Triple Monitors for Black Shark

[Xxx]

Hi all,

 

I am seriously considering a "surround" monitor set up, I was wondering what anyone considers what the "best" set up would be?

 

I am thinking to go the Eyefinity route and with three 24" monitors at 1920 x 1080.

 

I currently have an Nvidia GTX 285 but would go for an ATI 6970!

 

Here is the video that inspired me:-

 

 

 

 

Regards.

[Bruins]

I am planning of doing the same. I have ati 5870 video card. Need to save up for 2 more monitors though.

[Zorg_DK]

I'm planing on getting a new monitor myself soon too. I can't decide if I wanna go for one big 30" or three 24". It looks cool with three monitors in that video. I wonder if the bezels are going to be annoying..

[DTWD]

I was/am thinking along something similar.

 

Things I am thinking over:

 

1) How annoying will bezal thickness be? Should I get as narrow as possible (more expensive) or won't I notice?

 

2) 1080p TVs can be got cheaply, will they be sufficient. For example a 40" TV costs about the same as a 24" monitor.

[average_pilot]

They should begin to design monitors with detachable frames for multimonitor setups

[DTWD]

They should begin to design monitors with detachable frames for multimonitor setups

 

The problem is they tend to have things behind the bezals, sometimes you might be able to save some space by removing the bezal, but chances are your not going to save much.

[Xxx]

I am of like mind.

 

1. Big single monitor- 26", 27" or 30"? or

2. 3 x 24", ( cant afford 3 x 30? )

 

The HD TV's I dont think have the resolution of a dedicated monitor, even though they are HD? Would like to see one running BS!

 

I am still wringing my hands and trying to decide!

 

Have any of you guys noticed the left hand screen in the vid clip? It doesn't look correct to me? The right monitor shows the Shark's window frame and the left monitor shows the view is "open ", like he was flying with the door open maybe? It almost looks like the left monitor view is stretched? ( or is this just the angle they have their video camera)

 

Anyone see this? Have a look at what he says about his addition to a lua file, in his comments. ( there is just one alteration, I don't know what it does? Snapview or something? )

 

As far as I know, all you do is set up Eyefinity with the CCC as 1 large monitor and the definition correct for the three, ie, 5760 x 1080 and you're done. As long as all three monitors are the same resolution, eyefinity should work. There shouldn't be any need to alter the files within Black Shark? Just set up the GUI for the new resolution.

 

 

 

Regards.

Edited February 25, 2011 by Accipiter

[DTWD]

HD TVs (the majority over 37" now) are full HD. In other words 1920x1080, most monitors now a days are that resolution.

 

Monitors may give faster response times or better angles for viewing, but I have played games (both PC and console) on a TV and never thought "oh this is bad", just the oposite on certain games.

 

I have a 27" 1920x1200 monitor (a very good one) and BS looks far better on my 40" 1920x1080 TV.

 

The problems arise in getting a TV that's good for games/PC, not all of them are.

[Xxx]

Any ideas as to which TV? I always liked the SONY? Cheaper than a Dell 30" Ultrasharp, which is lotto winners only! :lol:

 

Two Iiyama 24" ( with the 24" I already have ) would be less expensive than a SONY? Also you would get that "surround effect".

 

I have thought the Track IR has a strange "immersive" quality of its own. When you become totally absorbed in a mission, I would suspect that your perception would tend ignore the extra side monitors ( which are peripheral anyway) since you are directing your view, at the action focal point, with the Track IR. Does that make any sense?? Or am I trying to make out a case for a single large screen?

 

I guess that unless you have tried out an eyefinity setup, its all very speculative. When you dont have THAT much doe its gotta be a correct choice!:unsure:

 

EDIT. I have recently read that in eyefinity, if you use the "besal adjust" there will be a loss of some resolution? More ammo for the large TV or single monitor solution?

 

Regards.

Edited February 26, 2011 by Accipiter

[DTWD]

Sony as a TV manafacturer no longer makes it's own panels so I tend to stay away on principle. I have also seen several Sony TVs running that I thought looked utterly...well poo.

 

I like Samsungs and would always suggest them, just make sure you drive them via DVI->HDMI not VGA.

 

I have the Dell 2707 Ultrasharp, which is a fine monitor, but not as good as my 40" Samsung for playing BS...go figure!

 

I agree with the TrackIR comment, if you have a big enough screen to be in your periphery then you don't "need" 2 other monitors. But you can tweak your TiR settings to only kick in after so much movement, so you can still use your other monitors if you want complete imersion.

 

If you drive a car you will know what I mean. Imagine driving along with a box on your head blocking out what's going on in your side windows, now the only way you can view what's going on is by moving your head. Hardly natural, so "surround" viewing is just giving your prepheray vision back, but you still look around (TiR) like you do in real life.

[Xxx]

Hi Paul, yes I follow what your saying. My T IR is set so, with perhaps a 20 degree head turn, I can look at 90 degrees in sim! After a while you "forget" its just in front of you.

 

If you prefer a single ( TV Size ) monitor to a triple set up, you are probably seeing what I see, namely the view of the sim in front of you but with the angles available with a little head movement!

 

However I see ( excuse the pun ) what you mean re peripheral vision. I think it would, most likely, enhance the sim if you could "see" that SAM or 30 cal comming at you from a side monitor.:shocking: The video example also demonstrates the low level speed effect, with the trees and buildings whizzing past your rotor blades!

 

Great stuff, immersive and like the real Kamov pilots no doubt feel, quite stressful:D

 

Regards.

[DTWD]

Accipter, my only concern with the setup in this thread is the "fish eye" effect that's going on those side monitors. I don't know if other methods don't have it, or even what other methods exist, but it's rather noticable in the video. But if your playing the game do you notice?

[Xxx]

Hi Paul. I agree entirely. I see a visual distortion in the feature vid and in others I see on U Tube. FSX on triple monitors have the distortion effect, in varying degrees!

 

I dont even know what methods to employ to correctly set up BS to be visually correct in Eyefinity! Seemingly there are files to alter, I am afraid.

 

Your question, "do you notice"? Ah, now there's a good one! I notice because I see it in the video clips. Even the "front" monitor shows some distortion ( magnification ) when the T-IR pans about. Put yourself in front of an Eyefinity set up, with all the combat jobs to do ( fly helicopter, look for targets, look for threats, deploy countermeasures, assign wingmen, stay alive ) and perhaps you simply wouldn't notice. You wouldn't have time!

 

It appears, if you prefer realism, and with this aircraft, if you fly this sim seriously then you do, the apparent scaling of view is an issue.

 

Perhaps some one has a set of definitive guidelines that provide a good 3 monitor view, with good scaling?

 

Regards.

 

David

or Accipiter is a group of birds of prey in the family Accipitridae, many of which are named as goshawks and sparrowhawks:smilewink:

[MackTheKnight]

The "fisheye" effect you guys are referring to is an unfortunate result of the way most game cameras render the field of view. Here's a great description of it and some explanations of the cause: http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=57&t=8418

 

Have a look around that forum as it's a great resource for multi-screen gaming discussion.

 

I'm running 3 X 1920 x 1080, 23" screens and to be honest I don't notice the "fisheye" much at all when I'm in the heat of the simulation. Same goes for the monitor bezels.

 

Hope this helps,

Mack

[Xxx]

A very good link, thanks Mack!

 

Have you had to adjust any settings in the Black Shark lua's?, Snapviews etc? or does BS just run fine after setting up the Eyefinity on your desktop?

 

Regards.

 

EDIT. I just saw your using two GTX 570's in SLI, so disregard Eyefinity reference. Just curious to know if there is any alterations needed in BS?

Edited March 1, 2011 by Accipiter

[DTWD]

Quite, also I would imagine if using TiR you won't be looking at the screen that's got the issue anyway. I assume it's more visable in these videos because we are seeing all three screens in our field of view opposed to the player who would be looking at one screen with the others in the periphery and when using TiR the "fish eye" will remain in the periphery.

 

Am I right in thinking that?

[Xxx]

Yes and if you direct your view at the side monitor with the Track ir, then that monitor would become your main focus of view, thus, loosing any "fisheye".

 

The only other issue I have ( apart from the questions re altering BS's Lua's ) is the possible loss of resolution/framerates when using the large display area? ie. 5760 x 1080? The CPU and GPU have to work hard to display all that real estate?

 

regards D.

[DTWD]

Yes and if you direct your view at the side monitor with the Track ir, then that monitor would become your main focus of view, thus, loosing any "fisheye".

 

Precisly what I was trying to say, but more elequently put :D

[MackTheKnight]

Yes and if you direct your view at the side monitor with the Track ir, then that monitor would become your main focus of view, thus, loosing any "fisheye".

 

The only other issue I have ( apart from the questions re altering BS's Lua's ) is the possible loss of resolution/framerates when using the large display area? ie. 5760 x 1080? The CPU and GPU have to work hard to display all that real estate?

 

regards D.

 

 

Correct, it works quite well with track-ir and the "Fisheye" does remain in your peripheral vision. Personally I think the advantages outweigh the disadvantages.

 

As for the framerate consequences, I'm getting acceptable frame-rates with my configuration and I"m running in windowed mode because I lose the use of my touch-screen if I run NVidia Surround, as MS Windows sees the 3 screens as one in that mode and it screws up the calibration on my touch screen. (The middle screen in my setup is a touch screen that I use for toggling switches in the pit)

 

The only thing I had to do to make this setup work was set my far left screen as my "Main" display in the nvidia display manager, and I then use the default "3 monitor" option in the DCS graphics config with a resolution of 5760 X 1080. With things setup this way my FoV is already correctly adjusted and everything works/looks perfect in both DCS A10C & DCS Blackshark.

 

My frame-rates seldom drop below 30 FPS except in very busy battles, in DCS A10C. Blackshark is a bit less demanding so FPS rarely drops below 40 FPS. Running in full screen I cap FPS at 60 due to refresh rates and V-Sync enabled. I don't want to sacrafice my touch-screen though so windowed mode is essential for me. :) (My specs are pretty high end so your miliage may vary)

 

Everything set to high except for water - low, civ trafic low & view distance, medium.

 

Like others have said in other threads - once you get used to a 3 screen setup for simulations, you'll never go back.

 

Edit: for full screen mode in eyefinity, nvidia surround or TH2Go, you have to do some more modification to LUA files to make things work. IE, edit snap views, setup a 1 camera lua file with your full screen res settings, etc.

 

-Mack

Edited March 1, 2011 by MackTheKnight

[Xxx]

Edit: for full screen mode in eyefinity, nvidia surround or TH2Go, you have to do some more modification to LUA files to make things work. IE, edit snap views, setup a 1 camera lua file with your full screen res settings, etc.

 

-Mack

 

Thanks Mack good information there. The touch screen sounds interesting!

 

Whats putting me off is the Lua mods you mention. Before I buy this kit I would like a clear idea of what needs "modifying". I tried the modifications posted, elsewhere in the forum, to set up a two screen system and got nowhere. Then I read that Win 7 doesn't like the settings?:unsure:

 

I nearly went the Nvidia SLI route, but baulked at the idea since some have said the Nvidia drivers for SLI are still in the infancy?

 

So I dunno really? If I had the money to burn and wanted to play, i'd just go right ahead.

 

I am not going to buy two extra monitors and change to ATI if there are "trial and error" modifications to undertake.

 

Thanks for the information. I will think on it some more!

 

Regards.

[MackTheKnight]

The trick for Windows 7 is to run the game in Windowed mode. Win7/Vista doesn't allow monitor spanning like XP did. The only way around this is to use eyefinity, nvidia surround, or TH2Go. All of these solutions essentially make Windows think you have one very wide display as opposed to 3 separate screens.

 

There are pro's and cons to all three of these solutions and if you browse that wide screen gaming forum you'll find lots of opinions. I highly recommend doing your research before purchasing, as there are some pit-falls and it can become a bit of a purchasing nightmare as one thing leads to another.

 

In hind-sight I may have been happier with eyefinity as the Nvidia drivers are a bit of a pain. Nvidia surround will only run in SLI mode and some games suffer some major performance penalties when running in SLI.

 

I've tried to get Nvidia surround to work on my setup but I have so far not been successful in getting all 3 of my monitors to sync correctly as the model #'s are slightly different, even though the resolutions and refresh rates are all exactly the same.

 

I was using TH2Go for a while but as mentioned previously, I didn't like giving up my touch-screen. TH2Go was by far the easiest to setup and it worked very well.

 

Essentially once you've chosen and gotten one of those 3 solutions working, the lua edits are fairly simple to get through. But I won't lie, it was a royal pain getting to a solution that I was satisfied with. And very expensive.

 

I'd be happy to assist with the lua setup should you decide to bite the bullet and buy the hardware. :)

 

-Mack

[Xxx]

Hi Mack.

 

Copy what you say re the choices.

 

For myself, I would summarise the negatives as :-

 

1. TH2GO, limited support for highest resolutions. Costs as much as a ATI 6970!

 

2. Nvidia SLI, useless in FSX. Dubious driver support from Nvidia. Cost of two 560 or 570's! ( Two 580's would blow my PSU and Nuke my bank account!:cry: )

 

3. Eyefinity, well several friends say this is the way to go. However, I dont like "Royal Pains.." to set the software up. Not Eyefinity itself, which apparently takes two minutes! No its the fact that BS has to be altered to work? I know its got a triple monitor setting in the GUI, but that's not relevant to Eyefinity.

 

 

Well, at the moment its leaning towards a majority verdict for a single high quality large monitor and track IR. Apart from BS and of course A10 ( which I shall buy when out on disk ). I fly some PMDG aircraft in FSX. I prefer high quality resolution. It took an age to set up FSX with one monitor and have it run well. I ask myself how it would run with a resolution of 5760 across three screens? Anyway thats a different sim!

 

So its still a "dunno":unsure:

 

Hope this thread helps those, like myself, who are trying to decide what to do. We all appear to be in the same boat. It may be helpful to post a sticky with the correct lua and config settings for Black Shark and A10, to take the guess work and mystery out of what parameters need changing. Just a thought.

 

Regards.

[MackTheKnight]

When I have time I'll put the details on the lua edit up here from my TH2Go setup. I think the settings for eyefinity would be the same but with a higher resolution.

 

Edit: alright here we go. This is my LUA file from ...\config\monitorsetup\ that I used for my TH2Go setup. I assume a full screen setup with eyefinity would be similar but with a different res. 5040 X 1050 is 1680 X 1050 per screen. You get the aspect ratio by dividing width by height, so 5040/1050 = 4.8. So if you wanted to run 5760 X 1080 your aspect would = 5.33. Just change the values accordingly and you should be good.

 

**********************

_ = function(p) return p; end;

name = _('1 Screen');

Description = 'One monitor configuration'

Viewports =

{

Center =

{

x = 0;

y = 0;

width = 5040;

height = 1050;

viewDx = 0;

viewDy = 0;

aspect = 4.8;

}

}

**************************

 

That's all I recall having to setup for BlackShark. My Field of view seemed okay as I had the zoom axis bound do my controller so it was easy to zoom out to a good FoV.

 

 

For A10C however I had to edit some files I found via this thread: http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=68026&highlight=field+view

 

For some reason it was a bit more fiddly with A10C but I did get it working with the help of that thread.

 

In windowed mode the default 3 camera.lua file works perfectly and there's no messing with field of view settings at all.

 

Hope this helps,

Mack

Edited March 2, 2011 by MackTheKnight

[Xxx]

Thanks Mack.

 

Just those edits into the config/monitorsetup/1camera.lua? Thats good news. Mine just looks like this at present:-

 

 

name = _('1 Screen');

Description = 'One monitor configuration';

Viewports =

{

Center =

{

x = 0;

y = 0;

width = screen.width;

height = screen.height;

viewDx = 0;

viewDy = 0;

aspect = screen.aspect;

}

}

 

The U tube clip I linked elsewhere in the forum, listed a "Snapviews" edit, I assume thats what sets up the FOV? However your info is well recieved. Thanks again.

 

Keeping on the subject of monitors and views, I have just been "practising" with the Vikhr against air movers and from the last 4 hours I have learnt that I definately need a very high resolution monitor, or stronger glasses:lol: Those air targets are dots, perhaps one or three pixels wide at a mile or so! Great realism!

 

Thanks again for the info.

 

By the way, have you ever tried the "Full Screen" (LAlt/F1) with your triple setup? I imagine it would magnify the Shkval on the left monitor and the Abris on the right?

 

Best Regards.

[rispeed]

Can you do three monitors with just a normal video card??? the only thing i saw was a matrox triple head to go, is that the only option?