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Pastimes : Dream Machine ( Build your own PC ) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dave Bissett who wrote (12902)	11/4/2001 10:11:31 AM
From: TraderAlan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 14778

Dave, I have a Radeon VE 32mbDDR dual card, under $100 in August. Works and looks fine. The Matrox is pricier, but they have a rep for the best 2D. I run both monitors at 1280x1024 16bit, and they look fine to me. Alan

To: Dave Bissett who wrote (12902)	11/4/2001 11:00:14 AM
From: Nick Morvay	Respond to of 14778

Dave, although I have not used one, the G450 is a good card for a dual monitor setup. I know of traders using these and very satisfied. The RAM requirement will depend on the resolution you plan to use. What is the application? For high intensity games, you need the 32 megs to achieve the high resolution of 3D graphics and fast response games demand. For 2D applications 16 meg should be sufficient. I have a 32 meg (max available) Appian Jeronimo Pro 4 port card that gives 8 meg per channel. That would be the equivalent to a 16 meg card of 8 megs per channel. The card is used at its max resolution of 1600x1200 at 32bit color. More than enough for 2D images. However, for the extra upgrade cost to 32 megs, it may be advisable to byte the bullet now instead whishing you had the 3D performance later. The Voodoo card is no slouch, so you may want to maintain as a minimum the same performance it offers. www6.tomshardware.com www6.tomshardware.com Regards, Nick

To: Dave Bissett who wrote (12902)	11/4/2001 11:55:39 AM
From: Rick Faurot	Respond to of 14778

I recently installed a Matrox G450 on my Dell 4100. This is a 32 meg card, so it gives 16 megs per monitor. I use 1280 x 1024 and 32 bit True Color. This card cost $95 plus shipping a couple of months ago. It was easy to install, though I did rely on the Matrox tech support board, which was quite helpful in making the process easy. The Matrox card is very versatile. I have it set up so my taskbar only shows on my primary monitor, which I like. I am very satisfied with the G450. I like having support available as I am not experienced with tech stuff. I am running a typical mix of quotes and charts, trading software, multiple browsers, word processors etc and it works great. I am running W2000 with 512 megs of ram and this has also been very helpful compared to my old computer which had 128 megs of ram on W98. I sometimes get up to 350 megs of ram in use with a lot of stuff open over a period of days. Couldn't have done it on 98. best, Rick

To: Dave Bissett who wrote (12902)	11/8/2001 5:59:55 PM
From: couldawoulda	Respond to of 14778

Dave - I use an ATI Radeon VE. You need to download current drivers for both 2000 and XP in order to get proper support. With Windows 2000 the driver strangely enough only allows you to extend your display settings so that application windows stretch across into both screens (ie. your background will stretch to fill both screens as does the start/task bar). Annoying to say the least. Works properly in XP which I'm using, however current software from ATI ("Multimedia Centre", "Hyrdavision") is unavailable. No matter though as the software is inconsequential. The Matrox G450 is not supported by XP I believe and if you were into gaming, there may be some compatibility issues with a lot of the games on the market as most of them are now 3d rendered. Tech. support for the ATI is excellent. Their software is crap. Exact opposite with Matrox as I have long been a fan of their cards since the "Millenium" was released. ATI is cheaper (OEM is $105.00 Canadian).