Windows 7 Changing Monitor Configuration-which is best?

[Saltgrass]

I am currently running one 1920x1080 monitor. If I wanted to upgrade for gaming to get a better field of view, should I go to a surround (3 monitor) system with the 1920 resolution, or one 2560x1440 monitor?

My primary concern is peripheral view, but quality is also important.

I am trying not to consider expense at this point

Thanks

 

[Mitchell_A]

I'd go with a triple setup, especially if you have an xfire or eyefinity card.

 

[Saltgrass]

I don't have an ATI video card, but Nvidia does the same thing. I suppose my biggest problem is not having any experience and not seen the different venues demonstrated. I have found some videos on the net, but I would probably need to see a game I have played to compare.

I don't think just increasing the resolution will give me what I want for gaming, and may not really help for everyday. So I will probably go with the 3 monitor setup, if I go at all when I start to consider the price...!

Thanks for the response.

 

[Mitchell_A]

Not to mention having two or more monitors greatly increases productivity!

 

[Saltgrass]

I have been reading about how ATI does a better job with multi-monitor setups than Nvidia, but going that direction would be very expensive.

I have decided to start by getting one extra monitor (which I wanted anyway) so I will have 3. I will not be able to run any games in a High Quality, but if I can run them at all, I might get some idea if I like the way it works. If I do, then I will go ahead with the purchase of another video card and the system will be ready...

Thanks, I will post back about my impressions of multi-monitor gaming.

 

[Jimbo22]

Saltgrass....once you go to the triple monitor setup for gaming, no matter what the resolution is, you wont want to go back to gaming in any other way. It's that impressive and immersive, alone the field of view is worth it. Then through in a 2.1 or 5.1 surround sound and it'll change your gaming for life. But don't forget, that with AMD, your 3rd monitor needs to use the display port on the card in order to work properly. There are adapters but there are only a few that AMD recommeds and those have to be active adapters.

 

[Saltgrass]

once you go to the triple monitor setup for gaming, no matter what the resolution is, you wont want to go back to gaming in any other way.

Probably, a very accurate comment.

I have the Nvidia card and have been looking through the Nvidia site for surround monitor setups. I have seen information that seems to be conflicting as to where you have to connect the monitors if you have more than one Graphics card. But for now, I will try using the one and play with it for a while (maybe a couple of days), and then order the other card when I am satisfied. I can even get a free game right now...Metro whatever it is...

I built my current system thinking I would upgrade it to SLI for gaming..hopefully that will take place soon....then watch out !!!

Thanks for the reassurance ...

 

[Saltgrass]

The new configuration is all set up. I had a little set back trying to use an older CCFL LCD monitor with two new LED LCD monitors and could not get surround to work. The replacement monitor solved that problem.

I have been playing Crysis 3 and Borderlands 2 to see how the surround works. I notice the outside monitors seem to magnify the presentation. Is that how it should work? If it is working correctly, I will assume that is done because the monitors are supposed to be in an almost straight line and not angled in.

It will take some getting used to the new view but I have already caught several bad guys trying to sneak up on me !

Thanks for your suggestions.

 

[Jimbo22]

I angle my two outside monitors just a bit...for me it's a better angle for viewing and less stress on my head/neck.....

Not sure what you mean "magnify the presentation" on the outside monitors...some elaboration please.

This is new territory for Nvidia with multimonitor setups. AMD first started it and is by far simpler and easier to setup and use, which is the only reason I went with an AMD GPU, and they are cheaper, because I knew down the road I would be setting up double and triple monitor just for this purpose.

See I told you...the field of view is incredible!

To really enhance the visual aspect of 3 monitors, hook up a 2.1 or 5.1 speaker system and really let the gaming begin....

 

[Saltgrass]

On my outer monitors, if I am facing something like a rock or case, if I turn to put the item on a side monitor it gets about 50% larger and continues to get larger the farther out it is. This is happening in both games I am running, so It must be normal or something about my system. But the distortion on the side monitors makes it hard to judge distances when something is presented on them. The front monitor still seems to be what I am used to. But the closer the item is, the more pronounced the blooming..., or at least it appears that way.

And I do already love it and I am not even used to it. But just now I did have a bad experience in Crysis 3 in the underground scene. Everything seemed to be larger and harder to see. I am having to run the system in High quality instead of Very High Quality as I was doing with one monitor.

Maybe it will just take me some time to get the hang of it.

 

[Mitchell_A]

Might be the field of view settings in the games. Just a thought.

 

[Jimbo22]

I would set everything to default settings in the video and see what it looks like, then start tweaking the video settings...eg...antialiasing, morphological filtering, texture filtering, and so on. Also have a look at your GPU settings as well, something like 3d application settings, not sure what it's called in Nvidia brand.

 

[Saltgrass]

I am not sure making adjustments on a game by game process would not seem to be a good fix for the blooming situation. I have thought about the FOV in that possibly making it smaller would push more graphical info to the other monitors.

Crysis 3 has the configuration utility I will be using tomorrow to see if I can make it look different. I have already had to use the Force multi-monitor setting since it does not seem to recognize them with its automatic default setting. At least that keeps the HUD on the center screen.

I will be looking at things like parallax and some of the other settings to see what happens. It might be by design so as to lessen the need for graphical power due to secondary monitors. Maybe if I was running a GTX 680 for each monitor it would look better...

 

[Jimbo22]

I think you might be on to something there saltgrass....I remember reading something about that....but that's been awhile. This is the very reason I went with AMD for multimonitor gaming...only need one card for 3 monitors and there's no issues like you have.

 

[Saltgrass]

The new GTX 680 will do 3 monitors on one card, but the quality in games will not be very high. I set Crysis 3 down to medium graphics to see if it would help the outside monitors and it does not, so it is not because the graphics is overstressed.

I may be starting to get used to it, but it doesn't appear to be as noticeable as it was earlier. I tried some settings to see if they helped. the FOV does not seem to make a difference. I tried several settings and got things looking much worse, but not better. I am also trying a setting where the close items do not loose definition as quickly, but not sure yet if it makes much difference.

I will keep checking, but I suppose for now, I will be living with it and hopefully not even noticing the symptoms. It is really nice not having to use the mouse to scan the area for bad guys, they show up whenever it open the viewer, if they are in front of me.

I am going to try Metro 2033 soon, and when the new one comes out in about 10 days, I will be trying it.

Thanks again..

 

[Jimbo22]

Can you post some screen shots of what your talking about. I'm just curious to see.

 

[Saltgrass]

OK, one shot was taken from the lower right of the center monitor and the second from the lower right of the right monitor. The distance to the object is the same, and the same area of the very large screen shot was cut out.

I would think, although the graphic detail may be lost on the side monitors, the size should remain the same. I have found no way to adjust the graphic rendering on the outside monitors alone, but I will revisit the FOV settings and any others I can find. But all three games exhibit the exact same behavior, so I must assume it is designed to operate in this manner.

Another thing that might be involved is when I try to use a resolution that accounts for Bezel displacement, the center monitor looses the signal and states it is "Out of Range". So something might not be working exactly right.

 

[Saltgrass]

I have now been playing with the multi-monitor setup for a couple of weeks. I have been unable to find a POV setting to make the display any better than it is normally.

I do like having the additional view, but correct me if you think my analysis is incorrect. The attachment below shows the multi-screens on a login page when set up for a Nvidia Surround Display. It is the same for shutdown and other type of situations.

But it appears that during a game, the blue part on the side monitors is the total amount of graphical information for that monitor, and is expanded to fill the entire screen. Since the graphics is stretched so much, the presentation must be distorted. I am suggesting only about an additional 15 degrees FOV is gained on each side monitor.

Again, I do like having the additional FOV during games, just not sure it is worth the additional expense.

Thanks for the suggestions.