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ATI and Dell 2709W displayport/eyefinity problems and solutions

No display during boot?, No eyefinity in XP?, Can't run three screens in XP? Me too.

So, a while back I got a Power Color 4850 card with a displayport port and connected it up to my Dell 2709W monitor and it didn't work right.  'Stupid new technology' I thought.
The symptoms of it's failure to work were:
1) no display during bootup
2) 640x480 max resolution that the monitor would display once in Windows
3) selecting higher resolutions resulted in a 640x480 display that you could pan around.
4) sometimes the ATI drivers would report a "The system has detected a link failure and cannot set the requested resolution and refresh rate on your DisplayPortTM display. Your display might not support the requested resolution or there may be an issue with the cable connecting the display to your computer"

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Displayport port

yes, displayport port


Whoever thought of calling a new technology used to connect displays to devices 'displayport' needs to be given a dunce hat, be chained up somewhere in public so we that can all go and laugh at him and call him an idiot.

Why?

Well, I've got a 'dvi' port, an 'hdmi' port, a 'vga' port and, wait for it, a 'displayport' port.

*sigh*

Tech support call scenario:

Tech guy: Is your monitor connected via displayport?
Customer: yes
Tech guy: And it doesn't work?
Customer: nope, i get no display, I've got my cable plugged in, but nothing
Tech guy: On the monitor, what input is selected?
Customer: Umm, let me check: 'Displayport'
Tech guy: What does your cable look like?
Customer: It's got two large white connectors on either end.
Tech guy: that's a DVI cable, not a displayport cable
Customer: Well, it connects to a display port on the back of the computer, so it's a display port cable right?
Tech guy: No the idiots that came up with the displayport technology gave it a stupid name.
Tech guy: Just select DVI on your monitor instead of 'Displayport'
Customer: Oh yeah, that fixed it.
Tech guy: Great,  you've no idea how many calls like that I get
Other tech guy: Another consumer confused by 'displayport'?
Tech guy: yup
Both tech guys: *sigh*