IGX

Looking to go to a multiple monitor setup. I'm not a gamer and photographer, it would be primarily for reading documents, comparing spreadsheets, and writing. Would like to go with two for now but have easy upgradeability to three-- idea is to put productive things on the monitors but leave unproductive things (email, facebook, twitter) on the laptop screen. Ability to go vertical would be a plus for reading pdfs. Any thoughts?

Three monitors might be more involved, but two monitors is as simple as hooking a second monitor to the back of your computer.

Get what you like. If you are on a Windows system, and have an old monitor around, you can test it out. If your graphics card has HDMI (which it should), you can use a flatscreen and an HDMI cable.

When you plug it in, with one extra, it should auto detect, but just right click on the screen -> Display Settings -> Customize Your Display . You'll be able to configure the monitors however you like, including detecting one if it doesn't show up automatically.

Turdacious wrote:Looking to go to a multiple monitor setup. I'm not a gamer and photographer, it would be primarily for reading documents, comparing spreadsheets, and writing. Would like to go with two for now but have easy upgradeability to three-- idea is to put productive things on the monitors but leave unproductive things (email, facebook, twitter) on the laptop screen. Ability to go vertical would be a plus for reading pdfs. Any thoughts?

are you a complete fucking idiot??

that's rhetorical, btw

TerryB wrote:are you a complete fucking idiot??

that's rhetorical, btw

You have to ask?

I have 3 24" monitors at work and could not ever go back, would actually rather have a fourth. I have no fuckin clue how anyone works on a laptop or even a single normal sized monitor.

I think the best would be like a 50 inch curved screen TV up to monitor specs.

Fuzzy Dunlop wrote:I have 3 24" monitors at work and could not ever go back, would actually rather have a fourth. I have no fuckin clue how anyone works on a laptop or even a single normal sized monitor.

I think the best would be like a 50 inch curved screen TV up to monitor specs.

How are they set up? Only method I know of is the Matrox triplehead2go.

A monitor with a laptop is a no brainer. Plug in the monitor while leaving the laptop lid open, and it should just work. Two externals and a laptop is more tricky, requiring a special laptop or some weird external hardware. So just get a really big external monitor to plug the laptop into.

nafod wrote:So just get a really big external monitor to plug the laptop into.

I've been doing that for years (using an old flat screen) but have run into a lot of limits.

This is along the lines of what I'm thinking: http://joshblackman.com/blog/2016/12/26 ... kstations/
Definitely overkill for my purposes, but hard to argue with the results (Blackman's output is impressive).

Turdacious wrote:

Fuzzy Dunlop wrote:I have 3 24" monitors at work and could not ever go back, would actually rather have a fourth. I have no fuckin clue how anyone works on a laptop or even a single normal sized monitor.

I think the best would be like a 50 inch curved screen TV up to monitor specs.

How are they set up? Only method I know of is the Matrox triplehead2go.

I'm not googling that...

They're side by side at slight angles. I use the left 2 for working and the right one for email, bloomberg, IM. If I needed a full monitor's worth of bloomberg launchpad up at all times I'd need a 4th. I also kind of want one the i could put in "portrait" orientation for editing word docs too.

Fuzzy Dunlop wrote:

Turdacious wrote:

Fuzzy Dunlop wrote:I have 3 24" monitors at work and could not ever go back, would actually rather have a fourth. I have no fuckin clue how anyone works on a laptop or even a single normal sized monitor.

I think the best would be like a 50 inch curved screen TV up to monitor specs.

How are they set up? Only method I know of is the Matrox triplehead2go.

I'm not googling that...

They're side by side at slight angles. I use the left 2 for working and the right one for email, bloomberg, IM. If I needed a full monitor's worth of bloomberg launchpad up at all times I'd need a 4th. I also kind of want one the i could put in "portrait" orientation for editing word docs too.

I'm looking at something like this for a basic setup:
As I understand it, the Matrox allows you to run multiple monitors out of one port on the laptop. Definitely not my area of expertise, and it costs almost as much as three monitors would (about $300) so if there's a more inexpensive way to do what I want to do, I'm all for it. Like you I think, my major concern is productivity.

/r/buildapc is worth a look

Turd, no computer is safe. Better to throw your laptop in the trash and hire a team of monks to act as scribes and couriers. Make sure they pass a background check.

katy gibbs secretarial school is coming back.

pretty girls to type and twirl for trump, ailes, et al.

"miss pennyfeather, pls bring me a coffee, cream and one sugar."

the universe will be restored to order.

Grandpa's Spells wrote:/r/buildapc is worth a look

Lot to dig through there, but a lotta great stuff. Thanks!

I haven't had a chance to look into it yet but I just installed a Lenovo ThinkPad P70 for a customer. They are a bit expensive, starting about $1900, but they have impressive display capabilities. It had HDMI, Displayport, and Thunderport (seen on Macs) and I am 99% sure you could use 3 monitors with it, but not 100% sure. The built in screen is 17.3" and real nice.

Now for that price you could buy three nice laptops and run them side by side but it wouldn't be this cool.

I don't know...multitasking on multiple monitors seems to slow the process down...unless you have a fuck ton of comparisons to make.

I agree that trying to multitask with multiple monitors is likely to result in wasted time. It's a good way to end up with one monitor for actual work, and another monitor for goofing off while pretending to work.

But you really don't have to do a lot of back and forth comparisons to make before multiple monitors (or one gigantic monitor) starts to help you with your primary task. It's convenient to have secondary documents or programs open and in front of you, just as it can be convenient to spread papers or books across a larger desk.

I've been tiling for years (read something on one half of the screen and write on the other half) but I've started to run into the limitation of that method. I do have my share of mindless work where having Netflix on the one screen and work on the other makes sense, but I try to limit that type of work as much as possible. I can see using three monitors (one for writing, and different documents open on the other two) but after that I don't see the utility of moar. If I was one of those people who could be productive and actively monitor my email or twitter feed I would but both of those are distractions I try to minimize.