Computer for Science!

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AmagicalFishy

New Member
Hey, everyone.

I need some help building a somewhat strange computer; it's going to be used to receive and display data on several screens—and pretty much exclusively that. This means it doesn't need anything particularly high-end (except for maybe the power supply and possibly a motherboard that supports a large number of graphics cards).

The guideline specifications (apart from some USBs or something for a mouse/keyboard) are that it's going to use Windows 7, and it needs to be able to support streaming and displaying stuff on eight (large) screens simultaneously. This is what lead to the assumption that the power supply is probably going to be the highest-end part.

Here's the graphics card we were looking at earlier.

The price quoted to us by someone was $2,000, which is way more than it needs to be (basically a box with two gigantic graphics cards).

What parts would you folks suggest?
 
Sli/Crossfire has a lot of issues that aren't worth the trouble, especially for your purposes. You will probably want a good CPU for processing raw data and a good GPU that can display on multiple monitors. Also, since it will be running so much, you should have a Gold certified PSU that will last a long time and save money on electricity.

GTX 780ti
i7-3770
PSU
Mobo

EDIT: If it's only displaying data, but not processing it, you could probably get an i5 instead of an i7. You've got a pretty huge budget, however, so you might as well go all out just in case.
 
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A 780ti sounds like overkill and then a bit more kill because there wasn't enough overkill.

Without knowing exactly what you are doing with the data or how you are visualizing it, it's hard to say exactly what you'd need.

A pair of those 5450s should do it (each supports up to 6 monitors with eyefinity). But your data crunching requirements, if any, might change what you use. If your display application is using some sort of graphics api to draw then you might need more power. It's hard to say.

You could get the newer 6450 for less but they look to only be available for 16x slots. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121439 Since you'd only need 2, you can easily find boards with 2 16x slots though :)

Power requirements shouldn't be outrageous. Could probably get away with a 500W with power to spare.
 
Thanks very much for the suggestions, guys.

The computer isn't going to be processing data—that's all done at a remote location. It's only going to be throwing up the graphs that were generated at said location. A giant interactive television, basically (but those actually cost way, way more :D).

I think $700 is pretty steep for a graphics card (though I might be misinformed in prices). I like the latter suggestion, but I think there was some bad communication on my part. When I said "basically a giant box with two graphics cards," I meant—the quote we got was for a giant box with two graphics cards (each of which could support 6 monitors).

We'll need to be able to support 8 monitors total, though.
 
Skips said:
Sli/Crossfire has a lot of issues that aren't worth the trouble, especially for your purposes. You will probably want a good CPU for processing raw data and a good GPU that can display on multiple monitors. Also, since it will be running so much, you should have a Gold certified PSU that will last a long time and save money on electricity.
Click to expand...

SLI and CF don't have any issues that I have come accross and any modern CPU these days can deal with 8 x 2D outputs without even breaking a sweat. A gold certified PSU doesn't increase the MTFB, nor is the electrcity you will save ever going to offset the extra cost of the certficiation - unless you're paying a very high tarrif.

To the OP,

You simply need a set up that allows 8 independent outputs.

This will not require CF or SLI. You simply run the required number of GPUs that allow for output to each monitor, and then configure.

2 x 6850s will do this, with a 500W PSU as mentioned above.
 
I've not built a computer which could handle so many displays before, so I'm a bit ill-informed as to how one would go about hooking up eight monitors to two of those cards.

Is it done via a 4-way DVI-splitter or something of the sort? Or, in a card like the 6850, will two displays be hooked up to DVI, one to HDMI, and one to a display port?
 
Even the 6450 I linked will support 3 monitors per card. You can use 6850s if you want. The one you linked will do 4. Basically, you connect a monitor to each output. The DisplayPort, and the all the DVI/VGA/HDMI that are on it. Each connector supports 1 monitor.
 
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