Multiple Monitors and SLI/Crossfire?

[jwankel]

My understanding in the past is that when enabling SLI/Crossfire with two video cards, you had to reboot and lost the second monitor. When I learned that piece of information I stopped paying attention to the whole SLI/Crossfire idea as I'm hooked on dual displays.

Has the SLI/Crossfire and dual-monitor situation gotten any better? If I've got two monitors can I either switch into/out of SLI/Crossfire mode without rebooting? OR is there a way to maintain my second display when SLI/Crossfire is active? It's not that I care so much what's on the second screen during the game, just that when I get done gaming I want to have my two displays usable again. I've not read anything conclusive saying that it can or cannot be done and if SLI or Crossfire is better in this area.

Thanks,

Jeff

 

[Viper GTS]

Yes you can switch without rebooting, but you still lose all other displays (SLI).

Or if you use Vista x64 SLI is just broken again & you can't enable it without hosing your driver installation.

:roll:

Viper GTS

 

[rbV5]

Enabling/Disabling Crossfire doesn't require a reboot unless the "slave card" has a smaller framebuffer ala 512MB X1800XT crossfired with a 256MB x1800 XL.

I used to use a 3 monitor setup with my Crossfire rig, just disable Crossfire in the Catalyst Control panel and the other monitors just fire back up.

A profile would have been even easier (activate from the system tray), however I couldn't get a profile to work properly for enabling Crossfire.

It's possible rebooting with different sized framebuffers has been eliminated with newer drivers, I simply haven't tried it since testing my x1800XT and x1800XL quite some time ago.

Made for some cool backplate pics with a couple multiple tuner TV cards and a couple double slot graphics cards and all the cables and such, but I rarely run Crossfire anymore.

 

[jwankel]

Thanks for the quick reply. Glad to hear that the rebooting is old news.

I'd read on a forum somewhere (of course can't find the post now now) that you could somehow hook your second monitor to the second card and both displays would stay active when SLI/Crossfire was enabled...any ideas about this? If I can switch in and out with rebooting (or crashing) that is the biggest thing, but I'd like to have my cake and eat it to.

I may be forced into buying a new video card quicker than I want, so I was considering going with a lower end DX10 with an option to go SLI/Crossfire if I get the Dell 24" later this year (to replace one of my current monitors).

Thanks again,
Jeff

 

[rbV5]

I'd read on a forum somewhere (of course can't find the post now now) that you could somehow hook your second monitor to the second card and both displays would stay active when SLI/Crossfire was enabled...any ideas about this?

Sure you can hook it to the second card....shens on it working with Crossfire enabled however.