SLI Questions, 3 monitors?

V

vconsuma

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Oct 27, 2007
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I currently have 3 monitors hooked up to my 9600gt and 7900gtx (30-22-20 inchers). The primary use of my computer and monitor space is for Poker. I don't game heavily but with Empire:Total War supposedly being a resource hog like Crysis I'm debating utilizing my SLI. I could be mistaken about it being a big resource whore though I'm not too up to date.

Questions
1. I've read that dual sli only supports two monitors while enabled, is it possible to seamlessly transition from SLI when I'm gaming, back to normal multi triple monitor use while I'm not? i.e. Can main 30" and 22" be plugged into the "main" video card while still having the 20' hooked up? I'm confused a bit on this and the sliZone doesn't seem to clarify (or I missed it).

2. I've read that you can create "custom settings" such as for Crysis, or COD4, does this mean I can create Empire:Total War which would shut down my alternate monitors to focus on gaming, and then create a Poker which re-enables everything? Transitioning 3 monitors to SLI is what I'm worrying about a bit. Don't want it to be a hassle.

Maybe just wait and see how the 9600gt runs it and then consider.

Thanks
 
i think by just disabling sli in the nvidia control panel you can switch from 2 to 3 monitors. i dont believe there is a restart required anymore. if your board has 3 vid card slots you could keep 3 monitors on all the time.
 
With XP you can only have 1 monitor working on the SLI'ed cards. I also have 3 monitors going (24,20,20)... I have SLI always on, and set the SLI focus monitor to my primary monitor (24). Plugged the other 2 monitors (20,20) to my 8600GT card (also set as dedicated PhysX card) and let the desktop be extended on those 2 monitors.

Apparently in Vista you can have multi-monitors running on a set of SLI'ed cards (8 series and higher only, probably). I'm not a Vista user... so I really cant confirm on that.
 
Hmmm thanks for the replies. I am on Vista and only have 2 vid card slots.

I guess going to have to dig deeper to solve this or maybe someone has something set up like this.

Thanks
 
Experiment around with it...

I know that Vista does support multi-monitor setup in SLI mode. I just don't know up to how many monitors you can add though.

But, good luck !
 
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