I need to run 10 x 1080p TV’s using 10 x of your USB 3 to HDMI adapters, i’m worried about USB resources though, how can I pick out a machine I know will work with this setup? My plan was to get 2 x 5 port USB hubs and connect the adapters to them, instead of routing all 10 through the one USB 3 port.
Another side question I have is in relation to the CPU, are there any recommendations as presumably all of the video processing will be offloaded to the CPU? AMD or Intel?
I should also mention each display will show static images, they might slide (a slide show on each) that’s about it though, no videos playing on each etc.
DisplayLink devices officially don’t support more than 6 external monitors. With the USB resource limits we’ve seen on some devices, that number can be even less, and is hard to predict from device to device.
We don’t recommend trying to use our products for huge display arrays like this. We’ve done technical demonstrations, but it really only works in very limited cases.
What I’m looking for is some technical details, DisplayLink still has a recommend / set amount of displays set at 6, I could do 6 via DisplayLink and 4 via the gpu to get my 10 displays, I get that.
What I want to know is what are the limiting factors, let’s say I get a motherboard with 10 USB 3 ports, place a 8 core cpu in it, do you think I’ll be able to output 10 x 1080p? It might not play video smooth or whatever, all I want is still images on all 10 displays, or do you think I would be able to do that? I’ve read about usb resources a s end points and controllers, but there are pcie usb 3 cards out there to get around this issue. I’m not looking for official support on this, just some point in the right direct / a way I can try and calculate what might work.
Unfortunately we wouldn’t be able to give advice on this sort of scenario, as we just don’t test for it. Without testing the exact hardware you intend to use, we wouldn’t be able to give any definitive answer. If you decide to go down this road, you’re pretty much on your own, and I’d encourage you to try one additional display at a time so you can see where the failure point will be, and so you can hopefully invest less.
Again, I don’t recommend doing this as it’s unlikely to be reliable even if you can get that amount of displays up.
To expand a bit on what Sam mentioned, aside from USB bandwidth concerns related to performance, there are other USB resource limitations to consider on virtually all modern USB 3.0 systems which will prevent adapters beyond 6 from outputting at all.
Please check out this article for additional details.
Thank you both for the replies guys, and I can fully understand your reasons behind not suggesting I use more than 6.
Since I wrote my original message I have since discovered MST hubs! and how they can split up the resolution of display ports! so that may be another route that I can go down.
I think what I am going to do is purchase a GPU that can output 4 monitors and purchase 6 USB to HDMI adapters, that way I should reliably get the 10 outputs I need? What do you think? 6 monitors at 1080p (the refresh rate is not so much of an issue but 60hz would be ideal) if I need to I can pickup and additonal PCIe USB controller is I run into any issues?
Honestly, my best advice is to try one additional display at a time so you can see where the failure point will be. With large display arrays like this, we can give no real idea what the outcome will be.