Max no. of displays M17x can run?

Hi, seeing that the 6970m is really powerful, is it possible to run multiple displays from an R3?

I have one monitor via hdmi, but it doesn't let me drive another one through the vga... haven't checked the display port.

Is it possible at all to drive 3 or more monitors from the m17x?

Thanks!
Carthik

 

I know that you can hook up 1 monitor at least as an "extended" desktop lolz. We're supposed to be able to do "Eyefinity" or watever, so that's 3 total monitors, righT?

 

Yea thats what I was thinking - I mean it has 3 ports and the graphics card should be able to drive them easily... so not sure why its not allowing me a third.

 

Eyefinity technically supports up to 5 monitors, not sure if that's a single setup though.

 

Eyefinity is actually six screens at once
AMD Eyefinity Technology for Consumers


I can do 5 off my Elitebook 4 plus onboard LCD, on a desktop many cards just have 6 outputs ( HDMI and DP )

you should be able to run the VGA and ONE digital output at once, but it depends on how Dell impleimented it. VGA + LVDS or HDMI or DVI at minimum I would think

 

You can run two external plus the laptop screen. I have seen Eyefinity used on the 5870's.(three external screens). The issue with the R2 not letting Eyefinity work was the OSD program might be the same for the R3.

YouTube - ‪Alienware M17xR2 Proof of ATI Eyefinity with Bezel Compensation‬‏

 

Hello folks,

I have been searching for a long time on internet about "how to add 2 external monitors to an alienware m17x r3 laptop" so in total I could have 3 monitors (2 external monitors + laptop's lcd monitor), but I could not find a real solution.

My m17x r3 has these ports on it:
(1x) HDMI-1.4 output with Audio
(1x) HDMI-1.3 input with Audio
(1x) mini-Display Port
(1x) VGA Port (DB-15)

My video graphics card on m17x r3 is:
1.5GB GDDR5 Nvidia GeForce GTX 460M

I want to add 2 external monitors to it, so I can have more space than laptop's lcd default screen size (1920x1080) and I can use 2 external monitors as extended screens of my laptop's lcd screen.

I read something about "eyefinity" & "Bezel Compensation" and there is also a "display port" solution with active/passive dp adapters on this link:
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/279498-33-displayport-adapter-eyefinity
but I did not understand anything.
There is also USB-to-DVI external graphics cards/converters, check this link:
IOGEAR - GUC2020DW6 - USB 2.0 External DVI Video Card
and it says "you can add 6 monitors to any laptop" (you will need 1 usb-to-dvi external graphics card for each monitor)


Is there a way to do that without buying any new device(adapters, converters etc.), by just using m17x r3's features??

I will be very happy if you help me about that.
Thank you!

 

If you even want to have a chance at running 3 total displays you will have to buy an adapter of some form, unless you purchase a displayport monitor.

Eyefinity is an ATI technology, you cannot use it with the 460m, but you should be able to do 3 independent displays.

Monitor 1 = Laptop Monitor
Monitor 2 = HDMI
Monitor 3 = DisplayPort (either with active DP adapter, passive DP adapter or DP capable monitor)

I have 3 monitors at home that are DP/HDMI/DVI/VGA capable, and I have just ordered a MiniDP to DP adapter. On Tuesday when it comes in I will hook up those 3 monitors in the order of HDMI, DP and VGA as well as attempt to run the built in display to see what all is supported.

 

Every attempt to get 2 external displays working has failed for me. Both external displays support HDMI though and my understanding of the ATI tech on this is that you can only do this with displayport capable monitors or something called a passive adapter which I guess I don't have. I have some mini DP to HDMI adapters but they will only allow one or the other monitor to work. Never both.

Cheers,

 

A miniDP to HDMI adapter IS a 'passive adapter', for Eyefinity to work you need an actual DP monitor or an ACTIVE adapter. Fortunately those are reasonably inexpensive now (they used to be kinda expensive).

For ex:
Newegg.com - POWERCOLOR Video Adapter ACTIVE MDP TO SL DVI-D ADAPTER-C Mini DisplayPort to DVI Interface (MiniDP) $24.99

Newegg.com - SAPPHIRE Active DisplayPort Adapter 100924 DisplayPort to DVI Interface (Standard DP) $26.99

However, even with an ACTIVE DP adapter or a DP monitor, I'm not sure if more than 2 monitors will work on NVidia based machines simply because Eyefinity with the use of DP is an ATI technology. Has nothing to do with NVidia.

 

So in Layman's terms, to run 3 Monitors on the m17x (2 external), one needs:
2 Monitors (Obviously)
1 HDMI
1 Active (mini-?) DisplayPort to VGA/DVI/HDMI

Is this correct? Has anyone had success with multiple externals?

 

+1

if you have gotten it to work, could you please post a picture or two to show it off??

thanks!

 

Seems to be the case, it may also be required that your graphics card be an ATI card. Someone with an nvidia card that has managed more than 2 displays will have to dispute this.

Again my mini mini dp adapter for my dp capable monitors will be here tuesday and I will be able to post the capabilities I find more accurately

 

Mini DP or DP? Which one does the Alienware have?

And if we do have an ATI/AMD card, running more is possible with USB-to-DP adapters, correct?

 

The laptop has a mini dp connection. I'm not familiar with usb to dp, but using such as that would be for 2d only as it could not take advantage of the 3d card

 

I guess I'm shocked that technology would be shared between Mac & PC laptops. What would the miniDP ports on mac be found?

Also I recall reading an engadget link about Mini-DP to HDMI no longer being an excepted standard.. Link can be found here. Guess we better get them before supply goes down and price goes up..

 

Macs have had mini dp for a few years now they have thunderbolt.

The adapters are fine it's the cables which are not allowed.

Cheers,

 

Oh, ok. Good to know.

Also, If Eyefinity supports up to 6 screens simultaneously, that would mean every laptop outlet would be used, right?
1.HDMI connection
2.ACTIVE mini-DP connection
3.VGA connection
Would 4 and 5 be USB connections and 6 be the laptop monitor?

 

Eyefinity supports up to 6 screens, that does not mean our laptops or graphics cards can. There are specific cards designed with 6 outputs, our machines are not them.

For example, this card has 4 DP ports and 2 DVI ports:
Newegg.com - ASUS EAH6970 DCII/2DI4S/2GD5 Radeon HD 6970 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card

There have been cards released with 6 DP ports as well.

I dont understand your reference to the USB as video outputs. If you used a USB port as a video output it would not be part of the Eyefinity setup, as I mentioned once already, since it would not be using the ATI graphics card to drive it. Aside from that, USB displays are slow, and they do not use any part of the built in graphics of a machine to function, they in essence have a 'built in' graphics card that supplies the image, using the USB simply to communicate with the system.

The MAXIMUM number of displays this machine can possibly support in an Eyefinity setup ASSUMING the specific drivers and physical characteristics of this machine would support is the following:
1: Laptop Display
2: HDMI
3: DisplayPort
4: VGA

Keep in mind, all of that working would require the support of applications like the OSD, possibly some sort of function built into the Intel drivers because of our 'switchable' graphics, and it would have to be physically designed to be capable.

Like I said, I'll be testing this on Tuesday when my adapter arrives so my full size DP monitors can plug into the mini-DP connector.

What I EXPECT is that I might be able to get 3 Displays to work, and my guess is that this is only the case on machines with ATI graphics as Eyefinity is an ATI technology and ALL of NVidia's display technologies that allow for more than 2 monitors require SLI.

NVIDIA Surround System Requirements

(With the release of Surround 3D capability, NVidia has lumped the requirements for 3D Surround and 2D Surround into the same set since they use the same drivers and cards)

 

Got it, I didn't understand how one could get 6 video outputs on a laptop, now I understand its because they don't traditionally support this many outputs.

I doubt I would ever need more than 3 screens, but I just wanted to know what the laptops are capable of. Thanks for clearing this up, Ill await your results.

 

I remember a few months ago a guy made a topic about how he had a total of 4 monitors connected to his R2 with eyefinity.

1)Laptop monitor
2)HDMI
3)Displayport
4)VGA

 

I'm still astounded that I can do extended desktop. It's so freekin cool to be playing a game while watching a tv show or the game on my external monitor lolzzzzzzz. 'Tis so damn high tech!

 

Well I've just hooked up my 3 external monitors to my laptop and at no time was I able to get 4 total displays working.

This is with ATI graphics, my guess is that NVidia graphics may be limited to only 2 displays, as I mentioned in a previous post, all of their surround technologies are based on SLI implementations.

Your choices are the following:

Built-in + VGA + HDMI
Built-in + DP + HDMI
Built-in + DP + VGA
VGA + HDMI + DP

Your highest quality option would be not to include the VGA, however if you wanted to use 3 identically sized monitors and not use the built in, you'd have to use it.

Any time I would enable the 4th it would tell me that I had to disable one of the other monitors to make it work. It would definitely detect all 4 displays however. Here are the pictures.

 

Do all the monitors have to be displayport? What model displays are you using and any adapters you employ?

Cheers,

 

Very cool, I'm glad to see a proof-of-concept on using multiple displays.

What type of mini-DP adapter did you use, passive or active? It seems like if one uses a passive mini-DP choice that monitor must also be VGA, so it would be:
1. DP-->VGA + VGA + HDMI
2. VGA + HDMI + Built-in
3. DP-->VGA + HDMI + Built-in

correct?

I cant wait to get going on some 3-monitor goodness!!

 

If you use the DP output you will need a DP adapter of some form. If your monitor supports DP natively like my ASUS VE276Q monitors do you can use a passive adapter. If it does not and you plan on doing Eyefinity for 3-monitor gaming you will need an active adapter.

Keep in mind, to do Eyefinity, one of your monitors must be seen as a TRUE DisplayPort monitor (this means it either must NATIVELY support DisplayPort OR it needs an Active DP Adapter). So for this you would need to be setup like this:

Eyefinity options:

Built-in + HDMI + Mini-DP to DP Adapter (passive) to DP native Monitor
Built-in + VGA + Mini-DP to DP Adapter (passive) to DP native Monitor
VGA + HDMI + Mini-DP to DP Adapter (passive) to DP native Monitor

Again, if your monitor is not a DisplayPort monitor, you will have to choose from the following:

Built-in + HDMI + Mini-DP to DVI or VGA ACTIVE Adapter to DVI or VGA Monitor
Built-in + VGA + Mini-DP to DVI or VGA ACTIVE Adapter to DVI or VGA Monitor
VGA + HDMI + Mini-DP to DVI or VGA ACTIVE Adapter to DVI or VGA Monitor

ATI Has a list of Eyefinity certified Adapters. Let me reiterate, to do Multimonitor EYEFINITY setups you *MUST* have a DisplayPort native monitor OR you MUST use an ACTIVE DisplayPort Adapter.

Validated Dongles:
AMD Eyefinity Validated Dongles
The vast majority are made by a company called Accell.

In that list you will see passive adapters, but read the section at the top, it specifically states that to use a passive adapter you must still have a DP native connection, those are for desktops with more than one DP output so it does not apply to us.

Some options for ACTIVE DP adapters:
Amazon.com: Accell B087B-006B UltraAV Mini DisplayPort to DVI-D Single-Link Active Adapter ATI Certified (Black): Electronics


Some others:
Newegg.com - active mini displayport adapter



All mini-DP to HDMI adapters are PASSIVE, the DP output passes HDMI information but it is NOT VALID for Eyefinity setups on these laptops. If you plan on using an HDMI input for eyefinity you will need 2 adapters. An Active DP to DVI adapter and a DVI to HDMI adapter.