Matrox Software Update Brings 16 Screen Support To Single PC

This isn't something for just any old, regular computer user, but if you're a "power user," you owe it to yourself to try your hand at using 16 displays at once. It's not easy to create your own in-house flight simulator, but you really can't do a stellar job without a serious amount of screen real estate. There's one company in particular that comes to mind when thinking about KVMs and screen spanning, and that's Matrox. The company has today released new software that provides multi-display desktop configurations, utilities, and enhanced Windows operating systems support on second generation Extio KVM extenders.

In other words, it lets people combine multiple Extio F2208, F2408 and F2408E Expander Units to drive up to 16 remote displays from a single PC. The package enables a variety of new multi-display configuration opportunities that includes support for two PCIe interface cards, main units and Extio F2408E Expander boxes to drive up to 16 displays—plus keyboard, mouse, audio and up to eight additional USB 2.0 ports—at a distance of up to 1 km from a single PC. The second generation Extio KVM extenders offer expanded Microsoft® Windows® operating system support, while the new configuration and diagnostic utilities allow users in process control, operations control centers, emergency dispatch, and other mission critical environments, to effortlessly monitor, manage, and/or upgrade their Extio appliances at the BIOS or operating system level.


The new software build is available now on the Matrix driver download website, so what are you waiting for? Oh, the shipment of your other 15 monitors...good point.

New and/or updated Matrox Extio F2208/F2408 features include:

• Enhanced Windows operating environment support for Microsoft Windows 7 (32/64 bit), Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Vista® (32/64 bit), Windows Server 2008 (32/64 bit) with SP2, Windows XP (32/64 bit), Windows Server 2003 (32/64 bit);
• Enable two PCIe interface cards, Extio F2208 and Extio F2408 KVM extenders, plus Extio F2408E Expander units to drive up to 16 DisplayPort and/or DVI displays, keyboard, mouse, audio and have eight additional USB 2.0 ports at up to 1 km from the PC;
• Clone multiple displays in two separate remote locations across two fiber-optic cables, while also stretching desktops;
• Extio Setup Utility (BIOS Level Configuration & Diagnostics) to verify and/or configure the fiber-optic transceiver, link status, USB ports, hardware mapping and device password protection;
• A Matrox Appliance Integrity Scanner to log device hardware/firmware configurations;
• A Matrox Appliance Configuration Utility to field upgrade firmware to take advantage of the latest features;
• Wake from sleep/standby by pressing any keyboard key with select systems.