Mixing Graphics cards to solve a multiple display issue?

[lukejongibson]

For the last couple of years I've been running 3 screens off my 980ti 1 x 4K and 2 x 1080p all that time the 4K has always misbehaved quite a lot, typically when i boot the system up the 4K will have a massive delay (upto 10-15 minutes) before it comes on, sometime I even need to turn it on and off again manually, and then sometimes even that doesn't work and I need to reboot the machine.

Typically once it's up and running everything is fine, sometime when I'm gaming or watching films on the 4K I occasionally start to get intermittent drops (i.e. screen goes black from a couple of seconds), but, turning it off and on again seems to stop it.

It has obviously been bugging the crap out of me, but having checked all the cables and tried swapping each screen on each graphics port, it probably leaves a more serious hardware issue, but not knowing what it is I'm reluctant to start throwing money at it, if I'm not sure it will solve the problem.

But, just now I had to reboot 3 times to get up and running again, so enough is enough I need to do something about it.

So my questions are:

1. by running a 4K and 2 x 1080p's off a single 980ti am I overloading the card?

2. Do you think the card could be faulty? Or is it more likely the 4K?

3. I've got a 560ti in another machine I could use, I know I can't run it in SLI, but even though it doesn't match would I benefit from running the two smaller screen off it and letting the 980ti run the 4K solo?

Cheers

 

[R_1]

1. possibly the max digital resolution is 5120 x 3200.
2. test the card, remove one of the 1080 displays and see if things improve. could be.
3. if you have the power supply and the PCIe slot this is my suggestion

 

[lukejongibson]

1. possibly the max digital resolution is 5120 x 3200.
2. test the card, remove one of the 1080 displays and see if things improve. could be.
3. if you have the power supply and the PCIe slot this is my suggestion

Okay thank you. It's close I guess, but still well under the max resolution. 5120x3200 = 16384000 pixels

3840x2160 + 1920x1080 + 1920x1080 = 12571200 pixels so theoretically it should be able to handle another 2 1080p screens. But perhaps having it across multiple screens lowers that in some significant way.

I'll give them both ago tomorrow and let you know

 

[k1114]

The max res is per port and a limit of dp 1.2 not the total. You can max out every port and be way above that without issues. If an intel igpu can run 2x 4k with no issues for productivity, you can imagine how much gpu power is needed.

Unfortunately with the 560ti, it's been moved to the legacy drivers and you can't install 2 different geforce drivers together. They will just overwrite the other.

 

[lukejongibson]

The max res is per port and a limit of dp 1.2 not the total. You can max out every port and be way above that without issues. If an intel igpu can run 2x 4k with no issues for productivity, you can imagine how much gpu power is needed.

Unfortunately with the 560ti, it's been moved to the legacy drivers and you can't install 2 different geforce drivers together. They will just overwrite the other.

Ah okay, good thing I didn't try it before asking then, that probably would have caused me no end of headaches. So what are you leaning towards, a faulty card? Or a faulty 4K?

 

[4745454b]

From my limited knowledge Nvidia is a bit behind multi displays. I was helping someone try to setup what's called a PLP multi monitor setup and the most recent data I could find from 2017 said it can't be done on Nvidia hardware. (PLP is portrait, landscape, portrait. It's where the center monitor is normal and the side monitors are rotated 90degrees.) I'm guessing Nvidia also has issues when the monitors are different sizes? I have four 1080 monitors attached to my 7950. (R9 280.) I know that's only one 4k screen, but that's also a lot weaker than your 980TI. I assume your 4k screen is a TV attached via HDMI? Have you tried a newer cable? Is the TV a newer model? It might be an HDMI issue.

 

[k1114]

PLP can't be done with surround but was never an issue with just running multiple monitors. Neither has running different sizes. Plp is a nice feature for eyefinity but neither are relevant when just running multiple monitors. Nvidia drivers have been a pain for a long time and that was my first thought. If you tried swapping the ports with the other monitors and turning the monitor on and off, that would tell me it's gpu related. But that doesn't say if it's a driver issue or the gpu itself. Without another gpu that could run 4k, it's hard to confirm if it is the gpu.

 

[R_1]

you could boot to linux (rufus to extract a linux distro on USB) and see of the card works in a new environment properly.

 

[lukejongibson]

From my limited knowledge Nvidia is a bit behind multi displays. I was helping someone try to setup what's called a PLP multi monitor setup and the most recent data I could find from 2017 said it can't be done on Nvidia hardware. (PLP is portrait, landscape, portrait. It's where the center monitor is normal and the side monitors are rotated 90degrees.) I'm guessing Nvidia also has issues when the monitors are different sizes? I have four 1080 monitors attached to my 7950. (R9 280.) I know that's only one 4k screen, but that's also a lot weaker than your 980TI. I assume your 4k screen is a TV attached via HDMI? Have you tried a newer cable? Is the TV a newer model? It might be an HDMI issue.

No it's a 4K Monitor, not a TV - Iiyama 40" ProLite https://goo.gl/ggVdBd I already said in my original post I'd tried each screen with different cables and in different ports.both Displayport and HDMI cables as well, the HDMI cable is the correct 2.0 and the displayport cables are 1.2, which is also set correctly in the menu, the cables are correct as they perform fine once the screen is up and running, having tested a HDMI 1.4 with it before it's quite obvious the frame rate is well under 60fps.

 

[lukejongibson]

PLP can't be done with surround but was never an issue with just running multiple monitors. Neither has running different sizes. Plp is a nice feature for eyefinity but neither are relevant when just running multiple monitors. Nvidia drivers have been a pain for a long time and that was my first thought. If you tried swapping the ports with the other monitors and turning the monitor on and off, that would tell me it's gpu related. But that doesn't say if it's a driver issue or the gpu itself. Without another gpu that could run 4k, it's hard to confirm if it is the gpu.

That's what I was afraid of. I could work without a 4K if I had to send that off for warranty, if it's the card and I don't have a backup that can run 4K if it's away for more than a week, it'll be cheaper just to upgrade to a 1080ti. I do have a few friends with 980/1080's so might give them a call see if they'd let me borrow and test.

 

[lukejongibson]

Okay I spoke to my friend and on Thursday I should be able to borrow his 980 to test it with. Thank you for your help guys.