9800 pro/xt resolution capabilities with dual monitors?

[Olmy]

I can't find dual res capabilities mentioned anywhere. Can anyone suggest to me if any of these cards are able to run one monitor at 1600x1200 and another at 1280x1024 (both CRT) at OK refresh rates and 32-bit colour?

Also:

Does running these cards in this sort of configuration take much off their performance (gaming or otherwise), and even if only one monitor is being used by a program? (Not a deal breaker for me, just curious.)

And wIll the image from the DVI port to the CRT via an adapter be as good as from the VGA port? I thought I read somewhere there could be potential issues of ghosting or similar, but I might well be wrong.

Cheers.

 

[Matthias99]

The 9800 (like all recent dual monitor cards) has two independent 400Mhz RAMDACs. They can run two monitors at any resolution/refresh settings they can run one monitor at. Each monitor can be at its own settings if desired.

I don't believe it takes much (if anything) off 3D performance if the other monitor is just sitting in 2D mode. Obviously, running two 3D apps at once will kill performance, but it does that on one monitor also.

Using a DVI->VGA converter should not introduce any issues by itself. However, if you are in an electrically noisy environment, you may notice problems with an analog signal that you would not see with a digital one. And obviously it won't look as good on an LCD display as DVI would. But it shouldn't look any worse than a regular VGA signal.

 

[Olmy]

Matthias, that is extremely helpful, thank you!