Im going to be replacing my old chunky TV with a new TV that will end up being mounted above my desk, and so I thought about 3 monitor setup and watching movies on the 3rd screen (the TV) whenever I want... This is just a idea, currently 2 monitors is fine obviously.
My current GTX 570 only supports 2 monitors. What would happen though if I were to get a very cheap GTS 620 (to allow for 3 monitors) how would it work? Do I need to set anything up with the nvidia drivers to make sure only my current GTX 570 does the processing?
If I were to run a game on the display that the GTS 620 was outputting what would happen? Would the GTX 570 still do the GPU processing?
I've done this before, but with a GTX 260 and a GeForce 7 providing the 3rd output port.
I found that with a windowed mode app, it would run at full speed until I dragged it onto the 3rd screen. As soon as it was even partially on the 3rd screen, the performance would plummet. With a fullscreen app, the app can explicitly choose which GPU(s) it uses, but most don't give the user control over this decision, nor do they support processing on one and displaying on another -- most just use whichever GPU you open the window on (often the 'primary' monitor).
One workaround is to configure your screens not to be independent desktops, but to use the 'clone' mode, or the mode that makes them act as one giant-res screen.
Another workaround that I used for some games was to place a fake d3d9.dll in their directory, which created two GPU devices, processing on the fast one, then copying he final images across to he slow one manually... But I wouldn't try this with any games with anti-cheat mechanisms as it might be flagged as a potential aim-bot, etc!
Probably easier to plug your main monitor and TV into the fast card, and your 2ndary monitor into the second card.
Ahh well that sucks, thanks for that. I might still do this though, as you say, my 2nd monitor is only used for basic stuff displaying the taskbar, browsing etc... while the 1st one is used for programming/games.
Disappointing that the version of my GTX 570 isnt sold anymore so SLI would not be a option (cant get 600 series either - long story, would need a new cpu).
You can always try eBay and/or the local equivalents to find a 2nd GPU for SLI
[edit]Actually, now that I think about it, everything that I said applies to Windows XP... I don't think I had upgraded to Win7 at that point. I haven't tried using that same hardware setup on Win7, so it could be different now.
Yeah, I actually thought about that aswell (GTX 260/GeForce 7xxx is pretty old now :P), you might be right. I just cant find any details about this on google, thats why I posted here, I have no idea what keywords to search.
Another workaround that I used for some games was to place a fake d3d9.dll in their directory, which created two GPU devices, processing on the fast one, then copying he final images across to he slow one manually... But I wouldn't try this with any games with anti-cheat mechanisms as it might be flagged as a potential aim-bot, etc!
You did that? That's badass. Gotta live to your +11000 reputation
