Author Topic: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?  (Read 2363 times)

Offline Dolly

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Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« on: 26 February 2013, 09:50 »
This is my card:

http://www.palit.biz/palit/vgapro.php?id=1486

Does pretty well on BF and Far Cry i think.

But im going to need to run 2 TV's soon but with different things on the TV's ( basically streaming 2 football matches at the same time )

If it doesnt do what i need it to do, any recommendations? keep hearing good things about the AMD stuff.

Offline BimmerDub

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Re: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« Reply #1 on: 26 February 2013, 13:47 »
Depends on budget and the resolution and size of screens your using ? People who run larger TV's (32" upwards) rather than dedicated monitors tend to go for cards with lots of memory (3Gb upwards) 600 series nivida have good reviews as they use considerably less power than the 500's they replace. ATI / AMD cards generally come with more graphics ram in like for like against the Geforce GTX cards. Have a look at the MSi Twin frozr and ASUS DirectCU II options for the 560 ?

Are you streaming from the internet or using TV tuner cards ? How does the PC spec up as well ?
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Offline Dolly

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Re: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« Reply #2 on: 26 February 2013, 15:03 »
its going to be 2 TV's ones 32" ones 37" (i think)

Its going to be streaming from the net

The PC aint a bad spec.

Asus P8 Z68 - V
Intel i5 2500k 3.3ghz
GeForceĀ® GTX 560 Ti 2GB (2048MB GDDR5)
16gb Corsair vengence DDR3 1600mhz (4x4gb)
OCZ agility 3, 120gb SSD
Cooler master 650w 80+
Windows 7 64bit premium

ive added a second SSD and a 500GB HD, and a blu ray drive, so power supply might start coming into it??

Offline Ridg

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Re: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« Reply #3 on: 26 February 2013, 15:59 »
Short answer, yes you can do worries, the power supply is more than enough too.

Slightly longer answer, the connections on the TVs will dictate if you need to buy any additional convertors, most likely you'll need a DVI to HDMI.

A 560 won't even be tickled pushing out 2 2D 1920x1080 feeds.  The size of the TV will have no effect these days as unless you're buying an XD TV they are all going to be 1920x1080, I personally have 2 24" monitors connected to a GTX460 running 1920x1200 with no issues what-so-ever (the fact I have a second in SLI is redundant as that's only used for 3D rendering and you'll be pushing 2D).

The only time you might notice a pull on the cards is if you want to send a h.264 stream which will be hardware accelerated by the card, even then you've got a CPU that can easily cope with it.

Offline Dolly

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Re: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« Reply #4 on: 26 February 2013, 16:23 »
cheers for that, i figured i would need an adapter, both tv's on hdmi with only one hdmi output on the card but thats not an issue.

im going to order the adapter and try and figure it out, good to know i havent got to fork out massive amounts on a new Graphics card.  :smiley:

Offline justalex81

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Re: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« Reply #5 on: 26 February 2013, 18:19 »
dvi - hdmi adapter for the other tv. i assume all sound will be put through dedicated speakers?

Offline Dolly

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Re: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« Reply #6 on: 27 February 2013, 18:07 »
i assumed both tv's will have their own sound via hdmi cable??

Offline Ridg

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Re: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« Reply #7 on: 27 February 2013, 19:16 »
i assumed both tv's will have their own sound via hdmi cable??

Err no, whilst you can send the sound via HDMI you've only got one HDMI port on your graphics card, you would also need a second sound card.  Odds are you'd have one on your motherboard, at which point you could send the sound via HDMI to one TV (using the sound chip on the GPU) and send the sound via coax / 3.5mm / component to the other TV (using motherboard sound card, depending on the connectors).  The real sticking point on this is that you would have to be using application that can dictate the sound mixer.


Offline justalex81

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Re: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« Reply #8 on: 27 February 2013, 21:05 »
what ridg said is what i was getting at. Not all graphics cards output sound via hdmi either but i'm sure you'll be fine with a 560. I'm on an ati card at the moment so haven't a clue about nvidia cards.

Offline Dolly

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Re: Can i run 2 monitors / tv's on my graphics card?
« Reply #9 on: 28 February 2013, 08:26 »
yeah my GPU currently sends sound to my TV, i see what you mean, ill have a play around when i get the 2 TV's connected  :smiley: