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Cheapest triple head card, web browsing only

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Plugers

Senior member
I have 3 19" LCD on my workbench for working on projects to pull up schematics, videos, forum threads, ect.

2 are DVI 1 is VGA (unfortunately the Comp recyclers didn't have 3 identical models)

All 3 have a native resolution of 1280x1024.

What is the cheapest route? Currently my MB supports dual with a Nvidia 6150.

Looks like when I plug in a dedicated GPU it shuts the onboard off.

Thanks
 
Can you double-check the BIOS settings? There is no good reason why the motherboard should force disable the onboard.

On my Asus motherboard, I can select an option to always disable the onboard, an "auto" mode that will disable onboard when a discrete video card is detectes, and an 'always enable' mode that lets me use both simultaneously. Hopefully your motherboard is similar, and maybe it's set to auto mode and you need to change it to always enable mode? Then you can just use your onboard video for up to 2 displays, and then a discrete video card for the additional displays.
 
I checked the BIOS. gives my the options PCI/PCI-E/On board. As primary boot device. In every case, well pci-e or on board, my on board turned off when a card was added.

I don't have a pci card atm.
 
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lehtv said:
2x DVI cards are rather expensive. Get a card with VGA+HDMI+DVI and a HDMI to DVI cable.

Sapphire 5450 1GB $32 ($17 AR) + Bytecc HDMI->DVI-D $10
Click to expand...

I dont think that will work. Low-end cards typically have a hard limit of dual monitor support. It's only the high end ones that support three out of the box, and even then you need to use a specific setup (IIRC I think it's VGA OR DVI + HDMI + Displayport).

Alternatively, you could just buy a DVI or VGA > USB adapter. Once the drivers are installed, it detects that monitor as a USB device. It's what we used at my last job for those blessed with three monitors. They can be a little sketchy sometimes if you're changing resolutions or using full screen apps/games, but it's better than spending $400 on a GPU just to run excel on three screens.
 
Dstoop said:
I dont think that will work. Low-end cards typically have a hard limit of dual monitor support. It's only the high end ones that support three out of the box, and even then you need to use a specific setup (IIRC I think it's VGA OR DVI + HDMI + Displayport).
Click to expand...

If that's the case then the newegg page has false advertising.

O33AXrb.png
 
lehtv said:
Can you even have NVIDIA and AMD drivers working simultaneously?
Click to expand...
yes, win7 supports 2 different mfg drivers.
lehtv said:
If that's the case then the newegg page has false advertising.

O33AXrb.png
Click to expand...

newegg and pretty much every one else go off of a template that cuts and pastes from a model feature set. most of the low end evergreen cards with vga outs were 50/50 on eyefinity being enabled, it was entirely dependent on the particular manufacturer and you have to go to their site and check the model # to be absolutely sure.



the OP needs to tell us what kind of m/b he has and what slots are available.

the cheapest single card might be a nvidia 640 but you would have to use dvi to dvi, hdmi to dvi, dvi to adapter to vga. not sure if the lower end kepler cards supports 3+ monitors or not.

other wise a 5670 6750 7750 or anything in that range would work but you would need to buy a displayport to vga adapter.
 
Plugers said:
I checked the BIOS. gives my the options PCI/PCI-E/On board. As primary boot device. In every case, well pci-e or on board, my on board turned off when a card was added.

I don't have a pci card atm.
Click to expand...

That's potentially a good sign - my interpretation of "primary" is that it implies there could be a secondary. If there couldn't be a secondary, a better description would have been to say "active," or perhaps simply omitted the word "primary" altogether. The fact that they use "primary" as a description gives me hope.

Also, to use my example motherboard, it too has the option of setting which display is the primary display. But that is separate from the other setting of whether to use the integrated graphics in a mode that is auto/always enabled/always disabled.

Such an independent option could be buried somewhere in the BIOS options. Could you provide more info on your motherboard, maybe we can independently verify the info/options and see if there is a way to get the onboard graphics to work simultaneously with a very inexpensive ($10?) discrete video card .
 
MB is Asus M2NPV-VM.

1 PCI-E 1X
1 PCI-E 16X
2 PCI

Are available.

Computer recyclers only had ATI cards, was thinking I should stay with Nvidia as on board is the same.
 
Threw an old ATI x300 in and if I select pci-e as primary in the BIOS I can load drivers and use that monitor. Then I tried going back in the BIOS to change on board back to primary, after that the x300 isn't found and if I try to reload the driver the installer says no compatible hardware found.

So as it sits with an ATI card, I can only have one or the other working.
 
What about nVidia disabling their graphics when AMD is used. Or, is that only if you attempt to do PhysX while an AMD card is in use?
 
3DVagabond said:
What about nVidia disabling their graphics when AMD is used. Or, is that only if you attempt to do PhysX while an AMD card is in use?
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's just PhysX, so if you want PhysX, don't install an AMD card. There are driver hacks out there, but from my understanding, they aren't the most reliable solution.
 
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