Not sure what is meant by starting from Dec. 1, 12:01am EST. Not quite there yet, but I'm going to assume whatever I post right now is still valid?
Anyway, my thoughts / experience with eyefinity and multi-display gaming:
When I built my new rig last September, I didn't even consider eyefinity. The 5800's were brand new at a non-inflated price point and provided very solid performance. I had vaguely read about 'eyefinity' prior to building my rig but was only mildly amused by it since pretty much all the publicity was based on the 6 screen version (which I think is both somewhat clunky and extravagant). It wasn't until the 5870's launched and I had already purchased one did I come to realize the power of simply using 3 monitors side by side. I watched videos and reviews (thanks a lot to [H]ardOcp) and decided I definitely wanted this. It took months for Dell's P2310H to come back in stock (eyefinity rush? It was pretty much the only 1080p DP monitor below $200).
When I got my monitors, eyefinity was hands down the biggest game changer I've ever experienced. I discovered WSGF through this when I searched for different FOV fixes for various games (WSGF just kept coming up on google for that).
It's important to note that this wasn't the first time multi-monitor gaming was available. But I think the fact that ATI was behind it and marketed it really brought it to a more mainstream crowd (even if not a whole lot of people actually have a multi-monitor setup, at least your average PC hobbiest now knows about it).
nVidia's surround was certainly a step forward for multi-monitor gaming. With both companies behind this technology, it encourages game developers to further support multi-monitor gaming. My roommate has a GTX 480 SLI surround setup and we both love gaming on three monitors.
I think in the future, multi-monitor gaming will certainly take off if it becomes more available to the average consumer. Nvidia surround has an SLI cost of entry while ATI has the DP limitation. If either camp rids themselves of those constraints, the ease / cost of entry will be greatly reduced especially as monitor costs drop at the same time. Cards are also becoming increasingly powerful relative to the games we're getting these days. Maybe monitor companies could somehow work with nvidia / ati on this (Dell certainly didn't expect their entire stock of DP monitors to get bought out weeks after the 5870 launch).
The 6870 in this giveaway is the perfect example of a very cost efficient entry card for eyefinity gaming. It's certainly powerful enough to run most games in triple wide for a very reasonable cost.
Personally since I have 5870 xfire already, the 6870 would be a novelty card for me (probably give it to a friend of mine and get him started with eyefinity). But I did want to share my experience with multi-monitor gaming.
There's no way I can comfortably game on a single screen in most games now. I'll use a single monitor if I HAVE to - but that's like running an old game at 800x600 windowed mode because I simply just have to.
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