New Matrox Extio F1400 is world's first remote graphics unit

Matrox Graphics has announced the Extio F1400, the world's first remote graphics unit. With this solution, the user interface of the computer -- the keyboard, mouse, monitors, audio peripherals, and graphics hardware -- are separated from the rest of the computer by up to 250 meters (820 feet) of fiber-optic cable. Designed for professional applications, this product supports up to 4 digital or analog monitors at a time, and has passive (fanless) cooling. The Matrox remote graphics technology enables a new physical layout for computers and is ideal for environments like audio studios, broadcast studios, dispatch centers, control rooms, and public spaces using digital signage. With this product, the critical parts of the computer like the disks, memory, and processors can be kept in a separate, safe, secure room. This saves space at the display station, removes a potentially noisy computer, and allows system administrators to access and maintain the system at a separate location.

"Matrox remote graphics technology enables a new physical layout for computers," says Alan Vandenbussche, VP Sales and Marketing, Matrox Graphics. "It more effectively separates the use and administration of a system. This technology has a better combination of integration, reliability, image quality, and distance than any other extension technology."

Matrox Extio is ideal for environments like audio studios, broadcast studios, dispatch centers, control rooms, and public spaces using digital signage. With this product, the critical parts of the computer like the disks, memory, and processors can be kept in a separate, safe, secure room. This saves space at the display station, removes a potentially noisy computer, and allows system administrators to access and maintain the system at a separate location.

The versatile Matrox Extio F1400 remote graphics unit (RGU) has a Matrox-designed graphics chip, 128 MB of graphics memory, dual-LC connector for fiber-optic cable, 4 DVI-I monitor connectors, 6 USB 2.0 ports (4 in front, 2 in back), integrated audio hardware, an optical connector for digital audio output, and analog audio connectors for a microphone input, line input, and line output. To meet different slot requirements, Matrox separately offers PCI or PCI Express (PCIe) fiber-optic interface cards for Extio products.

The Matrox Extio F1400 will be available in the second quarter of 2006.