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Geforce ---> Quadro for edge blending purposes (Mosaic)

 
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tschaeikaei




Joined: 08 Apr 2013
Posts: 489
Location: Germany/Saarland


PostLink    Posted: Sat Apr 02, 2016 6:24 pm    Post subject: Geforce ---> Quadro for edge blending purposes (Mosaic) Reply with quote


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Hi, since i did not read at all in this HTPC section, I'm maybe coming up with something that has been written about.
But let me tell you what i found.

The problem: I have two Marquee 9500U i want to use on a PC based edge blend.
There is various software to do this, but if you want more than a 30 days trial, you got to pay big bucks.
I read about Nvidia Quadro (professional rendering and 3D applications) cards supporting a driver-based solution for seamless edge-blending called NVidia Mosaic.
That driver isn't supported by any Geforce (consumer grade) graphics card, but by all of the newer Quadros.
Since both cards use the same chipsets and board layouts, some of them are even the same cards hardwarewise,
but clearly tell the OS (via GPU bios) what type (quadro/geforce) it is and since only the quadros support mosaic, you're not gonna get edge blending with a geforce card.
The solution:
Simply bios hack a geforce into the corresponding quadro card. The latest cards (Geforce 600 series and up) are not moddable this way, they are hardware coded (resistors) and those resistors value have to be changed.

But what i want is a card with two DVI ports both supporting analogue signals to feed my CRT projectors with.
And the very new cards simply don't do analogue output anymore.

I ended up buying a GTX480 to mod it into a Quadro 6000.
The card is here, stupidly i don't have a PC where i can fit the physical size of that huge brick into.
But let me find out if I'm the first one here to try this.

In my opinion the simplest way to go edge blending. Also it should be the cleanest way. You use the GPU
(which is much more powerful for such things than a CPU) and everything on your screen will run in edge blend mode
after the PC has loaded the drivers after booting.

Going to get a mainboard, CPU and everything else, build a HTPC and try it out.

http://www.forum-3dcenter.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=557018
German language how-to for the GTX480 and others
http://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/hacking-nvidia-cards-into-their-professional-counterparts/
Hardware hacking of the very new (600 series and up) cards

I've talked to the forum bosses prior to posting.

Regards, Julian

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AnalogRocks
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Joined: 08 Mar 2006
Posts: 26690
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada

TV/Projector: Sony 1252Q, AMPRO 4000G


PostLink    Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 2:53 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've been wanting to do this for some time. We were going to try with the old Quadro 4700 cards. I got one but found my 2006 PC's motherboard had died. I have the replacement MB now but have little time to play with this.

Give it a shot. I actually am in the planning stages for a new PC to blend 2,3 or 4 projectors. I am undecided as to which video cards to buy.

I'll look forward to your progress.

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AnalogRocks
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PostLink    Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2016 5:36 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hi tschaeikaei, any progress on this? I'm about ready to build my PC. I'm wondering if a pair of GTX 480's is the way to got for blending 4 projectors or should I go GTX 780's modded to Quadro cards? Hmmmmmm....
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tschaeikaei




Joined: 08 Apr 2013
Posts: 489
Location: Germany/Saarland


PostLink    Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2016 6:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Nice to see your're interested. I haven't had any progress on this, since the GTX480 does not fit into any PC case i have here.
I ordered a case, but since this is going to be a completely new PC and I haven't followed the new series of chipsets, mainboards and CPUs for some years,
I've not made a decision about those.
And; there is a comletely new version (hardware and software) of the 6 channel fan controller we've finished development in the last days.
You see, plenty of other stuff going on. Smile

I choose the GTX480 because there's a german languge step by step guide on how to convert it to a Quadro.
But check the above links to see if it is possible to mod the GTX780.

Are you using CRTs or digital projectors for your blend?
There's quiet a good way to use one display port sonnector for up to 18 monitors/ projectors, but the signal is digital only for sure.
If you're using moome cards, i could imagine you can go that way too, but i've never cared about using digital signals of any standard in my CRTs.
Analogue via VGA (in my case DVI-I) is my way and the absolute cheapest to go.

Regards, Julian

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AnalogRocks
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Joined: 08 Mar 2006
Posts: 26690
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada

TV/Projector: Sony 1252Q, AMPRO 4000G


PostLink    Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2016 3:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

tschaeikaei wrote:
Nice to see your're interested. I haven't had any progress on this, since the GTX480 does not fit into any PC case i have here.
I ordered a case, but since this is going to be a completely new PC and I haven't followed the new series of chipsets, mainboards and CPUs for some years,
I've not made a decision about those.
And; there is a comletely new version (hardware and software) of the 6 channel fan controller we've finished development in the last days.
You see, plenty of other stuff going on. Smile

I choose the GTX480 because there's a german languge step by step guide on how to convert it to a Quadro.
But check the above links to see if it is possible to mod the GTX780.

Are you using CRTs or digital projectors for your blend?
There's quiet a good way to use one display port sonnector for up to 18 monitors/ projectors, but the signal is digital only for sure.
If you're using moome cards, i could imagine you can go that way too, but i've never cared about using digital signals of any standard in my CRTs.
Analogue via VGA (in my case DVI-I) is my way and the absolute cheapest to go.

Regards, Julian


I've been busy too. Still have to look back into which pieces I'm going to build this with. I'll have to go thorough all the posts on that forum to see if the GTX780 is easily modable.

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tschaeikaei




Joined: 08 Apr 2013
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Location: Germany/Saarland


PostLink    Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2016 7:26 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

As i believe i read on the EEV blog somewhere, everything newer than 600 series is hardware coded.
Means you've got to desolder some tiny 0402 resistors out and solder other values in.
Should not be too hard but software-modding only is easier tough.
Since i paid about 25 bucks for the 480 and that thing should be fafst enough for what i want to use it, i did not care about expensive
newer series cards.

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AnalogRocks
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Joined: 08 Mar 2006
Posts: 26690
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada

TV/Projector: Sony 1252Q, AMPRO 4000G


PostLink    Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2016 10:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

tschaeikaei wrote:
As i believe i read on the EEV blog somewhere, everything newer than 600 series is hardware coded.
Means you've got to desolder some tiny 0402 resistors out and solder other values in.
Should not be too hard but software-modding only is easier tough.
Since i paid about 25 bucks for the 480 and that thing should be fafst enough for what i want to use it, i did not care about expensive
newer series cards.


My test card is a 2007 Quadro 4600 as soon as I put my old XP PC's "new" mother board in.

I looked at the GTX480's. I like them. I may do the same with a 3rd faster card for the gaming and desktop display.

tschaeikaei wrote:
Nice to see your're interested.
Are you using CRTs or digital projectors for your blend?
Regards, Julian


Forgot to answer this ^

I have quite a number of JVC DILA's over here. I plan to try blending those for portability. They are 1366x1024 resolution.

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tschaeikaei




Joined: 08 Apr 2013
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Location: Germany/Saarland


PostLink    Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2016 2:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

You could go 2458x1024, and you're not bound to analogue outputs like i am.
But portability and blending doesn't fit together if you ask me.

But I'm not into gaming to much and the 480 is faster than my main PCs GTX560 (which i never used to it's limit).
So i don't worry to much about performance for gaming.

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AnalogRocks
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Joined: 08 Mar 2006
Posts: 26690
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada

TV/Projector: Sony 1252Q, AMPRO 4000G


PostLink    Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2016 5:06 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

tschaeikaei wrote:
You could go 2458x1024, and you're not bound to analogue outputs like i am.
But portability and blending doesn't fit together if you ask me.

But I'm not into gaming to much and the 480 is faster than my main PCs GTX560 (which i never used to it's limit).
So i don't worry to much about performance for gaming.


I have to check their DVI inputs. Not sure if they can be pixel mapped like the VGA can. I seem to remember reading the DVI only does HDTV resolutions** so internal scaling in the projector applies. DLA-G150CL

EDIT: **Just read the brochure says HDTV ans PC resolutions on DVI I'll have to test.

I just ordered a GTX730 64 bit 2gb DDR for day to day stuff. I'll keep my eye out for a GTX480 too

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tschaeikaei




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Location: Germany/Saarland


PostLink    Posted: Fri Apr 29, 2016 10:43 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If you buy a GTX480, remember it is a very long card and does not fit into normal midi tower PC cases.
Mine is 27cm=10.63" without the mounting metal part.

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AnalogRocks
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Joined: 08 Mar 2006
Posts: 26690
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada

TV/Projector: Sony 1252Q, AMPRO 4000G


PostLink    Posted: Fri Apr 29, 2016 3:05 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

tschaeikaei wrote:
If you buy a GTX480, remember it is a very long card and does not fit into normal midi tower PC cases.
Mine is 27cm=10.63" without the mounting metal part.


Thanks for the warning.

I just got my new case. It's the Cooler Master HAF XB EVO. I'm looking at the box right now it says max VGA card length 334mm/13.1 inches so I should be OK.



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tschaeikaei




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Posts: 489
Location: Germany/Saarland


PostLink    Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2016 2:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

So, does anyone know about RAMDAC on these cards in general.
On my GTX480 (which came broken from ebay) there's no RAMDAC chip.
Seems they integrated it into the GPU. I've also read somewhere on the net about "integrated RAMDAC"
so i concern it as a given.
Thing is, i wanted to find out if they used one RAMDAC for every DVI-I port (two of them on the card) or if they used one chip
for both.
I also think they've used 400MHz RAMDACs, because... they do this everywhere.

So: Can i think of the card beeing able to convert 400MHz per DVI port or 400MHz combined on both of them?

Regards, Julian

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tschaeikaei




Joined: 08 Apr 2013
Posts: 489
Location: Germany/Saarland


PostLink    Posted: Mon Oct 10, 2016 4:26 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well...
No, it is a GTX480.

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