Although best known for it’s powerful graphics computers and supercomputers, SGI regularly produces related items of high technology. Back in 1998, SGI gave the display industry a boost by introducing the ground breaking 1600SW display.

The Silicon Graphics 1600SW is a flat panel display with a resolution of 1600×1024. It was, and remains, the only display to offer a full 16:10 aspect ratio, allowing detailed work for digital effects artists, as well as being able to show two A4 pages of text side by side. The 1600SW won several awards for it’s innovative design, and the display’s brightness and high resolution still places it at the top end of display design, over a decade later.

The display used the all digital OpenLDI interface, which required custom graphics cards. Several models of SGI workstation had the required connector either builtin, or available as an add-in card. Companies like 3D Labs also produced dedicated graphics cards with the special connector, allowing the 1600SW display to be used with standard PCs.

Since it’s introduction, many companies have also produced convertors, allowing normal video cards to be used with the OpenLDI interface. Over a decade after it’s introduction, the SGI 1600SW remains a high quality display that is very sought after by graphics professionals.