Multi monitor VS One Big monitor (Experiance is welcome)

[dangerman1337]

I was thinking that what i want would be a 27 inch monitor (Mostly the Dell U2711 or three 23 Inchers (Dell U2311H to be precise). But i was wondering that how much of desk space is needed though :hmm:. Which is better do you lot think?

 

[Voo]

Without you specifying what the main purpose of the setup would be, that's impossible to answer. E.g. for programming GUIs you really want at least 2 monitors, for other things the larger one is better and for gaming it depends on personal preference and game type..

 

[Emulex]

I use two 24" at work and 30" at home. I'd rather have the 30" single. you move your neck with two widescreen monitors too much. your eyes are better at up/down movements. just my experience. and yeah i do code.

30" are cheap and have the 2560x1600 loving twice the pixels of a 24"

 

[dangerman1337]

Amantuer photo editing and gaming btw, also how much desk space you need for three 23 inch monitors (Dell U2311H).

 

[Voo]

I'd rather have the 30" single. you move your neck with two widescreen monitors too much. your eyes are better at up/down movements. just my experience. and yeah i do code.

Well I just like to have documentation and other stuff on the side monitor (SSH terminal into the server, mail client [umn or reddit]) and code on the main monitor, that way I don't have to switch around and at least working on GUIs with only one monitor must be horrible (well writing GUIs is always horrible, but it'd be worse )

For photo editing I don't see how more than one monitor would be especially helpful - I mean you could let bridge open on the second monitor, but editing is a mostly sequential task and the border kills the idea of using both monitors for one picture.
For gaming it depends - some people love it, others don't.. for racing games it sounds perfect, I'm not so sure about FPS..

Desk space.. well I've got 2 24" monitors on my desk and a third monitor would make it a bit crowded I think.. 2x1m

 

[dangerman1337]

Well its looking like the 27 inch one more now due the fact the Triple inch would require Crossfire or constant upgrading and the desk i'll probably get won't be able to fit three 23 inch monitors.

 

[Wag]

I have a u2711. Nice display.

 

[Idontcare]

Well I just like to have documentation and other stuff on the side monitor (SSH terminal into the server, mail client [umn or reddit]) and code on the main monitor, that way I don't have to switch around and at least working on GUIs with only one monitor must be horrible (well writing GUIs is always horrible, but it'd be worse )

For photo editing I don't see how more than one monitor would be especially helpful - I mean you could let bridge open on the second monitor, but editing is a mostly sequential task and the border kills the idea of using both monitors for one picture.
For gaming it depends - some people love it, others don't.. for racing games it sounds perfect, I'm not so sure about FPS..

Desk space.. well I've got 2 24" monitors on my desk and a third monitor would make it a bit crowded I think.. 2x1m

Heh, I'm with you guys...2x24" and primarily used for coding.

I love having my main project up on one screen and a reference project, flow-chart, organizational materials up on the other screen.

The only way I'd go with a 30" is if I went to 2x30" in portrait mode although realistically I know I'd prefer a 2x2 config of 24" screens.

 

[HurleyBird]

3x24" eyefinity here. Definitely better for gaming than a single 30" (assuming you can actually run the game at that res and it is supported), and probably better for productivity in most tasks. Much worse for TV/Movies (and games that don't support eyefinity) though, so eventually I plan to put a 42-52" HDTV over top of it.

 

[Grooveriding]

I would go for the one 30". I've used friends multi-screen setups and the bezels are distracting and I found myself turning my head a lot to see everything.

Once you do go 30" though expect to not want to go back, my old 24" looks 'small' now when I am using it.

The U2711 is also very nice, it is smaller than a 30" but has close to the same resolution and a smaller dpi for a cripser image.

 

[tweakboy]

I use 2304res and then I have a 23" Dell HDTV @ 1280x768 res TV and its good for my DAW

I can move windows out of the way to the 1280screen and have the 2304 to do production. Plugsin and Synths and what not on the tv screen. I use Sonar 8.5 Producer Edition 8.5.3 with ton of synths and plugins. Thanks,,,gg

 

[gorobei]

i've been a multi-monitor user for better part of 10 years now.

for 3d animation it is a must. viewports on one monitor, curve/attribute editor and tons of other dialog boxes on the other. Even in photoshop, the extra desk space is nice as you can have 2 full images up next to each other rather than bringing one to the front. Very handy when copy/pasting.
3x1 portrait might probably be better productivity wise, 3x1 landscape can involve a bit of head turning. The main advantage is less clicking to bring apps to the front focus. 3d modeling requires thousands of mouse clicks/drags/hotkeys per hour, which contributes to RSI. extra screen space means less clicking if your aps support openGL.

as far as desk requirements, at least 5feet wide if you are doing landscape.

 

[NoQuarter]

Depends on what you want to do. Multi-monitor will let you watch a movie while you game, or run apps on different monitors to make multitasking easier. Some games work well in the ultra-widescreen Eyefinity/whatever nVidia calls it.

30" is superior if you want to watch movies on it without multitasking, or with a lot of games that don't work well in Eyefinity, or apps that can benefit from the larger resolution but don't benefit from multitasking much (CAD/Photoshop maybe?).

Personally I have 3 monitors and there are times that I wish I had a single 30" instead (like, playing Mass Effect 2) but not enough to switch from multi-monitor.

 

[Dark Shroud]

I have a wide screen 23" and I love it. But I don't do programming on this PC. For most things a single large wide screen is the best. But yeah when I get the desk space I'm going to add a bigger screen as a main and use this on the side one in portrait for typing & code.