5 Box setup using one computer to handle multiple monitors

[Nixi]

I keep reading reports about Vista and XP and how they handle multiple monitors. I'm in the market for a brand new PC to handle my 5 toons. I've already invested in the accounts (70 war, 63 sm, 46 pal, 46 lock, 46 mage) so it's only a matter of deciding on the hardware setup. I had the Shaman and Warrior on seperate accounts in the past, but after discovering this site I've been three boxing the lowbies. When I get them in the same level range, I'm gonna need a beefier computer to play all 5.

I've got a 19" mon (1280x1024) that I'm working with now. I'll probably put 4 toons on this mon and then use a seperate mon for my main.

I'm looking to start with a good foundation machine that can run 5 accounts and then add monitors down the road. From the information I've researched so far, I think I want a quad core intel with maxed out ram and an a geforce graphics card.

Anyone have any recommendation on the specs of the PC I should purchase? I have somewhat of a unique problem in that I'm living abroad and my language skills in my host environment kind of sucks. So I need to be as specific as I possibly can when asking for the hardware. I just can't say I want an intel quad core, I need to say "q6600" but then i'm fuzzy on the rest of the options that are out there.

And another big question is will I want XP or Vista to start handling my 5 box setup starting with 2 monitors with the potential of expanding to 3 or even 5?

Thanks in advance.

[Wilbur]

Thankfully, Parts generally carry the same part names worldwide.

Q6600 - Retail comes with a stock fan.
4GB DDR2 PC6400(+) RAM
Nvidia 8800GT - (s)(x)(Ultra) - 512MB or above.
Large HDD, etc.

If you are using diffrent sized monitors, then Vista is definately going to be better for you.

Additionally If you *really* want to add more than 2 monitors to the system, then going for an SLI machine will be beneficial. A quick word on SLI. It doesn't help WoW frame rates, so, once you get it, disable SLI mode and run them as independant Graphics Cards.

Are you intending to purchase a PC or are you going to build it yourself?

[-silencer-]

Q6600, 4GB memory (DDR2-533 is stock speed, so you don't NEED faster if you're not overclocking. Many go for DDR2-675 or DDR2-800 though.), 8800GT/GTS/GTX/Ultra - your monitor resolutions will make a difference. Since you already have 1 1280x1024 monitor, you could expand to two more at that resolution and refresh rate and use a Matrox TripleHead2Go adapter to output to 3 displays from one videocard. However, that adapter won't support 3x higher resolution monitors. 3x 1280x1024 would be ideal for 5-boxing WoW on one videocard. For the motherboard, go with the P33/P35/X38 chipsets, or 780i if you want to use multiple cards i the future. I don't believe SLI currently supports multiple monitors, but I could be wrong if newer drivers do.
Unfortunately, many store-bought PCs have horrible cases, motherboards, and power supplies.. so if you care about quality, either have someone custom build a PC for you, or order one from a high end shop like Falcon Northwest.

[Vos]

I disagree with the tripleheadtogo suggestion. While it's great to do surround gaming, or if you are limited to having only one graphics card, it actually costs more than a second 8800gt. I'd rather have options for running sli or connecting 4 radically different sized monitors. I think the point of recommending the sli board was just that it would have a second pciex16 slot on it, not to necessarily run it in SLI. Alot fo this depends on the mobo in the system. An intel mobo with 2 x16 slots does crossfire, but I believe it can also run two nvidia cards in this scenario for 4 monitor support. Also if you are gonna go with 4gb of ram then you should consider 64bit vista. Also maxed out ram on most of these systems would be 8gb which you can get for as little as 150 bucks now.

[Nixi]

Thanks so much for the replies. I'm starting to get a better picture of how this is going to work.

It's been 10 years or so since I've been inside the guts of a PC. I used to obsess about this stuff when I was a kid (windows 95 and the dawn of 3d graphics processors; I think i had an 8meg Diamond Monster something or another), so I'm a bit nervous of putting it together myself. It won't be a store bought HP or some other such nonsense. I'll try have one put together for me if I feel like I can trust the people at the components store, or I'll give it a shot myself. Worst case scenario is finding someone at work to help me assemble it. The big problem is making sure I purchase the correct components. Oh, and the fact my operatining system will not be in English. I won't be able to understand a damn thing when installing unfamiliar stuff. :(

I'm skeptical about Vista. I bought a laptop recently from the Taiwan company Acer, and I've had lots of problems with WOW. The "Graphics enchancement" will crash and the whole computer will get the blue screen forcing me to turn it off. It happens once a week on average, and I'm having a hard time getting Vista to patch the updates for it or for the network adapter. Laptops are just a big pain in the ass.

Laptop stats [Core 2 Duo 2.0 Ghz, 800 Mhz FSB, 4 MB l2 cache, 8600M GT GeForce, 2 GB Ram]

Plus I remember putting this on Dualview before in Vista. I think the laptop is decent, but when I opened up two copies of WOW, it slows to an absolute crawl. I ended up using that, and a 3+ year old laptop to dual box with Keyclone and fell in love with the idea. But I really wanna bring all 5 toons into one machine.

So I was reading else where about Vista having problems when using dualview whereas horizontal span on XP is nicer. I can't remember who it was, but there is a post that talks about someones beastly machine and as soon as he puts one copy of wow on his Dualview'd monitor space the whole setup slows down to about half speed. Is this the same performance hit I can expect if I get XP?

Multi-boxing is such a big investment, and a good plan is crucial. I just don't wanna make costly mistakes and I'm so glad there are knowledgable people willing to help in this forum. Thanks a ton guys!

[Wilbur]

Question 1) Why won't you be able to install Vista in English?

Anyway
Other than that onto OS choices.

IF you use XP then you will be limited to using Horizontal span to get good FPS. With 2 or even 3 monitors, this won't pose a problem. But, if you decide to get a fourth monitor, then you'll probably want to mount it above the existing monitors. This is where Vista comes into its own, it treats each monitor individually AND doesn't suffer the FPS hit like Dual-view does in XP.

4GB of Ram, you'll need a 64 bit OS, so Vista 64 is my recommendation to you. You'll suffer a slight overhead, but nothing too excessive I wouldn't have thought.

Try and order stuff online, from a company that'll ship it to your country.

[Vos]

The best performance comes from two monitors the same resolution in horizontal span under windows XP.

If you are going to have different sized monitors requires, this requires dual view. XP is bugged and has slowdowns on second monitors, Vista is not bugged and has good performance.

Frankly after knowing you are going quad core. I would then figure out your monitor setup/s. Figure out the exact size/resolutions you are going to use. After deciding that you can then decide on what you need to make the setup work best.....

4 toons on a 4:3 19" monitor will be pretty small will you be ok with that?

[Nixi]

I'm playing the Chinese language version of WOW and I can't get the game to input Chinese characters when using an English operating system. My old laptop has Chinese XP and my new one has English Vista. This wouldn't be such a terrible thing, if it wasn't for the fact that half my excuse for putting so much time/money into wow has to do with finding a hobby that can help me learn the language. So I want to be able to type it. I can't read or understand it will enough to operate completely in a Chinese operating system, but it's the only option I have. The desktop will just be my wow gaming system; I won't use it for anything else so I figure it's worth the trouble to put a Chinese language OS on there.

I've been fiddling around with my Vista laptop over the past couple days, plugging monitors in it and running the Dual view and checking performance. I think I'll stick with Vista when I build my desktop. It's the big holiday over here so all the stores are running outta stock for items and I couldn't find a Geforce 8800 based card when I did my initial browsing. I'll probably have to wait until after the Spring Festival before I can find stores with everything in stock. Although I'm gonna step my search up a notch and go to the main tech shopping area before the festivities start.