would with a 2, 4 or 6 screen setup) so it feels very comfortable.

Of course, this setup would be pretty abysmal for a gaming rig, but it's a demonstration of what can be achieved at very moderate expense.
Posted by 1stRaven - Fri 11 Sep 2009 12:32
I'm already running a triple screen gaming rig by using an ati 4870 plus a radeon 3000 card. Softth is then installed and allows for the single 4870 to render all three screens and then pass the output for the two side monitors to the second card to display them - hence the need for only a cheap secondary card. Works well in games like burnout and grid as you get to see the cars coming up the side of you. Yet to try it in X3 but that looks promising.

I might be tempted to upgrade to one of these cards if a single card can display to three monitors. Allows the use of the second pci-e slot for crossfire then.

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