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New release: AMD W600, 6 monitors, low power consumption, certified drivers
The Firepro cards are usually several times as expensive as the Radeon Eyefinity 6 cards.
The Radeon cards are not supported under Windows Server, where the Firepro cards are. But other than that, if you run W7, then I cannot see a reason a day trader would need the Firepro cards.
It would be nice if this Firepro card was really a low end GPU, single slot, low power card that was also far less expensive than a typical Radeon Eyefinity 6 card. But I doubt that will be the case based on prior experience.
Interesting card, and quite decent resolution support per monitor (although few of us need more than 1920x1200 IMO, based on monitors we have), but at $600 for this card, it is pricey.
I can't get a gauge of performance, but I think it's about equivalent to this option, which is priced about $100, and can run 4 monitors. With many a PC (at least ones with decent motherboards, having multiple PCI-E slots) you can pop in more of these, and have a decent performing setup.
The thing is trading and financial installs are not what this card is targetted for. AMD has the FirePro 2460 for that market, with low power, passive cooling etc is very well suited.
This card is designed for digital signage and projection. There are a few features on here which clearly separates it from the 2460. Namely support for edge blending and warping and super high resolution per display.
Unless you are going to buy a new set of WQHD monitors (think of driving 6 of those on your desk!) you won't need this and you are better off just stacking 2460's.
The other use case for traders will be in mitx systems with only 1 PCI-E slot... then if you need 6 monitors in a low power configuration then you have to have this card.
I have it installed. So far cannot tell any glaring difference over the 2460, but I have noticed over time the 2460's have a few anomalies either due to the card itself, or poor drivers -- things like "corrupted" textures on screen that require you to move the window to force a redraw.
I'll see if those things are now eliminated or not. If they remain, I would conclude the FirePro drivers are at fault (combination of six monitor setup, or FirePro, both of which are not as fully tested or popular as normal drivers with one or two monitors).