TripleHead2Go : warning to those interested

Brokunn · Post by **Brokunn** » 27 Nov 2007, 05:22

I'm writing this review as a warning to those interested in setting up their system with a TripleHead2Go: Depending on what game you're interested in, it may not perform as advertised.

First, I'll start off by saying that Matrox's â€œSurround Gamingâ€

Tucson · Post by **Tucson** » 27 Nov 2007, 06:58

coughfudcoughcough

Dem Pyros · Post by **Dem Pyros** » 27 Nov 2007, 07:40

umm.......are you sure you know what you're talking about?

P-Storm · Post by **P-Storm** » 27 Nov 2007, 09:15

[quote]I'm writing this review as a warning to those interested in setting up their system with a TripleHead2Go: Depending on what game you're interested in, it may not perform as advertised.

First, I'll start off by saying that Matrox's â€œSurround Gamingâ€

JKeefe · Post by **JKeefe** » 27 Nov 2007, 16:48

To be fair, I totally understand that this particular issue is not a result of the TripleHead2Go itself, but an aspect of the game (whether intended by the developers or not, who knows).

That's quite a post just to arrive at that one reasonable conclusion. The problem here is with poor FOV and aspect ratio support in games, not anything to do with Matrox.

Regardless of that, my problem is not with the fact that this issue exists (on the one game I bought it for, mind you), but that Matrox does not state anything even hinting at this issue on their website. Do you think that if the above quote was the first thing that anyone read on their â€œSurround Gamingâ€

KreK · Post by **KreK** » 27 Nov 2007, 20:02

Brokunn's opinion is honest, he did spent a lot of money and didn't get what he was looking for. And it is a good thing that he speaks about it because his post can prevent other gamers from doing the same mistake.

However Brokunn, you are primarily to blame yourself. As you discovered, these issues are well known, from Bioshock to WoW. You should have done your homework before buying it.

TH2G is a terrific product, I hope you can find interest in some other games than MMORPGs.

Post by **Mach1.9pants** » 27 Nov 2007, 21:00

I can certainly see where the poor guy is coming from. If I was an MMO addict (god forbid- you can shove 'grinding' up levels where the sun don't shine!) and saw on the Matrox site what it shows on the TH2Go and the SGU I would of come to the same conclusion.
However as a 'new tech' geek I know to research thoroughly anything that is out of the ordinary to make sure it does work, or at least I can get it to do what I want by mucking about with it. But a lot of people are not so tech literate and Matrox would do well giving links to relevant WSGF info & giving the cons as well as the pros.
So very sorry for your situation Brokunn, start a thread about getting a SG fix for your (horrid :wink: ) MMOs and maybe someone might have an idea how to fix it. If not start looking around in the various config files and see what you can do yourself.
Good luck.
M1.9P

Vroshnak · Post by **Vroshnak** » 27 Nov 2007, 21:06

The extra interface space far outweighs the lack of FOV in my opinion.

Here's the WoW thread if you are interested. Looks like it has the same problem.

[url]http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/node/7501]

Brokunn · Post by **Brokunn** » 27 Nov 2007, 22:30

Wow, I'm surprised by all the feedback I've gotten on this already. I think there may be a little confusion as to what my original intent was, so I'll reiterate the reason why I posted this topic:

Matrox is falsely advertising their product. This is a direct quote from their website:

Matrox TripleHead2Go is the only solution on the market to enable Surround Gaming by expanding supported 3D games across three displays and providing a much wider in-game field of view (FOV)

And, in some cases like Guild Wars, WoW, etc, that is absolutely not true (you actually get less FoV). Nowhere on the site is there any mention of "some games may perform differently than others", or "the top and bottom portions of your screen may be chopped of", etc.

I understand the concept of Vert-, I have no problem that it exists on some games, and I don't really have any problem with the games or developers. I have a problem with Matrox lying.

Now, I'd like to respond to a few of the folks who were kind enough to give their thoughts:

umm.......are you sure you know what you're talking about?

- Yes.

Have you looked games who are supporting this natively, because what you see on you pics are some vert- games. With true hor+ you get the result you want.

- Yes. Which is why I said above that some games like Half Life 2 look great, but that's not the point of this article.

That's quite a post just to arrive at that one reasonable conclusion. The problem here is with poor FOV and aspect ratio support in games, not anything to do with Matrox.

- Wrong. I have no problem at all with poor FoV support in games. I do have a problem with Matrox lying on their website. Let me give you an example that may explain my frustrations better:

Lets say you go to a website that offers a miracle hair growth product, and on the site they say "Hairplex TripleHair2Grow is the only solution on the market to enable Super Hairgrowth; providing a much fuller head of hair." Elated, you order the product, use it, and your hair falls out (i.e. less hair for you).

Now, you could have done a little research and found out that in some cases TripleHair2Grow actually causes hair loss... but what about the statement printed blatantly on their website? Is that not false advertisement?

Yeah, ok, go ahead and sue them. I'll be waiting with baited breath to see how you make out.

- I didnt say I was going to sue them. I just said they deserved it... the jerks.

Matrox has pretty good support from what I've heard and the company should be commended for pioneering new immersive gaming technology, not sued. While I suppose it would be nice to see some sort of explanation of the effect that improper FOV has on triplehead gaming, if you do your research before buying a TripleHead2Go, the potential issue should be readily apparent.

- From what you've heard? Well, I've experienced it directly, so I think that makes me the expert in this case (please see the link to the email correspondance I provided). If anyone else out there loves Matrox support and has nothing but happy-fuzzy-bunny-warm feelings for them, please put me in touch with your support guy ;)

In this very forum and the sister "Surround Screenshots & Videos"
forum you will find screenshots and descriptions of the necessary steps to make games work in triplehead. There you can see whether they are Vert- or not. You can also see screenshots of games here for a quick comparison.

- That's partially correct. The link you sent me gives me a crappy little "blow up" screen shot of Guild Wars, which is actually incorrect since it's a Vert- game. That should be clipping off the top and bottom, not stretching the image.

I did, however, manage to find this article via a Google search (don't know why it wont come up in the WSGF search) which does help shed a little light on the subject. Unfortunately, here are the steps one would need to take to get to the conclusion that Guild Wars doesn't work as Matrox advertises.

[list]1. Don't take Matrox at their word, start researching
2. If you manage to find the "Surround Gaming" article here on WSGF, come to the understanding that the TripleHead2Go essentially gives you one big widescreen monitor (i.e. they don't have any other magic up their sleeves with this product).
3. Read the WSGF FAQ after that and draw the conclusion that Vert- games will perform on the TripleHead2Go just as they would any old widescreen.
4. Possibly find some article (like the one above) that indicates Guild Wars (or whatever game you're looking for) is a Vert- game.[/list:u]

...thats a lot of if's and assumptions that, I personally don't think the average consumer is going to experience before buying a product like this.

Come here and do some research. Have you explored whether Guild Wars and WOW have options to increased the FOV?

- Yes. Yes I have.

Brokunn's opinion is honest, he did spent a lot of money and didn't get what he was looking for. And it is a good thing that he speaks about it because his post can prevent other gamers from doing the same mistake.

However Brokunn, you are primarily to blame yourself. As you discovered, these issues are well known, from Bioshock to WoW. You should have done your homework before buying it.

TH2G is a terrific product, I hope you can find interest in some other games than MMORPGs.

- Thank you! That was a very nice reply. And once again I'd like to re-iterate that I'm really not that hurt about my particular game not working, I'm angry with Matrox for not saying anything about these well known issues on their site.

The extra interface space far outweighs the lack of FOV in my opinion.

Here's the WoW thread if you are interested. Looks like it has the same problem.

- Wrong. You absolutely do not get extra interface space. Take another look at those screenshots above. You could move all of your HUD menus to the top/bottom third of the screen and still achive the same the same FoV that you get with the TripleHead2Go.

Thanks to everyone who has responded!

Tucson · Post by **Tucson** » 28 Nov 2007, 00:21

I sympathize with you, well, not really. I would have encouraged more research. But it's your right to get a refund.

I could have made your post a lot easier: "Not all games work properly in triplehead. Make sure to research your desired application before you buy."

EDIT: some spelling errors

Dem Pyros · Post by **Dem Pyros** » 28 Nov 2007, 02:20

Lets say you go to a website that offers a miracle hair growth product, and on the site they say "Hairplex TripleHair2Grow is the only solution on the market to enable Super Hairgrowth; providing a much fuller head of hair." Elated, you order the product, use it, and your hair falls out (i.e. less hair for you).

Now, you could have done a little research and found out that in some cases TripleHair2Grow actually causes hair loss... but what about the statement printed blatantly on their website? Is that not false advertisement?

But that's not exactly what they're selling.

They are more like selling a "super hairgrowth comb" and you happened to pick the wrong type of gel to go with it.

They are right in what they are saying, as that is what the product is intended to be used for. If the developers of the games choose to butcher the support, that's not Matrox's fault.

Notice how it says "supported" in the quote.

Tucson · Post by **Tucson** » 28 Nov 2007, 06:27

I actually did enjoy that analogy.

Having interacted personally with matrox sales, my suggestion would be to take your complaint to them. They actually want you to enjoy their product, believe it or not. And they're probably just as frustrated with the situations you mentioned as you are.

If your complaints still cannot be remedied then you should return the product. I honestly don't know what you expected to do by posting a tyrad about it here, besides to try and slander matrox.

You didn't even post here once for help, and we're giving away thousands of dollars of support for free! Programmers, technicians, the testing, feedback, the time alone! So sorry if I don't feel moved by your cause.

JKeefe · Post by **JKeefe** » 28 Nov 2007, 06:50

Matrox has pretty good support from what I've heard and the company should be commended for pioneering new immersive gaming technology, not sued. While I suppose it would be nice to see some sort of explanation of the effect that improper FOV has on triplehead gaming, if you do your research before buying a TripleHead2Go, the potential issue should be readily apparent.

- From what you've heard? Well, I've experienced it directly, so I think that makes me the expert in this case (please see the link to the email correspondance I provided). If anyone else out there loves Matrox support and has nothing but happy-fuzzy-bunny-warm feelings for them, please put me in touch with your support guy ;)

I've experienced iit a great deal myself as well, but as a reviewer of the Analogue and Digital TripleHead2Go products, my experience is not indicative of a normal support scenario.

...thats a lot of if's and assumptions that, I personally don't think the average consumer is going to experience before buying a product like this.

The average consumer does not buy a TripleHead2Go. You buy high-end and somewhat esoteric hardware, you should be expected to understand its operations and the limits of those operations.

JohnnyWakko · Post by **JohnnyWakko** » 28 Nov 2007, 08:32

DELETED: Information after the fact rendered my record breaking length post irrelavent and a total time waste. Should have seen it, it was HUGE!

Post by **Mach1.9pants** » 28 Nov 2007, 08:54

To be fair to the guy, JohnnyW, the Matrox site lists GuildWars as a supported game. No where on the site does it mention that you may see less than you would with your plain old single monitor due to games being VERT-.
And according to Matrox:
" For a game to be included in the list of supported games above, it has to meet the following criteria:
1. The game supports a TripleHead resolution either natively or through editable configuration files or registry entries.
2. The in-game FOV (Field of View) must be adjustable to an appropriate wide-angle FOV.
3. There are no known graphical anomalies for in-game 3D rendering of 3D scene on TripleHead."
The key bit being point 2, in GW you are stuck with the same rubbish as Bioshock before the Racer_S hack. I really can't see that any game on the supported list should be anything but natively or 'cfg' tweaking HOR+. I reckon that Matrox are not being strictly honest when they include GW on their supported games list!

JohnnyWakko · Post by **JohnnyWakko** » 28 Nov 2007, 09:15

DELETED: Information after the fact (thanks 9.1 for informing me) rendered my record breaking length post irrelavent and a total time waste. Should have seen it, it was HUGE!

EDIT: Hey, I thought I deleted this post! Sorry 1.9, I deleted it forever. It was a good post though, but was irrelevant seeings TH2G said they supported that game, which I thought they didn't mention it.

Post by **Mach1.9pants** » 28 Nov 2007, 10:11

[quote]DELETED: Information after the fact (thanks 9.1 for informing me) rendered my record breaking length post irrelavent and a total time waste. Should have seen it, it was HUGE!

LOL, PM it to me! I assume you are getting it all backwards being downunder and 9.1 is 1.9? I wish I had made it to mach9.1 :shock:

SergiLlop · Post by **SergiLlop** » 20 Dec 2007, 01:21

Brokunn is absolutely right. WOW has the same problem, and it's VERY annoying. I ended not using TH2GO for WOW.

Several users and myself asked Matrox about this issue, through their official forum (which they conviniently eliminated) but they did NOTHING to help us, claiming it was Blizzard fault. Well, maybe it's true, but Matrox SHOULD NOT say that WOW and several other games as the one being discussed in this thread, support TH2GO because they don't.

KreK · Post by **KreK** » 20 Dec 2007, 19:24

Can anyone of the administrators please change the Guild Wars screenshot on this page:

http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/wiki/index.php/Surround_Gaming

It really does look like false advertising, and my guess is that someone looking into surround gaming might come to the wrong conclusion about getting much wider views in Guild Wars.

illogique · Post by **illogique** » 21 Dec 2007, 00:05

how did they make that shot anyway?

Widescreen Gaming Forum