Page 2 - technical overview & compatibility

A technical overview

First off let's talk a little bit deeper and allow me to explain to you what exactly the Matrox Tripplehead2Go (T2G) is and does. I'll do it in the most simple way as possible. The T2G is not a graphics card and has no "graphics core". The T2G is nothing more than a little box that you connect to your videocard with the standard analog "VGA" cable. Your graphics card will then think that the little box is in fact a monitor by utilizing the EDID signal to report the resolution back to Windows (both Windows XP and Windows 2000 are supported), from there the TripleHead2Go module outputs the data from the GPU to the displays.

What is EDID: Extended display identification data (EDID) is a data format provided by a monitor to show its capabilities to a graphics card. It is what enables a PC to know what kind of monitor is connected to it. The EDID includes manufacturer name, product type, phosphor or filter type, timings supported by the display, display size, luminance data and (for digital displays only) pixel mapping data.

So the EDID data returned to the graphics cards is now a monitor with a resolution up-to 3840x1024 pixels. Now I state 'up-to' as four resolutions are supported: 3840x1024@60Hz (three 1280x1024 displays), 3072x768@75Hz (three1024x768 displays), 2400x600@60Hz (three 800x600 displays), and finally, 1920x480@ 60Hz (three 640x480 displays).

The T2G will then split the signal towards three monitors (left/center/right). Now here's the first limitation you'll run into, it's analog and thus the signal will max out at three monitors of 1280x1024. Which is a lot. But yours truly for example works with 24" 1920x1200 screens.

However three 17" or 19" LCD screens will put you back what .. 700-800 USD ? The new 30" Dell screen at 2560x1600 will cost you 2000 bucks. I can tell you already that for gaming the T2G solution is a heck of a lot more fun.

So then, once all cabled are connected and the box powered up you boot into windows and voilla .. you can simply select your maximum resolution. That's pretty much it. So yes .. that means that your working environment (desktop) is now divided into three screens. Today we will focus on gaming.

Hardware Compatibility

This does all sound sweet doesn't it ? Well .. not for ATI users. Let's talk a little about compatibility with the two biggest brands in the consumer graphics card business namely ATI and NVIDIA. For this review I have tried the T2G on two separate systems. One based on an ATI graphics card solution and one on a NVIDIA platform.

I'll be very short .. Do you own a NVIDIA GeForce Series 5, 6 or 7 generation product with a decent amount of horse power ? Then you are good to go, you will stumble into no issues whatsoever .. and that includes full SLi functionality which actually is highly recommended.

A sweet desktop for sure, with GeForce graphics cards.

Do you own a Radeon X1000 family series of graphics card solutions?  Then do not buy the T2G. You'll immediately run into weird compatibility issues. Do you have a Crossfire solution ? It's 100% a no go ... ! Do you own a Radeon X1K (1300/1600/1800/1900) product ? Then you'll be limited towards a resolution of 2400x600. Do you own a pre-X1K product (X800/X850) you'll be limited even worse in 3D towards 1920x480.

Absolutely silly .. You are looking at a Radeon X1800 XT 512MB. We are stuck here at three times 800x600 on Radeon graphics cards.

Utterly impractical ... Matrox has been seeking dialog with ATI about resolution support. In short, ATI cards of course can easily support it yet at the moment of writing ATI refuses to cooperate to get this fixed for unnamed reasons. We'd surely love to hear from ATI about this reasoning as in my opinion this really is a loss for ATI as the T2G is an admirable addition towards the fantastic ATI gaming experience. So in this case NVIDIA is getting a "green" light and ATI the "Red" light no matter how cliché that might sound.

Here's a little table in which you can see compatibility versus resolution:

* ATI Radeon graphics disable D3D caps in desktop resolutions above 2048 x 1536.
"2D Windows desktop" refers to the maximum resolution that Windows desktop can be set to for business use (ie. Email, MS-Office, etc).
"3D full screen" refers to the maximum resolution that a full screen 3D video game can run.
"3D/video in a window - max window size" refers to the maximum size a window containing 3D or video can be set to within the 2D windows desktop.