Specifications
MAXIMUMPC
JUL 2011
maximumpc.com
45
Madness
THREE OF THE MORE HARDCORE
GAMERS ON STAFF SERVED AS
OUR INTREPID TESTERS.
LAST MONTH’S REVIEW of Samsung’s
MD230X6 six-screen Eyefi nity display got
us thinking big. We were awestruck by the
majesty of so much screen real estate—
particularly in games, where a screen con-
fi g of massive proportions provides a level
of immersion that a single screen, or even
two screens, can’t come close to matching.
But the MD230X6 wasn’t perfect, as our re-
view revealed. This got us wondering: Would
just three of the 23-inch displays side-by-
side make for a more satisfying all-around
experience? Would it be as encompass-
ing in games? What if we could take three
large displays and turn them vertical? And
hey, while we’re imagining the possibilities,
what would gaming be like on three gigantic
HDTVs? What, after all, could be more maxi-
mum than that?
We knew of no better way to answer these
pressing questions than with a Maximum PC
Challenge. We grabbed three of the more
hardcore gamers on staff to serve as our in-
trepid testers: Online Associate Editor Alan
Fackler, Senior Associate Editor Nathan Ed-
wards, and Senior Editor Gordon Mah Ung.
We had each editor play three distinctly dif-
ferent game types—Need for Speed: Hot
Pursuit, Call of Duty: Black Ops, and World
of Warcraft—on our four test setups: Sam-
sung’s MD230X6 with all six screens, the
MD230X6 with just three screens, three of
NEC’s new PA301Ws 30-inch screens verti-
cally oriented, and three NEC E461 46-inch
HDTVs.
We were looking for the perfect combi-
nation of screen real estate, game immer-
sion, and functionality across multiple game
types. Which confi g would prevail? We needed
to fi nd out—even if it took hours and hours of
gameplay (oh, how we toil!).
While our primary objective in this chal-
lenge was to identify the most awesome
screen setup for games, we also include a
sidebar on which GPU/s will produce the
best frame rates and quality settings in each
multiscreen scenario.
Now, with that out of the way… Game on!
BECAUSE ONE SCREEN IS NEVER
ENOUGH! WE SET OUR SIGHTS ON
FINDING THE BEST MULTISCREEN
SETUP FOR GAMING
BY AMBER BOUMAN