You can probably get one from Dell. Yeah, I know, "Dell". But they made me an offer I couldn't refuse with one of their sales (P4, 1.6G, 128 Ram, modem, burner, free shipping, $499 after rebate.) It works just fine, and their tech support, the few times I needed it mostly because it didn't ship with current drivers, was OK.
Since I know at this point I should upgrade to at least win2k or winXP for my multiple monitor setup, how hard is it to just install winXP on my previous win98 system? Not being too computer savvy, I'm not sure whether to just buy a brand new pc with everything I need pre-installed or try to install winXP and dual monitor cards myself. Anyone in/have been in the same situation?
do not buy a new one....if you do not feel comfortable doing it, take it to a local shop or have someone come over. I have a friend that looked in the paper and hired some teenager who was advertising, he came over and this kid turned into his super-tech dude. Some of these kids are smarter than Micheal Dell....
JWKirkland, Good idea. Thanks. If I do this, what do you know about having 1 pc with 1 type of video card (my initial Nvidia single monitor card) and having a Matrox dual or quad video card alongside it? Will there be any conflicts because of 2 separate video cards with 2 different manufacturers? Any help is appreciated.
http://www.realtimesoft.com/multimon/db.asp You can search this database to see what multi-card setups work for other people.
I currently run two CRT monitors on my trading machine. I am considering buying two flat panels. Is there a problem with mixing two CRT monitors (21") with a pair of flat panels to make a four-monitor setup? Is this okay, or do all four monitors need to be the same (CRT or flat panel)? Thanks for any help on this, -Eric
Eric, No problem at all. Your crts use an analog connection. If you get an analog lcd, you can use the same connection on the video card(s) you're using now. If you buy a digital lcd, you'll need a card with digital capabilities. I use the Matrox G200 card. You can run 2 analog and 2 digital with this card. Check out www.matrox.com for further info. I believe you can also run 4 analogs at the same time on this card, but I'm not 100% sure on that.
Syd 697, I don't think you have to upgrade to WinXP. I still run an old Celeron 400, Win 98 SE, an old Nvidia AGP card, and i just have added an old Matrox Millenium PCI 2 megs video ram that I bough on the net for 7$ cdn, and an old 15" monitor that I have. After about 2 hr of twitching the BIOS and download the new drivers for the Matrox, I now have a 19" monitor on my Nvidia, and the old 15" monitor on the Matrox, and all this for 7$ !!! Win 98SE could supported 2 monitors very well. You could go to http://www.languru.com/multimon.htm to have an idea. Cheers !!!!
For anyone who wants to respond: I thought I'd give it a go and try to install 1 or more video cards into my win98 system (I know I should have win2k), so I could have 3 monitors instead of one. Before purchasing the other video cards, I thought I'd call Dell (my pc maker) and ask them some advice about what could be a possible compatible card with my system, figuring their tech support might know something about it. Well, I talked to 2 different reps, and both told me that you can't add any more video cards into my present system. I couldn't believe it, considering all the feedback I've gotten thru this website from other traders telling me it's no problem to do. So now I'm kind of stuck and confused. I actually did open my pc tower up to see which slots I had available. It seems that my one and only video card in my pc is in an AGP slot and that there are no other AGP slots, which leads me to believe that I would need to buy a PCI video card for my other monitors. Should I just go ahead and purchase the video cards and take my chance? I've gotten great links from you all for sites where I could get cheap cards. Suggestions anyone?
I can't think of any reason why you couldn't add additional cards. They would have to be PCI or you could get one quad card to replace your AGP card. The AGP is supposedly better but PCI is absolutely fine. I have an ATI Xpert 128 16mb on each of my monitors but I'm sure there are better value cards today. I feel 16mb video ram is more than adequate for trading,(i.e. you don't need those 64mb cards). Whatever you choose try to get a card(s) that is also Win2k compatible in case you do upgrade or buy new computer later. Tony