14 DAY TRIAL // The Ivy Bridge series of CPUs will be many things, but one of its features might turn out to be somewhat too hard to make use of for motherboard makers and, by extension, consumers as well.
Intel's oft-delayed next-generation central processing units will be many things: the latest CPUs from the Santa Clara, California-based company, the most advanced and, thus fastest yet, the most capable in terms of graphics (compared to their predecessors), etc.
The graphics side of things might not be all it's cracked up to be though.
Not that the integrated GPUs won't be stronger than the ones currently available, because Intel promised they would be.
Nevertheless, one video feature will be hard to implement for motherboard makers: multi-display support.
Since Ivy Bridge CPUs promise much better graphics, some people will no doubt want to connect three displays to the motherboard.
Unfortunately, Intel has implemented only two PLLs, phase-locked loops that can't be shared by DVI and HDMI, or any TDMS or analogue interface.
It is a small consolation that DisplayPorts can share them just fine, with one monitor working at up to 2,500 x ,600 pixels and the other two at 1,920 x 1,200 pixels.
We say a “small” consolation because motherboard makers aren't about to start manufacturing platforms with only DisplayPorts. There aren't many monitors with support for them after all. VR-Zone points out that there is still a solution to this dilemma: DP++, or Dual-mode DisplayPort.
Featured in some video cards from Sapphire, it uses some low-cost components to make a DP++ adapter that turns DisplayPort signal into TDMS signal, allowing an extra DVI port to be used.
Mainboard companies could start doing something similar, but whether or not they have such plans remains to be seen. We'll keep you informed in case we learn more.