Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

I posted awhile back asking advice on where to get the hardware to run 4 monitors. Well, I got the stuff in the mail and got it all set up. Here's what I'm running:

4 Samsung 213Ts (21.3 in flat-panel monitors)
Xentera GT 4 (256 MB DDR video card, PCI, 4 DVI outputs)

This is the computer I already had, that I'm currently running this on:

HP Media Center 1070
- 520 Pentium 4
- 512 RAM

While by no means am I computer illiterate, I'm in a bit over my head with this system. Since I installed everything, my computer is running extremely slowly. CPU usage hovers around 15% with no applications running, and jumps to about 40% when I run poker clients, Poker Tracker, PlayerView, Firefox, and iTunes. But when I try and move windows or load new windows, the computer drags tremendously.

The video card claims as system requirements:
-Windows 2000 or XP compatible (Pentium 4 recommended)
-128 MB RAM, 256 recommended.

I obviously meet these requirements, so I'm not sure why my computer would be running so slowly. If I simply buy more RAM, is this likely to fix the problem? Should I just go ahead and dump the machine I've got in lieu of something more powerful all around? Is the problem possibly caused by something on my system that I can fix? (I looked at all the processes running under Task Manager, but I don't konw enough to recognize what I can and cannot delete.)

I just got the system set up very late last night, and by the time I woke up today the customer support numbers I have were closed.

cool site
 

"I looked at all the processes running under Task Manager, but I don't konw enough to recognize what I can and cannot delete."

This might help:

http://www.answersthatwork.com/Taskl...s/tasklist.htm

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Are all the proper video drivers installed? Sound drivers? Having either of the two impproperly installed will cause this situation, I recently experienced it myself when I got a new card for my 2001FP.

Make sure you remove the old drivers BEFORE you install the new ones, this is key as well. Hope this helps!

Good luck!

-Arthur

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Pictures please!

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Arthur,

Check

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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Pictures please!

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Yeah, if someone wants to host the image for me, I'll send it.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

[ QUOTE ]
Yeah, if someone wants to host the image for me, I'll send it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Send it to me (email is in my profile) and i will host for you

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

I can't offer you too much advice, but...

512mb ram really isn't much, especially if your running XP.

I just bought 1 GB of dual channel RAM from newegg for $72, and for what you just paid for your setup, that's a small price for a huge upgrade.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Yeah, if you are running all that stuff you definately could use the extra ram.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

yeah, I think I'll buy another 1.5 GB of RAM, and see if that does the trick.

What is the difference between the different types of RAM out there?

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

first, you need to know how many open memory slots your PC has.

if you have 2 slots, then I think you'll want dual channel RAM - my understanding is that you get 2 pieces of RAM working together in dual channel mode, making each of them run faster than 2 individual sticks of ram would run.

if you only have 1 open slot, then you'll want to buy a single stick of 1 GB or 512mb.

you'll also need to be sure that the speed of ram you buy is compatible with your pc. if you have a newish pc, then this shouldn't be a problem. (I think)

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Motherboard has to support dual channel, and I've never seen gigantic improvements from dual channel ddr setups anyway. anandtech or arstechnica will have better explanations about memory and current configurations. Whether it has two slots or not has nothing to do with whether it supports dual channel or not. And don't buy into the gamer timed matched 300 dollar supertimed hype [censored] that gaming rig ricers like to spew out.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Is it only sluggish when you have the 4 monitors connected? It would seem that your system might be the culprit because no matter how you look at it, 4 tables at 1600x1200 is a HUGE amount of bandwith to display.

1600x1200x24bpp/8= 5.76MB per refresh per screen!

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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4 tables at 1600x1200 is a HUGE amount of bandwith to display.

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Yes it is. This goes beyond the current state of my knowledge but I really think trying to move that much data through the PCI bus is most likely the problem. AGP would be better. PCI Express is probably the right thing.

Try setting all four monitors to a much lower resolution -- like to 800x600 -- just as an experiment. If that makes things run at a normal speed, even with stuff open on all screens ...

More RAM might help a little bit but if the above experiment makes a big difference you've got to do something else to gain bandwidth for those 213T's ... so don't waste money on memory your new computer won't be able to use.

You might wamt to consider a dual processor set-up with PCI Express to handle the load you're trying to push around.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

this thread is very amusing. thanks dude!

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Holy crap terry--I didn't realize he was running this on the PCI bus!

That is your problem, the pci bus cannot handle that much bw

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

wow...four 21" flat panels...i gotta see this!!!!!!!

Are there mobos out there that have multiple agp slots?

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

i think ...correct me if i'm wrong someone...but the new SLI motherboards allow you to use two of the new PCI Express cards together.

I doubt thats really necessary for this--I expect normal AGP and a decent 256MB card will prob do it fine.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

you are missing the point about quad-dvi. Standard PCI is a bottleneck here.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

The current PCI Bus on most computers is around 133MB/second, depending on how new it is and exactly which standard is followed. Quite honestly I didn't see how one of the posters figured he got you at ~6MB/second for refreshing, and how that pushes it over. Perhaps he meant gigs, I'm unsure. In any event, that is quite possibly the culprit, although I'm not totally sure of it.

For the future, though, and on a setup as nice as 4x 21" panels, I'd probably rethink my motherboard and get one with at least 1 PCIX, although currently AGP and PCIX don't have many differences at all since nothing needs more bandwidth than AGP can offer, although in the future this will not be true and PCIX will be able to be utilized to its fullest potential.

Sorry I can't provide more concrete help, hopefully this information will guide you. Good luck in solving the problem.

-Arthur

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Not sure PCI is really your bottleneck.
See this card.

4 DVI outputs at up to 1600x1200 all supposedly out of a single PCI slot.

The same company's site also features several other PCI and AGP cards taht can be used in combination to also get you up to 4x 1600x1200.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

[ QUOTE ]
Not sure PCI is really your bottleneck.
See this card.

4 DVI outputs at up to 1600x1200 all supposedly out of a single PCI slot.

The same company's site also features several other PCI and AGP cards taht can be used in combination to also get you up to 4x 1600x1200.

[/ QUOTE ]

What I was saying was:
1600x1200x24bpp/8= 5.76MB per refresh per screen. So you have 4 screens refreshing at 60Hz
5.76MB x 4 x 60 = 1.3Gb/s of data. Now you know that some of that will be buffered by the onboard 256 of memory but if he has a lot going on you will see sluggishness in the screens.

PCI has a max bandwidth of 132MB/s = 4bytes x 33Mhz. That is the MAX, not taking into account the protocol overhead and all the other devices using the same bus.

Just try disabling 2 or 3 of the screens and see if you still have the same sluggishness. If it speeds up, you have your culprit.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Generally the video card to use when using more than 2 monitors is a Matrox branded card. They are not so great of 3D, but the best in the business for 2D and multi-monitors. Most wallstreet trading stations use Matrox video cards so I am told.

Since I assume you will be doing mostly business applications and poker on your system, this is no doubt the way to go. The only problem is that the AGP bus is not designed to hold the bandwith of 4 monitors (from what I recall), so until recently these video cards were mostly PCI... and slow. Really slow. Now that the PCI Express video cards from Matrox are hitting the market you can have a whip-fast system. The only problem is you will also have to buy a new motherboard, ram and processor to go along with the new video card. I reccomend anything compatable with the AMD64 series, they are all fast and very afordable.

TT [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

TT knows PCs?

I'm so impressed!

The Doc

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Thanks for all the input guys. I disabled two monitors and it runs completely fine. Are you guys really that sure that the PCI slot is the problem?

The guy (who allegedly builds these multi-mon systems for traders) I talked to on the phone when I bought this stuff seemed to know what he was talking about, and per his recommendation I got the PCI card. I told him what type of computer I had, and off the top of his head he told me that my motherboard wouldn't support a quad-display from the PCIe slot, but that it would from the PCI slot.

At this point, is it worth it to go out and buy some RAM and see if that fixes the problem, or do I just need to get a whole new system - one built buy one of these companies specifically for multi-monitor displays?

Thanks again for the help guys, and Astro I'm glad to amuse you.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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At this point, is it worth it to go out and buy some RAM and see if that fixes the problem, or do I just need to get a whole new system

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I disabled two monitors and it runs completely fine.

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You answered your own question. I don't think that adding RAM will help you. I also am not convinced that you need a whole new system. I'm afraid the guy you are talking to might not know what is going on.

Why didn't he recommend the PCIe version of your card?

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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Why didn't he recommend the PCIe version of your card?

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Because he was afraid he was going to lose a sale if he also had to get The Dude to upgrade his motherboard, processor and RAM. And also perhaps because PCI-E videocards just hit the market within the past few months and are still hard to find.

Forget it Dude, out of your element.(always wanted to say that [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]). Don't buy new ram, it will only be a waste. Send back the PCi card and instead get a new mother board, new ram, and new procesor. If you PM me I can help you out, I build my own computers (faster, more efficent, and much cheeper). Or I can help find a comercial computer pre-built that includes everything you need.

TT [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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Why didn't he recommend the PCIe version of your card?

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he told me that my motherboard wouldn't support a quad-display from the PCIe slot, but that it would from the PCI slot.

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His company sells the PCIe version of my card for $160 more than the PCI, so I don't know why he would recommend the PCI over the PCIe unless my motherboard really won't support it, or he just didn't know what he was talking about.

Why would manufacturers make 4 DVI output PCI cards if they're so worthless? And why does dropping down to 2 monitors confirm that it's not a RAM issue?

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Some poker clients are notorious resource hogs. To determine if more RAM will help (do this after having everything running) : Press CTRL-ALT-DEL –> Click the Performance tab. Look at the Commit Charge.

The Peak Commit Charge is the most RAM your computer has tried to use during the current session. If it is higher than your amount of physical RAM (512000), your machine is using the hard drive as virtual memory and that will be very slow. If that’s the case, more RAM will help – if not, you are going to have to get more processing power.

The guy didn’t lie to you about PCI Express. Unless your computer is very new and came with it, your motherboard doesn’t support it. PCI-E cards do not fit in a PCI or AGP slot.

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I run poker clients, Poker Tracker, PlayerView, Firefox, and iTunes.

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I can’t say for sure, but I think the stock trader software probably doesn’t put the kind of load on a system that you are putting on yours. I don’t think they are running a big, constantly updating internal database and a bunch of applications, but are instead running basically one program that just displays information downloaded over some sort of network.

Any way you look at, that’s a lot of data being moved around on your system and a faster / better computer with either dual processors or a 64 bit system would definitely help.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

4-DVI PCI cards are probably not worthless if:

1) you're not running 4 1600 x 1200 monitors

2) you're not moving stuff around, and have something like stock tickers on 1 or 2

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

More RAM isn't a waste, 1GB is the min anyone should have who does any type of multi-tasking - especially with 16 tables of poker + PT + whatever else he runs.

Will it fix this specific problem? Probably not. Will it help overall system performance? Yes.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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The guy didn’t lie to you about PCI Express. Unless your computer is very new and came with it, your motherboard doesn’t support it. PCI-E cards do not fit in a PCI or AGP slot.

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My motherboard has a PCI-E slot on it. The video card I used to run dual monitors was a PCI-E card. Is it possible for my motherboard to have that slot, but still not be compatible with a quad-display video card?

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

no.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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Just try disabling 2 or 3 of the screens and see if you still have the same sluggishness. If it speeds up, you have your culprit.

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I did that, and the computer runs fine on 2 monitors. I then pulled up 12 tables, Poker Tracker, Player View, Outlook Express, iTunes, AIM, and Firefox. My peak commit charge was 534000, so it definately looks like I need more RAM.

So here's my question for you guys. Assuming this guy I talked to misunderstood what motherboard I had, and that the PCI-E card will work on my computer (meaning I don't have to buy a new computer, should I just swap the PCI card for the PCI-E and buy more RAM, or should I just go ahead and buy a new computer anyway?

How much money would I have to spend to get a completely new comp that would easily handle the load I'm trying to give it?

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Hmmm ... you have a PCI-E slot and he sold you a PCI ... I would tend to get my information from another source. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

If you are positive you have a PCI-E slot (look it up for yourself, or take the easy way out and post which board you have here – some of us are probably sucker enough to check it out for you) then switching to the better card (and it is much better for your purposes) and adding another stick of RAM will definitely make a difference. Whether the difference is “enough” is something you can only find out by trying it. I think it is probably worth a shot, though.

Since your system is now marginal in its ability to handle what you are trying to make it do, tweaking it will still leave it marginal, even if you succeed.

You can take a look at the custom system configurator at monarchcomputer.com to get a ballpark figure for a dual processor or 64 bit system. If you decide to go the new computer route, I think you really need to go for something powerful rather than messing around trying to get something that will just “work”, but it’s gonna cost you.

BTW, thanks for an interesting thread. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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If you are positive you have a PCI-E slot (look it up for yourself, or take the easy way out and post which board you have here – some of us are probably sucker enough to check it out for you)

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Hey, man. I may be over my head with this system, but I know a PCI-E slot when I see one. It's there.

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If you decide to go the new computer route, I think you really need to go for something powerful rather than messing around trying to get something that will just “work”, but it’s gonna cost you.


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How powerful are we talking, and how much is it going to run me. Since you admitted to being sucker enought to look up my motherboard, are you sucker enough to post a link to a comnputer that fits my needs well?

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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are you sucker enough to post a link to a comnputer that fits my needs well?


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No. If I started doing that sort of research it would take me several days ... and I would want one.

Just keep in mind that you do not want a high-powered gaming machine. Your needs are very different from the Alienware type stuff that is aimed at providing super framerates on one monitor for one game. You need serious computing power as well as data moving ability – that’s why I keep mentioning dual processor or 64 bit systems.

If I were in your situation, I would try a PCI-E card and a stick of RAM first. That might very well hold you til the prices start to come down on the stuff that is cutting edge right now.

If you really want to go for the new set up, I would tend to look for lots of processing power (to run the multiple applications) AND fast FSB (Front Side Bus) to be able to move lots of data ... and PCI-E would be a must. Sorry, but I really can’t be any more specific than that cuz I just haven’t researched such a system.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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Hey, man. I may be over my head with this system, but I know a PCI-E slot when I see one. It's there.

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Dude: How old is your computer? If it is 1/2 year old or less, you MIGHT have a PCI-E slot. PCI-E is brand new technology, something that wasn't possible until recently. My guess is you actually have a plain vanilla PCI slot (actually, you might have 3 or more) and you might be confusing the two.

The reason why PCI video cards can handle 4 monitors for stock traders is because trading apps don't need to screen refresh quickly, so slow performance is not an issue.

TT [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

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My guess is you actually have a plain vanilla PCI slot (actually, you might have 3 or more) and you might be confusing the two.

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I have a PCI-E slot. I use an HP Media Center PC m 1070m. You can look it up if you're that convinced I don't know what I'm talking about, but it's there.

Re: Trouble With 4 Monitors
 

Since your Peak usage is high, adding RAM will make a very big difference. That in itself might solve the whole problem.

Since you do indeed have a PCI-E slot, using it will also make a meaningful difference. Exchange that sucker – it’s a bet you can’t lose.

Your motherboard will support up to a 3.4 GHz Pentium. The difference there would be smaller than the other upgrades, but getting the one with the 2MB cache would be more likely to be a meaningful difference than the 1MB cache.

My money says RAM and PCI-E does it for you.