Connecting screens - best practice

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Azlan
Posts: 7
Joined: Wed Sep 01, 2021 2:49 pm

Connecting screens - best practice

#1 Post by Azlan »

Hello all,

Can anyone share their experience on offloading panels (CPU utiliz.) from the main sim pc?
Here I think about maybe using a mini pc with a range of USB to VGA/HDMI converters, having this PC run all the panels with Air Player, connecting to the main Sim pc running Air Manager.

Is this doable? Or is there another best practice solution?

Looking forward to hearing about your experience.

Regards
Azlan

lonespace
Posts: 64
Joined: Wed Mar 25, 2020 1:58 am

Re: Connecting screens - best practice

#2 Post by lonespace »

How much of your CPU is Air Manager actually using? I can’t say I’ve seen any noticeable impact on my sims frame rates and thus no need to offload the panels to another PC

Azlan
Posts: 7
Joined: Wed Sep 01, 2021 2:49 pm

Re: Connecting screens - best practice

#3 Post by Azlan »

It is not just about how much the application is utilizing.
Currently, I have several graphics adapters in my SIM PC, showing panels on external monitors (non-AirManager).
The continuation of adding adapters now hit a physical limit in the PC. That's why I am looking for a better design.
So to understand any decrease in SIM performance, I would first have to remove the extra adaptors and make a baseline.

X-plane is really bad in taking advantage of computer resources, so every hardware muscle is important.

Could be nice if somebody had any experience in decentralizing the screens.

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jph
Posts: 2846
Joined: Fri Apr 10, 2020 12:50 pm
Location: Somewhere over the rainbow..

Re: Connecting screens - best practice

#4 Post by jph »

Easiest way for AM / external maps / lilnavmap etc etc is to buy a second hand PC either with - or add - a multi output Nvidia GPU. You can get some ex business PC's for less than about 50 euro and a suitable card for about 50 euro. This will run 4 monitors.
Just make sure you buy a desktop - NON small form factor) that uses standard parts - for example -
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/284422206399 ... SwifdhJLi9
Standard ATX, std PSU, RAM etc. nothing proprietary at all.
I have a 3 Thinkcentre 72 units with 3470s processors. Had a few GTX970s lying about. These make great machines. If needed you can change the PSU for 30, the processor for around 20 and an SSD for about 30.
Out of interest, what 'multiple' adapters are you using in a single PC ?
Joe. CISSP, MSc.

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