3 Monitors, No Surround, No SLI?

Andyk5

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jul 27, 2011
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If this is the case I am really screwed.
I have been playing around with a surround setup and realized that it makes me even sicker in fps games and having a stretched out desktop is annoying. So I went back to 3 normal displays method.
For this I choose activate all displays under Nvidia menu. When I go to Crysis, to play on my center monitor at 1440p, I see that the second gpu is not getting any load. When I select maximize 3d performance, I can only run 2 monitors but SLI kicks in and frame rates pretty much double.

Do I have to turn one of my monitors off everytime I want to play a game?
Is it that hard for the SLI to stay with 3 monitors on? I pretty much got this second card just so I can plug in the 3rd 1440p DL DVI only monitor. If I knew I was going to be gaming with one stupid card, I would have just bought an active adapter instead of a second GTX 680.
 
I have not done 3 display surround before, but to my understanding, all monitors need to be using the same Dual link DVI port on all cards/outputs. Are all 3 of your monitors running the DL DVI?

Note that there could be something completely different going on which might also be causing the problem you're experiencing.
 
You should have the option to play any game in a single-monitor resolution even with Surround enabled - no? Just choose the resolution of a single monitor and make sure your primary monitor is the one in the center.

As far as the stretched out desktop goes, maybe someone with more recent Surround experience can recall the name, but Matrox made some utility that alleviates the hassle by allowing you to put the key UI elements on your center monitor by cloning the taskbar or some such.
 
I think you guys are misunderstanding me. What i am saying is, when I have 2 DL DVI monitors on one GTX680 and the hird DL DVI monitor on the second GTX680 I can't turn the SLI on. There are 4 options under SLI menu.
1) Max 3d performance ( Works only if you have all your monitors on one card. SLI Enabled)
2) Surround ( Can use DVI inputs on both cards, SLI Enabled)
3)Activate all displays ( Use the inputs like Surround but without the surround, also no SLI enabled)
4)Disable SLI ( cards run individually)

This is killing me, I don't even know what is the point of having selection 3 and 4? They are pretty much the same thing. I now need to buy an active Displayport to dual link Dvi adapter for $70 so I can connect all 3 monitors to one card so I can see all my monitors and have SLI on at the same time, and I am not even sure if that is going to work. This currently works with an HDMI cable and a 1080p screen but you never know, as soon as I go to 1440p it may say screw you no SLI for you.

Dumbest thing ever....If you want 3 monitor surround gaming at 7680x1440 it is ok to have split monitor inputs and 3 displays but if you try to game on one monitor and see desktop on others, and although it is much easier than the surround, it is not allowed....
 
If you have an onboard video on your motherboard, then you are in luck.
 
I don't, I have the HD3000 on the i72600k but it is limited to 1080p resolution
 
I had a similar problem before, I own 4 1080p monitors, and decided to change the middle one with a 120hz. So what I did is to activate all 4 displays with SLI enabled while gaming *only* on the 120hz, I had to connect the 2 displays on my onboard video ports.

What board do you have anyway?
 
Connect 2 of the monitors to the top card's dvi ports and connect the 3rd one to the bottom card's top dvi port. Then go to NV control panel and select "Span displays with Surround" and click "Configure". Make sure all 3 displays appear in the next window and click through using standard resolution. Re-boot and you should be good to go?

PS- The choices on my setup are all under "SLI configuration" and read; Maximize 3D performance, Span displays with Surround, Activate all displays and Disable SLI.
 
Connect 2 of the monitors to the top card's dvi ports and connect the 3rd one to the bottom card's top dvi port. Then go to NV control panel and select "Span displays with Surround" and click "Configure". Make sure all 3 displays appear in the next window and click through using standard resolution. Re-boot and you should be good to go?

PS- The choices on my setup are all under "SLI configuration" and read; Maximize 3D performance, Span displays with Surround, Activate all displays and Disable SLI.

Well, yes I can configure the Surround. That is not what I am trying to do though. I want to have my individual monitors and have SLI enabled at the same time.
I thought Activate all monitors would do that, if not, what is the difference between activate all monitors and disable SLI? It does exactly the same thing.
 
Well, yes I can configure the Surround. That is not what I am trying to do though. I want to have my individual monitors and have SLI enabled at the same time.
I thought Activate all monitors would do that, if not, what is the difference between activate all monitors and disable SLI? It does exactly the same thing.
Not sure what you mean by "I want to have my individual monitors and have SLI enabled at the same time".

When you disable sli only the top card and 1 monitor will work. Activate all monitors will use both video cards but not span the displays (so all 3 displays will operate independently)...is that what you're trying to do?
 
Not sure what you mean by "I want to have my individual monitors and have SLI enabled at the same time".

When you disable sli only the top card and 1 monitor will work. Activate all monitors will use both video cards but not span the displays (so all 3 displays will operate independently)...is that what you're trying to do?

It is really not that complicated. I want to have 4 displays operational, all acting individual, but when I play a game on one, I want both of my $400 graphics cards to pitch in for the frame rate.
 
Your board has a HDMI and DVI ports connect one monitor there. Make sure its activated in the bios and allocate around 64mb of ram.
 
Ugh...nevermind you have 1440p it will only alow upto 1920x1200
 
When using "Activate all displays", were you running the game in Full Screen mode?
 
When running 'Activate all displays' SLI is disabled, you can only run a maximum of two monitors off the one card in SLI, the outputs on the second card are disabled.

I believe the case is the same for AMD.

A workaround, as people are trying to explain, is to enable 'Surround' and run a surround resolution for your desktop but only select the resolution of your center monitor in games while gaming, that way only the center display will be used while playing games and the two side monitors will go into standby mode.

And before you even state it, windows maximise fine in surround. The only window that doesn't is Steam library and in that instance it isn't that hard to run it as a window, set the desired size in the desired location on your displays, close Steam library, open it again and viola! It opens back at the exact same location you closed it at at the exact same size - It's a miracle....;)
 
When running 'Activate all displays' SLI is disabled, you can only run a maximum of two monitors off the one card in SLI, the outputs on the second card are disabled.

I believe the case is the same for AMD.
AMD cards are not limited to running two monitors off of the primary card while Crossfire is enabled. Most current cards will do at least 4 (or more if you can daisy-chain the DisplayPort monitors)
 
When in standard Crossfire mode or Eyefinity mode?

NV will also allow you to run 4 monitors in SLI, provided Surround is enabled. In standard SLI mode however it's 2 monitors max.
 
When in standard Crossfire mode or Eyefinity mode?
AMD cards don't make a distinction between the two. The two technologies are independent.

NV will also allow you to run 4 monitors in SLI, provided Surround is enabled. In standard SLI mode however it's 2 monitors max.
AMD cards don't care if there's an Eyefinity display group or not. If you have 4 monitors attached to a single AMD card (or the primary card in a Crossfire config), they'll all work. Your options are:

4 monitors extended.
3 monitors in a group, 1 extended.
2 monitors in a group, 2 extended.
2 monitors in a group, 2 monitors in a second group.
4 monitors in a group.

Crossfire being enabled or disabled also has no effect on any of the above display configuration options.
 
When running 'Activate all displays' SLI is disabled, you can only run a maximum of two monitors off the one card in SLI, the outputs on the second card are disabled.

I believe the case is the same for AMD.

A workaround, as people are trying to explain, is to enable 'Surround' and run a surround resolution for your desktop but only select the resolution of your center monitor in games while gaming, that way only the center display will be used while playing games and the two side monitors will go into standby mode.

And before you even state it, windows maximise fine in surround. The only window that doesn't is Steam library and in that instance it isn't that hard to run it as a window, set the desired size in the desired location on your displays, close Steam library, open it again and viola! It opens back at the exact same location you closed it at at the exact same size - It's a miracle....;)

I am already doing that workaround. My thing is, I usually have things that I am monitoring on my side monitors like skype, netflix a browser etc... while i am in a game. This way I am forced to have on monitor while I am gaming.
As far as windows maximization KM player also does not lock on to one window. It maximizes over the whole screen.

Now I wonder, what if I buy an active DisplayPort to DL-DVI adapter and try to do Maximize 3D option. Since Everything will be on one card, it may work, I just don't want to waste $70 if it does not.
 
I am already doing that workaround. My thing is, I usually have things that I am monitoring on my side monitors like skype, netflix a browser etc... while i am in a game. This way I am forced to have on monitor while I am gaming.
As far as windows maximization KM player also does not lock on to one window. It maximizes over the whole screen.

I see.

What you can do is run a 4th accessory display for your IM, netflix, Scype, etc which is independant of the Surround configuration and is visable in most cases (a small minority of games don't play nicely) while playing games.

This is what I used to do and it worked quite well, there is a trick, however, in setting it up and the display has to run off a DP connection (you can use adapters).
 
I see.

What you can do is run a 4th accessory display for your IM, netflix, Scype, etc which is independant of the Surround configuration and is visable in most cases (a small minority of games don't play nicely) while playing games.

This is what I used to do and it worked quite well, there is a trick, however, in setting it up and the display has to run off a DP connection (you can use adapters).

I have just set that up also, the 4th accesory display... I do not know why Nvidia is making things so hard. It can use 2 cards to power one massive desktop on 3 monitors, but cant use two cards to power one monitor and have 3 accessory displays. It just makes no sense.

Oh, my accessory display is running on the second card through HDMI. I think you don't need the DP port for that.

I still want to try the DP the active DLDVI adapter to see if I can use both DVI and the dP on one card for 3 monitors so I can have the "maximize 3d acceleration setting" where SLI is on, all 3 monitors are operational individually at the same time and surround is off.
The whole surround desktop stuff is kinda quirky for me especially with 3 portrait monitors.
 
Even under an AMD configuration, I'd be terribly surprised if you could play a game fullscreen on the center monitor while keeping the side monitors active whether you're running extended desktop mode or eyefinity mode, the only thing you could do is run in windowed mode in which case CF/SLI is disabled anyway.
 
Even under an AMD configuration, I'd be terribly surprised if you could play a game fullscreen on the center monitor while keeping the side monitors active
This works perfectly fine on AMD systems.

1. Make sure all monitors are connected to the primary card, none on the secondary card (if you have one).
2. Switch to Extended Desktop mode
3. Set the center monitor as primary
4. Fire up your game in fullscreen mode.

All monitors will stay enabled and the game will appear only on the center screen. Crossfire works in this configuration as well.
 
maybe It might work when you install that beta driver from NVIDIA? Ver. 326.19.

They might have change how SLI surround behaves because of the 4K monitor.
 
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