building a "wargaming" table

[c0lorlessgreen]

I want to build a kind of "wargaming table," if you will, with 8 or 9 monitors such that:
1) There will be one main monitor (everyone will see)
2) Around the table each person will have their own small monitor (one person might have two)
3) Each monitor will need video independent of each other monitor
4) Each person will need personal interfacing ability to interact with the application (ie, each person will control one factor displayed on the main screen, whether via touch-screen, keyboard, and/or mouse)
5) Each monitor should be flat-panel and have a wide viewing angle

And for the required information:
1) To explain this most simply, I'll say it's for role-playing games. I'm looking to set up something where every player around the table is able to control their own character and the GM is able to control everything on the board, where the board is displayed on the main screen.
2) My budget is unknown at this point in time. Since the graphics don't need to be anything beyond the most basic workplace graphics and processor power isn't a big concern, I don't imagine this should have too big of a price. The lower the cost, the better. Definitely under 5-digits, though. 3-digits would be nice, but I just don't see that happening.
3) I'm located in the US. As far as who makes the parts... as long as they work well and have a long lifespan.
4) I have no brand preference.
5) I have no intention of using current parts or not using current parts
6) I have searched for similar threads, but the only one I found (about an 8-monitor system) seemed to be for a MUCH different application
7) I do not plan on overclocking the system. It is not meant to be a high-performance system.


What I'm looking for are useful tips, suggestions, or even how-to's.

TIA

 

[bluehmstr]

What a really neat idea! Do you have software in mind or will you be writing your own?

One way to go would be to get any motherboard with a PCIe slot and at least two PCI slots. Use the PCIe slot with some cheap card for your main monitor, and use the other two PCI slots with something like the Matrox g450 MMS Quad PCI display (about $500 each.) That'll give you 1+8 displays. As for interactivity, you could use small USB touchscreen LCDs like the 7" Lilliput with VGA and USB interfaces (about $250 each).

The VisionTek Radeon X1650XT Quad PCIE 512MB 4PORT DVI ($390) would also be a great card to use, but it needs to be installed in a PCIex16 slot.

After re-reading your post, I realize you want joint control on the main monitor and just displays for the other players. This set up might still work if you can map the input from the little touchscreens to the main monitor. A touchscreen is just a mouse turned inside out, right? It should be possible, but I'm not sure how to go about it.

What about collaboration software?

 

[Aluvus]

Here are the problems you will have to deal with if implementing this as a single system:

1. Lots of monitors. Normal video cards support 2 displays at a time. Cards that support more monitors are available but expensive. My suggestion would be a slightly older, not-very-high-end motherboard with lots of PCI ports, plus 4 or 5 PCI video cards. If you need a full 5 PCI slots, you will find your motherboard options limited (Newegg has some newish Socket 754 stuff though).

2. Lots of inputs. There is no practical way to give everyone their own mouse cursor (I believe there are some hacks to get X.org to support 2, but that's it). Everyone would have to share a pointer, which would mean people fighting over it. No fun, unless everything is completely turn-based. Even then, you would run into issues of people moving the pointer during someone else's turn and such.

Keyboards are a little more doable, depending on the application. If each person just needs, say, 3 keys available to them, then give them each a USB keyboard and physically disable the keys they don't need. Makes sure the keys available to each user are unique. This is not a pretty solution, but it's economical. If you were up to it, you could also grab a microcontroller and bodge together a mini-keyboard for each person that only has a few keys. Or use 1 micro connected to buttons placed at each person's seat. Or rip the guts out of a keyboard and just wire switches to it.

Touch screens (or tablets, or what have you) could work, depending on the application, because they do away with some of the contention issues of using mice. You may find cost to be pretty ugly.

The alternative would be to set up multiple computers and network them. This gets past the issues outlined above, but of course means buying even more hardware. The best solution is going to depend on your application.

 

[herm0016]

what came to my mind first was getting cheap laptops for each of the people, network those to a main system that does the processing and such. you could get away with more that way as far as inputs and processing power goes because the inputs would be processed on each laptop, then the movement in the actual game can be done by the server. I am sure you could do it all with some *nix, which would help keep the cost down. if you can get some used laptops that are all the same it would be much better too.
edit:
try liquidation.com or other such sites for laptops in that sort of qty. should be able to get them cheap.

 

[n7]

Good god, this sounds nice.
And near impossible.

*scratches head*

GL with this...you're gonna need it.

 

[bluehmstr]

Keep us posted, I really want to know how this turns out.

 

[Diaonic]

When I first read what you are trying to do this is what I thought of.

Electronic Poker Table

Obviously you are going to have to have some custom software that will send different video signals to each screen and represent that character. It will also have to somehow give a unique ID to each of the screens so that each "player" is unique and that a new player could just sit down and start playing. I'm not even certain if this is possible on one computer and eight screens.


Hardware wise depending on how graphic intensive this program gets. You could probably use two of these:

4 Port Dvi

And eight touch screen monitors. I would recommend Xenarc they have sizes ranging from 7in - 15in

The other alternative is to have 8 mini atx computers with touch screens attached, but then you run into another whole batch of problems.

power consumption
price
heat



Then obviously your going to need some carpenter skills and make a table that will accommodate all these devices.

anyway, just some ideas.

Good luck

 

[c0lorlessgreen]

Unfortunately, there are two main factors that are preventing this from happening:
- a dedicated hardware build doesn't seem likely to be marketable, especially at the probably cost ($5,000+ just for monitors, or $2000+ if I only use the small monitors)
- if I use, instead of touch screens, small flat panels and touch pads, I'll still have to make custom hardware (and software), which will still put the cost too high
- if I don't use custom hardware, it won't be marketable and will be way too expensive just to build for myself

Sorry to disappoint, bluehmstr. n7, you hit it right on the head - the RPer's dream, eh?

It seems the networked laptops idea is the way to go. Now to find a bunch of old laptops for cheap. Anybody got any?

I intend at this point to pull this off with just software - build it like an older networked multi-player game.

The 4-port graphics card information will still go to use - thanks much. I couldn't find any like that for the life of me.

Thanks a bunch everyone.

 

[Skott]

This is an intersting idea/build. Why does it have to be laptops though? I would think cheap workstations would be just as good and cheaper than laptop costs in general. Wouldnt it? Or how about something like that unit the one company sells where the pc is in the keyboard? Then you just have a monitor for each person? Or some kind of cheap unit that the OP builds in place of the workstation or laptop? I'm no expert on this sorta thing but I would think there would be a cheaper option than laptops.

 

[c0lorlessgreen]

Laptops for the sake of transportability. The location isn't always the same, and we can't keep the hardware at the usual location unless it's small enough to be kept out of the way.

The table idea was for the long term, so location and transportability weren't an issue - it was intended to be built to stay in a single location.