GregP

Is it that, or just the fact that the main video card is being forced to render a huge resolution? I'm not sure.

Ah, I see. BTW, I tried to run a similar setup (DD's 3-monitor T-B profile left, main center, Shkval/ABRIS on right) and saw a huge framerate drop too. I was using a GeForce GTX 260 and 8400 GS. However, when I dropped back to 2 monitors and used cypher1312's Phantom Monitor Fix, I got a jump back up to very playable rates.

DD, each 8800 has two outputs, don't they? So wouldn't that give you 4 outputs total? Running 3 monitors should be no problem.

So you're using a 2-screen setup in BS, or 3? If 2, check out cypher1312's Phantom Monitor Fix (search for the thread, it's around here somewhere): it somehow gets around BS rendering the 3rd screen, bumping up your framerate. You do, however, have to run in Windowed mode instead of Full Screen, which drops FPS a bit. Overall though, your framerate ought to increase significantly.

So I'm trying to simply move the controls indicator a little further up on the screen ... any quick ideas about how exactly to do this? I've looked thru that lua file and it looks like I could sink whole day into experimenting with different values, as it's not at all obvious to me which parameters would affect the position.

Whew ... after much, much trial-and-error, I have finally got Dick Dastardly's touch-buddy profile working with the Phantom Monitor Fix. I've got a 1280x1024 touchscreen on the left and my main 1920x1080 in the center. PMF lets me see framerate (via FRAPS) and the controls indicator - except that the bottom of the controls indicator goes off the bottom of my screen. I know why this is - because I'm using a resolution of 3200x1080 in my options.lua (1280 left, 1920 center) but since my left screen is only 1024 tall, the 1080 of the overall image makes the controls indicator go partially off-screen. It seems that the controls indicator defaults to being in the extreme lower left corner. Surely there is some way to move it around the screen via lua options, but I haven't been able to find it yet. Anybody attempt this, or find a way to do it yet?

Exactly, that's what I was implying. Heiliger Bimbam, what resolution are you running? Unless it's something like 800x600, applying any AA at all ought to have a noticeable effect on framerate. So if you're not seeing anything, I'd guess it's not actually being applied.

I think the massive framerate increases some people see in going from XP to Vista (Munny being a case in point) have to do with XP by default not taking advantage of multiple cores while Vista does. In my own experience, using DCSmax under both XP and Vista - and thus presumably roughly equal utilization of multiple cores between the two OSes - my framerates go from 45-50 in Instant Action in XP to 51-57 under Vista.

Absolutely! Here's what you do - package them up all nice and safe, drop them in the mail addressed to my house, and I promise to make downright splendid use of them in boosting up my framerates. :) Short of that, I guess overclocking the i7 wouldn't hurt; if BS is anything like LockOn - and I believe it is - CPU power is just as important, if not more so, than GPU power. When I overclock my E6700 from 2.66 to 3.5, I see a pretty linear increase in framerate in LockOn.

Well, this may be a dumb question, but are you certain it's actually applying the settings in-game? i.e. have you taken screenshots and then compared them outside the game? With Nvidia's Control Panel, you have to point the drivers to the "DCS.exe" in order to have it "take" the AA/AF settings - using the "launcher.exe" will not do anything, as that is just the GUI.

Actually that could be exactly my problem - do these default to the left monitor? If so, that would explain it. Good idea, I'll try shifting Shkval and ABRIS over to my right monitor.

yO!, What are you trying to do with 3 monitors? Just extend the cockpit view? Or put Shkval/ABRIS on separate monitors?

AlphaInfinity, My understanding is that the phantom monitor, especially if on the left, needs to use the same res as the right monitor. Therefore, your assumption in your numbers of 1024 on the left screen makes BS think the right screen should be 1024 also, and therefore it doesn't center your Shkval and ABRIS correctly. Two things you could try to test this: 1) Drop the res (in Nvidia/ATI Control Panel) of your right monitor to 1024. 2) Go through your test.lua and options.lua and re-set your numbers based on assuming 1280 width on both left and right monitors.

OK, so I went back and did a more rigorous test of what effect adding the second video card had, and the short answer is: it ain't good. :( My testing conditions were: Vista, 1024x768 on left and right monitors, 1920x1080 on center. First I tried all 3 screens (primary video card has center and right screens, secondary has left) and I get a steady framerate of 20 FPS. Then I disconnected the right monitor, removed it from the multiple-monitor config in Nvidia Control Panel, and now I get 40 (!) FPS. I then reconnected the right monitor but this time to the secondary video card and moved the left monitor to primary (just to verify first results): 18 FPS. So - running two video cards and three monitors, non-SLI, non-TH2GO, non-SoftTH, I am seeing a framerate drop of 50% over the single-card, two-monitor configuration - ouch! I guess that means I'll need to remove the third monitor from NVCP each time I want to fly the Shark. Annoying, but at least I get my frames back. Now if I could only get the in-game framerate counter and controls indicator to work - nothing I've done yet has solved this one, including the Phantom Monitor Fix when using two monitors.

I'm running in windowed mode because BS crashes if I try to use more than one monitor in fullscreen mode. My config is as follows - note that my left screen is using Dick Dastardly's awesome touch-buddy profile: options.lua: ["graphics"] = { ["multiMonitorSetup"] = "dd_shkabr+cam+phantom", ["color"] = "32", ["heatBlr"] = 1, ["scenes"] = "high", ["water"] = 2, ["fullScreen"] = false, ["visibRange"] = "High", ["aspect"] = 1.777777, ["textures"] = 2, ["shadows"] = 3, ["display_mode"] = { ["avi"] = { ["bpp"] = 32, ["resolution"] = "640x480", ["full_screen"] = false, ["aspect"] = 1.333333333, ["height"] = 480, ["width"] = 640, }, -- end of ["avi"] }, -- end of ["display_mode"] ["effects"] = 2, ["haze"] = 1, ["lights"] = 2, ["height"] = 1080, ["resolution"] = "3968x1080", ["civTraffic"] = 0, ["width"] = 3968, }, -- end of ["graphics"] DD_ShkABR+Cam+Phantom.lua: Description = 'Shkval & ABRIS on the left, camera on the center' Viewports = { Center = { x = 1024; --(the width of your leftmost monitor) y = 0; width = 1920; --(the width of your primary monitor) height = 1080; --(the height of your primary monitor) viewDx = 0; viewDy = 0; aspect = screen.aspect; } } Shkval = { x = 13; y = 13; width = 486; height = 306; } ABRIS = { x = 585; y = 157; width = 366; height = 447; } This works pretty well under Vista; in Instant Action I get framerates in the mid-30's, down from low 50's with a single screen.

Thanks for that, Feuerfalke, some useful info there. Basically I answered my own question last night when my second video card arrived in the mail: Under Vista, I actually seem to see a 20-30% framerate DROP by adding a 3rd screen. Without the second video card, using my leftmost 1024 monitor, center 1920 monitor, and no right monitor (but specifying my "width" in options.lua as 3968, what it would have been had the rightmost monitor been there, which is what DCS requires in order to center the screens properly), I seemed to be getting framerates in the 30's. When I added the second video card, and actually output the rightmost screen (blank other than the DCS loading screen and comms menu, when I use it) but kept my options.lua "width" the same, framerate seemed to drop to low 20's. I have no idea why this would be, but for now it seems that it's smarter to just not use the 3rd monitor.

Can you also see the controls indicator (ENTER - RCTRL)? I've heard this is supposed to be the other benefit of using the PMF. After playing with it some more last night, I can confirm that no matter what I do, I never see the framerate counter nor the controls indicator for some reason. Ah - yes, that makes sense. So I think cypher1312 somehow just made a mistake in this first post where he leaves the res of his rightmost monitor out of the "width" property in his options.lua. For me, in XP the PMF seems to have no effect whatsoever; under Vista, it moves my left screen slightly off-center but leaves the center screen centered, but again doesn't offer any benefit either in terms of FPS or seeing framerate counter or controls indicator. Sure wish cypher1312 would come back!

I bought one off of eBay from a company called "easyworldwidetrading" in Hong Kong. From what I've seen, the ones they sell are for non-widescreens; I bought a 17" version which I used on an HP L1710 LCD. Installation was easy once I figured out how to pop the bezel off the LCD (just slid a screwdriver under the side of it and worked my way around the periphery). Once the bezel's off, you just lay the touchscreen on top, put the bezel back on (it does tend to bulge the bezel outward a bit, but mine still snapped back into place), hook up the USB cable and run the calibration utility on the enclosed CD. For $190 total, it cost less than the 7" Mimo touchscreen I'd been thinking about buying before that.

So, am I asking a really obvious and dumb question here? Or just nobody knows the answer? :) Maybe what I'm suggesting is not even possible for 3D apps. I know a second vid card can run additional monitors for 2D stuff, but maybe 3D apps use only the main graphics adaptor, and thus the need for something like TH2GO. Well, I'll find out in a few days when my other video card arrives.

But wait ... now I'm confused: in cypher1312's original post in this thread, he uses a resolution width of 1680+1280=2960, not the 1280+1680+1280 that it would be if he were rendering the phantom monitor too. So I think by using 3968 in my settings rather than 2944, I've short-circuited whatever benefit the PMF would have given me. Right?

Well I'll be damned! S77th-RYKE, you were right, those were the settings I needed to change to get my screens to center properly! Problem is ... I don't seem to be getting any better framerate with the PMF than I do without it. It's a slideshow. :( ARM505, I did try alt-tabbing out and trying to toggle PMF, but this doesn't seem to make any difference.

It's an HP L1710; got it for $80 ($110 with $30 rebate) from Tigerdirect. With the $90 touchscreen kit, it was cheaper than the 7" Mimo touchscreen (http://www.thegadgeteers.com/product_mimo.html) that I was originally considering!

Yup, I have, but that's caused other problems (both of my screens are offset to the right) that I posted about in his thread. :)

Having gotten my 17" touchscreen working over the weekend, I'm now using it in concert with my 37" main monitor and Dick Dastardly's Touch-buddy profile. TB works flawlessly, but I'm taking a huge framerate hit by having to render an effective 3968x1080 resolution (1024 on left touchscreen, 1920 on center, 1024 on right 'phantom' monitor), which drops FPS down to single digits and is basically unplayable. I also have a 22" widescreen that I want to add to this setup, so that in place of the right phantom monitor I'd be adding a 1680 screen, meaning now my effective resolution would be 4624 - ouch. To do this, though, without a Matrox TripleHead2Go device, I obviously need a second video card but I do not want to do SLI - rather, I want to buy a lesser card. What I'm wondering is, will the second card assume some significant portion of the load of rendering this massive 4624x1080 resolution? If I hook the second card up to the 22", and the first (which is more powerful) to the 17" and 37", would this be expected to give me any kind of improved framerate, or would it not make any difference? I'm wondering if maybe BS would consider the first video card the 'main' card and therefore somehow do the entire rendering job via that card instead of split between the two.

Well, Friday night I got the touchscreen working and I have to admit I was surprised at how easy it was to do. The hardest part was just figuring out how to get the front bezel off the LCD. Eventually by sliding a flathead screwdriver under it I was able to pop it off. After that, I simply slid the touchscreen on the LCD screen, put the bezel back on, hooked up the USB cables, ran the calibration program included on the enclosed CD, and it just WORKED! :) I've now got it working nicely with DD's profile here and I'm loving it ... well, other than the awful framerate hit I take by having to render a 3968x1080 resolution (1024 on the left touchscreen, 1920 on center, 1024 on right 'phantom' monitor).