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AMD Eyefinity multi-screen display technology analysis

Are you tired of switching back and forth between more than ten windows when working with a computer;
Do you want to enjoy the visual impact of ultra-widescreen movies in front of your computer;
Do you dream of finding enemies faster in the game and destroying them;

If your answer is yes, then you might be interested in ATI’s Eyefinity multi-display technology because it meets all of the above requirements.

We have to admit that ATI's HD5000 series graphics card is a successful product, it not only won the "first DX11 graphics card" award, but also far ahead of the competition in performance. In addition, this card also has a special technology, which is what we are going to introduce today - Eyefinity.
Eyefinity is simply a multi-screen output technology that is less expensive, more compatible, and more versatile than traditional multi-screen technology, especially in the gaming world, with the help of Eyefinity, players will gain wider The vision, the more refined picture, makes it easier to get the initiative of the game.
Let's follow the author to explore how to create a set of Eyefinity multi-screen display platform.

Multi-screen display technology history review

Speaking of multi-screen display, it is actually no stranger to some players. As early as a decade ago, this technology has been widely used, but the scope is limited only to professional fields.

At that time, the multi-screen display needs to be realized by a special adapter. Users can connect multiple monitors with one computer, and can control multiple monitors to display different or the same screen, thus effectively improving work efficiency. In fact, we are common outdoors. Many of the large screen displays are built using this principle.

However, in the early stage of this multi-display technology, since the adapter was used, there was still only one signal source, and after the adapter was transferred, signal attenuation would inevitably occur. When the number of connected displays is too large, it will seriously affect Picture quality.

In addition, this early multi-screen display only supports some professional software, not suitable for ordinary users, not to mention the application in the game.
What did Eyefinity bring to us?
Traditional multi-display technology is not only expensive, but also not ideal for software compatibility, so it is only used in professional fields for a long time. ATI's Eyefinity can be seen as an evolution of traditional multi-screen display technology. Eyefinity not only inherits the traditional technology multi-display simultaneous output features, but also provides a larger display area and resolution, and with excellent software compatibility. So that ordinary players can also experience the fun of multi-screen display.

ATI's Eyefinity technology is currently only used in HD5000 series graphics cards. It can connect up to 6 monitors at the same time. In addition, it also provides a variety of display formats. Players can choose the best combination, which makes Eyefinity's application field. It's more extensive, not only in the professional field, but more importantly, this technology will give games and movies a wider view and more powerful visual effects.

With Eyefinity technology, players in the game will gain a broader perspective. In real-time strategy games, we can see more units at the same time, and truly experience the wonderful experience of the game.

In racing games, Eyefinity technology can even provide a wrap-around screen placement. When the player switches to the car's perspective, the scenes on the side of the road are flying fast, almost the same as driving a real car.
The most dominant is the shooting game. Players will get a wider view than other players through multiple monitors, so players will be more aware of the enemy, and Eyefinity seems to have broken the fair environment of the game.

With Eyefinity technology, players can experience the stunning visual effects of a large screen, and Eyefinity technology can perfectly play super-wide ratio movies.

Eyefinity also inherits the advantages of traditional multi-screen display technology in professional applications such as office, users will get more desktop space, so you can display more windows at the same time, further multi-tasking features of multi-core computers. Microsoft researchers say that using multi-screen displays is one of the easiest ways to increase efficiency (up to 50%).

The foundation is the most important - the basic requirements of Eyefinity

The so-called workers must first sharpen their tools. Eyefinity technology still needs hardware support. The most important one is the HD5000 series graphics card with integrated DP interface.

Many players may not know much about the DP interface. The full name of the DP interface, DisplayPort, is an interface standard developed by VESA (Video Standardization Committee) in 2006. This interface can transmit video and audio signals simultaneously, mainly in the field of displays and home theater. The current version of the DP interface is DP 1.2 released on December 22, 2009. In order to meet the needs of notebooks or highly integrated hardware, there is also a mini-DP interface with a smaller interface size.

Simply put, the DP interface can be seen as an upgraded version of the HDMI interface. The DP interface not only has the same ability to transmit video/audio as HDMI, but also has a larger transmission bandwidth. The maximum speed of the DP 1.1 version is 8.64 Gbit/s, version 1.2. It has reached an amazing speed of 17.2 Gbit/s, and the latest HDMI interface speed can only reach 10.2 Gbit/s. With its large bandwidth, the DP interface has the mission of multi-screen output from birth.

In addition, the DP interface also has excellent compatibility. The DP interface can directly output DVI-D and HDMI signals, which means that the player can easily connect to the HDMI or DVI-D display using the DP interface with simple pin conversion. Without any signal conversion.

Playing with personality - creating your own Eyefinity

Through the introduction of the previous page, we have a comprehensive understanding of the DP interface, but careful players will notice that most HD5000 series graphics cards only have one DP interface, but Eyefinity technology strictly stipulates that the DP interface must be used. So how does a DP interface connect multiple displays? This requires the excellent compatibility of the DP interface and other interface aids.

If you want to build Eyefinity multi-screen display system, all the monitors use the DP interface is the perfect choice, but the current graphics card with six DP interface is still not on the market, so the second best method is to use at least one DP interface. The remaining monitors can be connected to the DVI/VGA or HDMI interface on the graphics card. Currently, the HD5000 graphics card in the market only supports the construction of a single-card three-screen.

However, the display with DP interface is still a small number, and the price is very high. If we don't have a DP display, we can't set up the Eyefinity system? The answer is no, with the help of the active converter, the player can connect the display of the DVI-D interface with the DP port of the graphics card to obtain the effect of multi-screen output.

It should be noted here that there are two kinds of converters for the DP to DVI-D interface. One is the passive converter that only mentioned the changed pins mentioned above. This converter can directly output the DVI signal by means of the DP interface. The advantage is that no signal conversion is performed, so the DP interface is actually used as a DVI interface. This converter cannot support Eyefinity multi-screen output with more than two screens.
The other converter has a built-in signal conversion chip, which can convert the DP signal into a DVI-D signal that supports Eyefinity technology. Therefore, only the active converter can be used to realize Eyefinity without using the DP display. Multi-screen output of various combinations.
At present, most HD5000 series graphics cards only provide three interfaces: DP, HDMI and VGA. Therefore, only one display can be connected to a maximum of one graphics card. If players need to connect three or more displays, they need to use dual graphics cards to get the fire. More graphics interface, in addition to the 9.12 or later version of the catalyst driver.
Below, the author summarizes several connection methods for common graphics interface for players.

How to choose Eyefinity monitor?

Although the use of Eyefinity requires multiple monitors, it seems to cost a lot, but in fact, the total price of three 19-inch LCD monitors is more than 3,000 yuan, and the price of a single monitor with the same screen size is tens of thousands or even More than 100,000 yuan, through this comparison we can clearly find that Eyefinity technology provides players with a relatively inexpensive large-screen display.
Since Eyefinity requires at least one DP interface on the graphics card, although the active interface can be used, the original DP port display has better compatibility.
There are not many displays with DP interfaces in the market. Among them, Dell 3008, Dell U2410, Dell 2408, Dell P2010H, Dell P2210H, Dell P2310H, NEC MultiSync EA231WMi-BK, HP LP2480zx, HP LP2475w, HP LP2275w, Lenovo 2440x and so on.

The Dell 3008 is a 30-inch large LCD LCD monitor with a maximum resolution of 2560×1600 and a dynamic contrast ratio of 3000:1. It supports 1080P full HD images with a gamut coverage of 117% and is included. VGA, DVI-D, HDMI with DisplayPort interface, and this display supports Dell's UltraSharp technology, with excellent picture effects.

The Dell 2408 screen size is 24 inches and is a standard 16:10 display. This monitor has an IPS screen and its picture clarity is significantly higher than that of a normal monitor. The best resolution of the Dell 2408 is 1920x1200. The biggest feature of this monitor is that the screen can be rotated 90° vertically. Players will get more information while reading documents or browsing the web. This design also improves Eyefinity multi-screen. The output of the display, if the three displays are rotated 90 °, then the player will get better multi-screen output.

NEC MultiSync EA231WMi-BK has a 23-inch screen, the best resolution is 1920x1080, supports 1080P full HD picture, response time is 14ms, the display also has DVI-D, VGA and the latest DisplayPort and other interfaces.

Since Eyefinity is a large screen effect caused by stacking multiple displays, the display effect is inevitably affected by the display frame. Therefore, I recommend that players try to select a narrow frame display, and if it is mainly for playing games, try not to use double. The output mode of the screen, because the display frame will separate the game screen from the middle, which has a great impact on the game screen.
However, the player does not have to worry about the display frame occluding the game screen, because ATI provides a frame compensation technology, which can make a perfect connection of multiple display images.

Eyefinity graphics card competition

After the Eyefinity multi-display system is built, the screen resolution will increase greatly with the increase of the area. For example, the resolution of a single 22-inch display is 1680X1050, and after using the Eyefinity technology, the three 22-inch screens are horizontal. After placement, you will get a resolution of 5040X1050, so if you want to use Eyefinity technology to play games, then a powerful graphics card with large-capacity video memory is essential.

The highest-end model in the HD5000 series is now the HD5970, so if you want to get the best Eyefinity multi-screen output, an HD5970 graphics card is the best choice. In addition, with the help of Catalyst 9.12 driver, players can use the HD5970 to build a crossfire system to achieve better performance in Eyefinity.
At present, the single GPU core of HD5970 graphics card only has 1GB of video memory, which greatly limits the performance of the graphics card at 5760x1200 resolution. It is believed that if ATI launches a single-core 2GB HD5970 graphics card, it will further enhance the effect of Eyefinity multi-screen display.

Although the HD5970 graphics card's Eyefinity performance is excellent, but its price is relatively high, I believe that only the ashes players will use, so the single-core HD5870 is more suitable for the fever player.

After testing on a foreign website, as long as the player slightly reduces the screen settings, the HD5870 can run almost all mainstream games at 5760x1200 resolution, even the latest games like Dust 2 can get good results under Eyefinity multi-screen.
The HD5850 is cheaper than the HD5870. It is a cost-effective product in the HD5800 high-end series of graphics cards, but the price reduction means a performance degradation. When using the Eyefinity multi-display technology, the HD5850 has a relatively large performance degradation compared to the HD5870. At 5760x1200 resolution, the HD5850 can't fully display the picture effect of DX11, so the HD5850 can be said to be the lowest hardware for players to use Eyefinity technology.
The HD5770 is a mainstream model in the HD5000 series of graphics cards, but its Eyefinity effect has dropped below a smooth level. This card can only achieve satisfactory large-screen output when running games 5 years ago or older. The game has been unable to meet the smooth requirements of the picture.
Although the HD5750 can technically support Eyefinity technology, if the performance of the HD5770 under the high resolution of the Eyefinity 5760x1200 is slow, the HD5750's effect is terrible.

Eyefinity game test

The famous foreign hardware website pcper used a variety of games to test under Eyefinity multi-screen output, and obtained detailed test data, including "Dust 2", "Need for Speed 13", "Call of Duty 6 Modern Warfare 2 ", Devil May Cry 4", "Prince of Persia: Blade of Time", "Batman", "Team Fortress 2", "GTA4", "Light of the Torch" and many other games.
The HD5870 graphics card produced by HIS used in the test is also the best hardware that I recommend players to set up the Eyefinity system.

In "Batman" we turned off AA anti-aliasing and Physx technology, the game achieved 200FPS in single-screen 1920x1080 resolution, when using Eyefinity three-screen output, the 5760x1080 resolution game frame number dropped to 100FPS, the decline Up to 50%.

Eyefinity Technology Summary

Finally, let's summarize the necessary conditions for building an Eyefinity multi-screen system.
1. Use Vista or Windows 7 and above.
2, with ATI HD5000 series graphics card, and the graphics card has at least 1 DP output port.
3. The passive DP to DVI interface can only provide the output of up to two screens.
4. The active DP interface can be connected to a non-DP display and build an Eyefinity system with three or more screens.
5, must have a DP connection to build Eyefinity multi-screen display.
So far we have learned the principles, features, performance and construction of ATI Eyefinity multi-screen technology. This technology completely overturns the traditional multi-screen display can only be applied to the limitations of the professional field, bringing the large screen to the average player, and more attractive, when the game uses Eyefinity technology will get unprecedented shock.

However, Eyefinity is not perfect as a new technology. Since Eyefinity is composed of multiple monitors, the width of the display border will directly affect the final screen effect. Once the monitor border is too wide, it will be presented in front of us. In the "divided" world, the most important thing is that there is no borderless display at all, and there is always an annoying dividing line in the big screen of Eyefinity.
In addition, since Eyefinity will directly improve the resolution of the screen, for gamers, a PC with strong hardware performance is required to ensure a smooth high-resolution game screen.
In addition, Eyefinity's connection method is also more complicated, and must be connected in strict accordance with the prescribed method, which is not easy for the entry player.
Of course, it doesn't hide, although there are some shortcomings, Eyefinity not only effectively improves the work efficiency, but also gives the game unprecedented luxury.

 

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Post time: Nov-26-2018
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