Multiple vid cards in on one motherboard?

[jdraughn]

Does anyone know if you can choose which card renders each game window, as long as you have different monitors? I know wow don't like SLI so I was thinking of getting like 3 8800GTs, and have one dedicated to my main window, and the other two can each run two windows. Total of 3 monitors, 3 video cards, 5 game windows.

I don't know if you can make a wow window render on a specific video card though, I dont know how it would work.

[Kaynin]

2 monitors per videocard is what you should look for. If you want three monitors, you only need two videocards. Would suggest running the main monitor from one and the two extra's from the other.

Either that or a HD3870x2 might do the trick
http://www.azerty.nl/_azerty/data/product/7/2/2/72200/img/1/G.jpg

I'd go for 2x decent cards primarily tho. :P

[jdraughn]

I am not sure if you understood what I was asking. When you start a game, as far as I know it starts and runs only on the "primary" video adapter. If you start 5 games, are they all going to render on the "primary" video adapter, letting the GPU horsepower on the addional video cards go to waste?

[Kaynin]

I am not sure if you understood what I was asking. When you start a game, as far as I know it starts and runs only on the "primary" video adapter. If you start 5 games, are they all going to render on the "primary" video adapter, letting the GPU horsepower on the addional video cards go to waste?

As far as I know; monitor -> port All instances on that monitor are funneled to the videocard that has that port. So, 3d apps use the gpu of the videocard that renders thayt monitor.

Could be wrong, but it would be weird if it wasn't like that.

[-silencer-]

The Maximizer program allows specification of device ids, so just use that to get each instance of WoW to:
- the correct monitor..
- the right size/position within that monitor..

Maximizer has a config file that stays in the WoW root directory to define which device id (monitor) and resolution to display WoW.

Or you could load them up in windowed mode, then drag and drop them to the monitor of your choice.

[Steph]

If you would manage to use the separate cards for the different monitors, I would expect a problem for things like Keyclone's Picture-in-Picture function, since that swaps the windows between monitors. For a setup like the OP is thinking about, that would mean swapping the application between graphic cards.

[jdraughn]

I use AHK and just want one screen in the center, and two on each side with the monitors in portrait mode. I am not as concerned about the frame rates of the other 4 windows, but I don't want them to be intolerable either. In the past I have used a 8800GTS and it was great when I had only one window visible, but if I tried to show more then two at a time at the same time, my FPS would drop pretty horrible. This was on a Q6600 CPU.

Thats why I was thinking 3 video cards, one for each monitor and the center one would only have to display a single wow window, with all the eye candy turned up.

Best buy has 42" 1080P LCD tvs for 800.00 right now, and I currently run a 37" as my monitor (also 1080P). I was thinking of picking up two of them to go on either side of my 37" in portrait mode.

[-silencer-]

I use AHK, and I know using multiple videocards with multiple monitors works. You'll have to use WoW Maximizer too..