Nvidia Surround with a GTX 980: Will an HDMI splitter work?

[Virral1290]

I am making a new setup which involves three monitors for productivity and gaming. I plan on purchasing them eventually, but I wanted to do my homework first and make sure that it is a good idea.

I am going to purchase three 1920x1080 monitors, which I am interested in using Nvidia Surround to use them all as one big screen when it comes to gaming. Unlike most people who have custom towers, I am using a custom built laptop that only has 1 HDMI port in it, along with two mini-display ports, which will be powering my whole setup. I found a 1x4 HDMI splitter that looked promising, and it looks like I would be able to connect my laptop to the three monitors (and an additional one if I chose) because of it. I also know that my graphics card supports up to 4 displays, so that works out.

I still have my doubts however. There has been a lot of confusion from when I was researching splitters, and I kept hearing that they are only good for duplicating or cloning displays, not extending them like I want. If this is true, then this sinks my plans. Part of me tells me that it would be silly if it couldn't extend for some reason, especially since I have my display extended right now to a TV through HDMI while I type this.

I just wanted to be absolutely sure. I am a little stressed out because i'm putting a lot of money towards this, and I want to be sure that I have everything I need the first time, and that there are no issues. I will number my questions below.

Also, in case it's needed, here are some specs. I may have a laptop, but I had it custom built to have desktop parts (even though my laptop is a little bulky because of it):
-GTX 980
-Intel I7 6700K CPU
-1 HDMI port, 2 mini display ports, 5 USB ports (just being thorough)

Finally, my questions.

1.) Will an HDMI splitter help me extend my laptop's displays, not just clone or duplicate them? Is an HDMI splitter even a good idea?

2.) Extra Question: With my specs, how well do you think my laptop will perform using Nvidia Surround? As a side note, I can play games in 4k on my laptop, but with somewhat less graphically demanding games. Higher demanding games is possible, but my frames drop below 30... which isn't ideal.

Thank you for taking the time of reading though all of this. I hope you all can help my find an answer very soon, and even offer alternate options if my current way of approaching this has no chance of working. If any other information is needed, I will provide it.

Thank you!

 

[nmb255]

A splitter will not extend your display. It will at best replicate your display, or let you choose which display gets the signal.

If I've followed your requirement and hardware correctly though, you should be fine. At least on driving the displays. You say your equipment has 1xHDMI and 2xDisplayPort[Mini]. If that is correct and they are all independent outputs you should just be able to hook-up three displays with the right cables. In the OS you would extend your desktop across the three... position them where you want. Set one as primary. Anyway you go.

Performance - I have no really idea, except to say that 3x1080 is less than 1x4K. So I suspect it will be good.

 

[Virral1290]

A splitter will not extend your display. It will at best replicate your display, or let you choose which display gets the signal.

If I've followed your requirement and hardware correctly though, you should be fine. At least on driving the displays. You say your equipment has 1xHDMI and 2xDisplayPort[Mini]. If that is correct and they are all independent outputs you should just be able to hook-up three displays with the right cables. In the OS you would extend your desktop across the three... position them where you want. Set one as primary. Anyway you go.

Performance - I have no really idea, except to say that 3x1080 is less than 1x4K. So I suspect it will be good.

Thanks for your help. I guess I should just buy a Mini Display to Display Port adapter for two of the monitors, and use my HDMI for the third. Thank you for helping to clear that up for me!