Widescreen Gaming Forum

I PMed Paddy this question and he reccomended that I post it up here so I am in case anyone has any thoughts on the matter.

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Hello,
I have been a huge fan of this site for ages. I have been widescreen gaming for years but have never really considered trying the whole surround gaing thing with multiple monitors.

I recently was looking at some threads you started featuring "grid" Although I am not a racing sim fan... that game looks absolutely beautiful on those screens! Needless to say it enticed me a bit.

So down to my question.

I currently own a 22" Samsung 225BW. I am purchasing a HP LP3065 in the next few weeks. I did some measuring and found that my 22" is the same size (physically) when tipped on its side in portrait mode. If I picked up another one of these Samsung 225BW's could I use this tripleHead thing? Secondly... My setup is a bit complicated. I also am a digital photographer so I use a macbook pro connected to my screen as well. Is it possible to use the triplehead with my Macbook pro setup as well as with my PC. So in theory.. THe mac would be connected and using the 3 screens in addition to the laptop screen. and the pc would use just the 3 screens. Am I getting into trouble here?

Also... I am mainly an FPS player. When playing FPS games like COD4, would I be able to use only the middle screen and use the side screens for other things like running ventrilo or whatnot. I suppose that would mean running the game in windowed mode.

Sorry if this PM doesn't make much sense. But you seem to me to be very intelligent and probably understand what I am asking.

Regards,
Brad

Hi Brad ...
eeek ... not easy to answer ... Laughing

Using the TripleHead2Go you can't have individual monitors rotated/turned on there side ...
It is possible though with SoftTH ... http://www.kegetys.net/SoftTH/

Regarding your Macbook Pro ...
Firstly let me mention I know nothing about Mac's ... that said ...
I'm not sure what you are asking ... at the moment you have one screen and your notebook ...
If I understand correctly ... your PC is connected to one input on your monitor and your notebook to another ... you then switch between the two inputs.
You should be able to do the same thing when using the TH2G.
The notebook connected to any of the secondary inputs to the monitors.

Also the TH2G works with Mac Book Pro ... should you want that in TripleHead too.
Take a look here .3.. http://www.matrox.com/graphics/en/solutions/mac/
and here ... http://www.matrox.com/graphics/en/solutions/mac/choice/ ... it says ...
Quote:
Why TripleHead2Go Digital Edition:
Dual-link DVI conne33ctivity offers a purely digital connection from system to displays3
Adds up to three external digital monitors to your system for maximum onscreen real estate
Can use notebook's LCD alongside three external displays


Here is another thing worth considering ...
I have never tried it but as the TH2Go has two inputs ... one digital and one analogue ... maybe you would be able to run both your PC and your mac in TH.
Here is a Matrox connection diagram I have added the text showing a possible connection setup for you ...



I guess it would mean (in this configuration as opposed to connecting your Mac directly to one of your monitors) that you would have to have either your Mac or your PC turned on but not both ... I'm not entirely sure.


Regarding playing a game on the centre screen and having other things running on the side screens ... yes you would have to have the game running in a window.
CoD4 can work in TH and believe me once you try it in TH you will not want to play it on a single screen ever again ... Laughing
I can't play any game on a single screen any more it just doesn't feel right after playing in TripleHead.
Take a look at the fix for CoD4 here .. http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/node/8385
It isn't perfect as there are some Punkbuster issues and dopefish is still working on the fix for the latest patch.
Here are some screens ... http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/node/

Another thing worth mentioning is the current lack of widescreen resolutions with the TH2G ... take a look here ... http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/node/7651
SoftTH can do widescreen, rotation and different aspect ratios etc. (as I mentioned earlier) there is some info on that also in the thread.
I am sure that Matrox will be working on the lack of widescreen resolutions as it would be in their best interests but when they will sort it no one knows and Matrox don't seem to want to comment on future features.

I hope that answers some of your questions ...

BTW ... You should have posted your questions on the forum as I'm sure others would want to know this stuff and there may be others that could help you more than I can ...
Never mind ... no big deal ...


Cheers ...........

PaddyWak

So how do I switch between the digital and anologue inputs on the TH2G?

Thanks!

B

I think you may need to get two DTH2Go boxes. You could run each one digital, and then switch between the inputs on your monitor

The TH2Gd has an analog and a digital input for peeps to use one or the other, not both. And if I were to hazard a guess, I'm thinking plugging both, 1 to pc, 1 to mac would confuse the (censored) out of the TH2Gd, especially when it comes to monitor IEID and whatnot.

You could probably get away with plugging/unplugging dvi or svga depending which of mac or pc you use, how the TH2Gd will manage that however I have no idea.

Switchboxes are mostly out of the question as they are mostly for 1 source 2 displays and not 2 sources 1 display.

As Ibrin said, 2 TH2Gd seems to be the only viable option.

I think a KVM switch would work, wouldn't it?

http://www.aten.com/products/productItem.php?pid=20080107103319001&psid=20070130114411002&pcid=20070130111333003&layerid=subClass3

this is the only one i could find, supporting high enough resolutions.

I would buy 2 triple heads... but the thing with that is that each of my monitors need to have at least 2 dvi inputs no? My sammy has only a dvi and a vga.

you don't need two TH2Gs:

Monitors -> TH2G -> KVM Switch Output

PC -> KVM Switch Input1
MacBook -> Kvm Seitch Input2

Hmm, had forgotten about kvms, I think some rare ones have dual dvi or something. That might work.

And please ignore my switchbox part in my previous reply, it should have been '2 sources 1 display and not 1 source 2 displays.' which would work, provided the res. was supported.

The switchboxes I've had have issues just getting to 1920x1080/1920x1200 though so nevermind 3840x1024.

Don't think I've seen a dual-link one but that wouldn't work since the TH2G uses 2 single link dvi cables. So a dual-dvi kvm seems to be the only viable option, and for that price, may as well buy another TH2G.

So far the only dual head dvi switch I've found is:
http://www.avocent.ca/products/sv/switchviewsc8_dvi.asp

Severely overkill and most likely more expensive than a TH2G.

-edit- found a probably cheaper one:
http://www.startech.com/item/SV231DVIDDU-2-Port-StarView-Dual-DVI-USB-KVM-Switch-with-Audio.aspx

Still, TH2G wins.

I would buy 2 triple heads... but the thing with that is that each of my monitors need to have at least 2 dvi inputs no? My sammy has only a dvi and a vga.

You can use VGA inputs too, but then you'll have to buy optional DVI --> VGA adapters for your secondary TripleHead2Go.

In addition, you should be able to mix VGA and DVI connections:
http://www.matrox.com/graphics/en/products/gxm/th2go/faq/#31

I thought on the TH2Gd you could use 1 of either dvi or vga input but the 3 outputs remained digital?

I thought on the TH2Gd you could use 1 of either dvi or vga input but the 3 outputs remained digital?

Outputs can be either digital or analog, but DVI-to-VGA adapters are not included in the TripleHead2Go package. They are optional "upgrades".

The three Digital TripleHead2Go outputs are DVI-I (DVI integrated), meaning they output analogue and digital signals. They are just like the DVI-I connections on modern GPUs, which means they can be adapted to VGA with simple adapters without difficulty.

All I was saying is that there's no link between input and output,

if input is digital you can output analog or digital
same if input is analog too.

I'd like to save someone else the headaches I spent buying 2 different KVM switches and spending 2 days trying to make the T2G DVI work through them with a WinXP and Win7 PC. They just won't do it. The second one I bought was an IOGear GSC1782, which supports high resolutions and DDC, but when you feed the TripleHead2Go DVI with it, you get only the #1 display. Without the KVM in the loop the T2G works great.

So I am returning the KVM switch. If anyone ever manages to pull this off I would like to know how they did it and what KVM they found which will carry the 3840x1024 needed for the 3 displays. When the KVM is in use, the display only has 3 resolutions available, which top out at 1280x1024 x 1. The GXM program doesn't list any higher than that until I remove the KVM switch. Then it lists the selections needed for triple displays.

I also tried to use a DVI to VGA adapter on the output of the KVM, to try and send it to the T2G's VGA input and try that, but the displays remained dark. I know the VGA input works because I have used it when I did not have the KVM switch.