How to use multiple graphics cards in opengl

[bhanu]

hi all,
we are using opengl-0.3 functions for running our application and we are having multiple graphics cards in our pc.we found that only one graphics card is active in all the times.how to invoke the other graphics cards by making use of opengl functions? any opengl initialization function is there, which will initialize other cards.please help us regarding this issue.

Thanks,
Bhanu S

[eile]

First Google hit on you subject answers your question: http://www.equalizergraphics.com/documentation/parallelOpenGLFAQ.html

[Nighthawk]

By default, only the primary GPU is used. There are 2 ways to use multiple GPUs.
1.) You can try to enable SLI/CrossfireX in the graphics driver. The driver “emulates” a single GPU for your application, but internally renders on 2-4 GPUs. This has various downsides(Possible Problems: lag, bad scaling, readbacks being very costly, …)

2.) Program for your GPUs explicitly yourself:
http://www.opengl.org/registry/specs/AMD/wgl_gpu_association.txt
http://www.opengl.org/registry/specs/NV/gpu_affinity.txt
You need a different context for each GPU and delegate the workload yourself.
Nvidia Multi-GPU is only supported on expensive Quadro Cards iirc.

[bhanu]

hi mr.eile,
Thanks for your quick response.i got some information regarding this issue in the link suggested by you.still i have some queries,
1.which version of opengl libraries shall support multiple graphics with opengl feature.
2.whether this x11 functions are applicable for windows environment as iam using msvc.
3.is there any software to synchronize both graphics cards.

Thanks
Bhanu S