PCI videocards

  • Thread starter Thread starter Jonathan Keith
  • Start date Start date
J

Jonathan Keith

Hello all,

I'm going to be building a new PC shortly to be used for video
editing, graphics work and gaming.

I want three monitors for this rig, and I would like to have a
dedicated gfx card for each monitor. As no-one makes mobos with three
AGP slots (as far as I can see), I will be looking for two PCI gfx
cards, the holy grail being ones that are DX9 ready, and out of choice
I'd prefer to buy ATI.

Can anyone give me any details of anyone who makes decent PCI cards
for a PC any more? I know ATI did make a 64 MB version of the Radeon
9000 a while back, but I think that has been discontinued. They make
Mac ones still, but would I be able to use these on a PC?


Many thanks,

Jonathan
 
Jonathan said:
Hello all,

I'm going to be building a new PC shortly to be used for video
editing, graphics work and gaming.

I want three monitors for this rig, and I would like to have a
dedicated gfx card for each monitor
Click to expand...

Why? The 9800 Pro I have, and many other cards have seperate RAMDACS for
both monitor outputs and for all intents and purposes (that I can think of)
are two seperate video adaptors.
As no-one makes mobos with three
AGP slots (as far as I can see), I will be looking for two PCI gfx
cards, the holy grail being ones that are DX9 ready, and out of choice
I'd prefer to buy ATI.
Click to expand...

You'll want a 9800, 9600 for decent DX9 performance. And just about
anything else for the other screen I'm sure a 7000 would be ok if you just
want 2D or simple 3D stuff, dirt cheap too.
Can anyone give me any details of anyone who makes decent PCI cards
for a PC any more? I know ATI did make a 64 MB version of the Radeon
9000 a while back, but I think that has been discontinued. They make
Mac ones still, but would I be able to use these on a PC?
Click to expand...

I think Sapphire are still making a PCI 9000, but it's 128MB. They do 64
and 32MB versions of the 7000.

Ben
 
Ben Pope said:
Why? The 9800 Pro I have, and many other cards have seperate RAMDACS for
both monitor outputs and for all intents and purposes (that I can think of)
are two seperate video adaptors.


You'll want a 9800, 9600 for decent DX9 performance. And just about
anything else for the other screen I'm sure a 7000 would be ok if you just
want 2D or simple 3D stuff, dirt cheap too.


I think Sapphire are still making a PCI 9000, but it's 128MB. They do 64
and 32MB versions of the 7000.

Ben
Click to expand...


You can buy a 64-meg Radeon 9100 PCI for less than $50. Has everything on
the list except full DX9 support. As fair as I know, there aren't any PCI
cards that do DX9.
 
Well, after some more research it looks like the Sapphire 128MB Radeon
9000 PCI is the front runner. Not bad for about sixty quid, either. By
the looks of things, only Sapphire and Hercules even make PCI Radeon
cards at the moment.

Unless anyone can tell me otherwise?
 
Jonathan said:
Well, after some more research it looks like the Sapphire 128MB Radeon
9000 PCI is the front runner. Not bad for about sixty quid, either. By
the looks of things, only Sapphire and Hercules even make PCI Radeon
cards at the moment.

Unless anyone can tell me otherwise?
Click to expand...

It's just not DX90 compliant :-(

Thomas
 
You can buy a 64-meg Radeon 9100 PCI for less than $50. Has everything on
the list except full DX9 support. As fair as I know, there aren't any PCI
cards that do DX9.
Click to expand...

Unless you go for a Geforce FX 5200 PCI. It may be DirectX 9 ready, but it's
performance is questionable to the point of why does it bother to be DX9
compliant?
 
3 monitors aint gonna happen....2 on a card that has dual support or if your REAL lucky 2 PCI cards, but finding a couple that will
tolerate each other will be difficult. Under windows?
 
3 monitors aint gonna happen....2 on a card that has dual support or
if your REAL lucky 2 PCI cards, but finding a couple that will
tolerate each other will be difficult. Under windows?
Click to expand...

Of course 3 monitors is "gonna happen". If nothing else he can get a
Matrox Parhelia, which is triple-head, or if he has real bucks then go
for a G450MMS which is four-head.

Doing it with DirectX 9 the only real option at this time would be a
Geforce FX board of some sort in the AGP slot with a PNY Geforce FX 5200
in the PCI--safest bet would be another PNY 5200 in the AGP so you don't
have to worry about mixing brands or architectures. That would give
support for four displays. No real reason he couldn't use a second PC
5200 to get a dedicated board for each display but I'm not sure what
that would gain. XP supports up to ten displays out of the box, so OS
support is not really an issue.
 
Back
Top