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42 Chapter 3: Using multiple Matrox Helios boards
Multiple board installation
You can install and use multiple Matrox Helios boards in one computer.
To use multiple Matrox Helios boards, install each additional Matrox Helios board
using the same method as when you installed the first board (refer to the Installing
your Matrox Helios board section, in Hardware installation). Theoretically, you can
have up to 16 Matrox Helios boards installed in your computer at one time; this
is discussed in the next section.
Using MIL-Lite, you have to allocate a MIL system for each board and allocate
the resources of each MIL system. For more information, see MsysAlloc() in the
MIL Reference.
Simultaneous image capture from different
boards
You can simultaneously capture images from video sources attached to different
Matrox Helios boards; however, the number of video sources from which you can
simultaneously capture images is determined by the available bandwidth of your
PCIe/PCI/PCI-X interface (segment). If there is not enough bandwidth, your
board will drop frames.
Matrox Helios XCL, XA, and XD are susceptible to dropping frames because the
PCI/PCI-X bus bandwidth is shared when you are using multiple boards.
Matrox Helios eCL, eA, and eD might have a problem with dropped frames when
there are less than 4 active lanes on the PCIe connector to the Host (for example,
if the board is connected to a x4 PCIe connector that has only one active lane).
Customers have to verify with the motherboard manufacturer to find out whether
their particular motherboard works efficiently with a x4 PCIe board, such as
Matrox Helios eCL.
The use of a high performance PCIe/PCI/PCI-X core-logic chipset, such as the
Intel E7525 series, AMD 760MPX, or ServerWorks GC (HE, LE, WS, or SL), is
necessary to sustain PCIe/PCI/PCI-X transfers to Host memory. If a
high-performance chipset and a 133 MHz 64-bit PCI-X slot is used with a Matrox
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