New monitor. . .what should I do?

SO, it's time to retire my 19 inch wide screen monitor.

When I peruse the flyer for my local computer store, I see in my budget I can afford up to a 25 inch monitor, or perhaps instead, a pair of 22's.

On this computer THE application is SL. Tho I sometimes switch to a browser or paint program.

As computers go, it's a capable machine. Quad core 920 w 6g ram. The video card is a single 9800. (I should have held out for a 280, but oh well.)

SO, any suggestions?

SL is reportedly less than happy with multiple monitors.

Yeah. I've heard that. Tho, I hear Lil runs two monitors.

I'd probably run SL in one, and use the other for anything else I need to do. I don't think I'd need to split SL across two monitors.

That's exactly what I do, and I've had no problems.

I have run 2 monitors for many months, HOWEVER, do not try to span the client across the monitors.

22-25" wide screen is to die for. Run SL on the nicest one and run your browser, email and other stuff on the other.


BTW - be warned that once you get used to two, it is hard to do without the second one.

I was thinking either a 25 or a pair of 22's

Personally I'd go for the pair of 22's.

I now officially hate you

I'd go for the pair of 22's. Once you go dual, you never go back. It takes a few days to get used to, but then you wonder how you ever got by with just a single screen.

Economically, it's pretty much a no-brainer. A standard 24" LCD has 35% more pixels on it than a standard 22", whereas a pair of 22's obviously has 100% more than just a single 22". If the price is the same, it would be silly to go for 35 instead of 100.


As for the question of how well SL works on dual monitors, it was true a few years ago that FPS would drop considerably on a dual monitor system if the viewer window straddled both screens by even as much as a single column of pixels. The window had to be entirely on one screen or the other, not at all on both. That hasn't been true in a very long time, though. Nowadays, the viewer works just as well spread across two screens as it does on just one.

I personally use 4 flat panels on my main desktop. I've got two very high end 24" Eizo Flexscans, and two 6-year-old 19" Samsung Syncmasters. The latter are obviously relatively low end by today's standards. The two Eizos are my main workspace, and the Samsungs serve as secondary extra space. When the Eizo's are full, I'll move the least visual-quality-dependant apps, such as command prompts, console windows, word processors, browsers, etc., on to the Samsungs.



I've said it before and I'll say it again. Screen real estate is like sex or pizza. No matter how much you've got today, you always want more tomorrow.

When I had one screen and then upgraded to two, the change was amazing. When I went to four, it was crazy cool. Now I find myself dreaming of having six or eight. I'm starting to feel a little like Ozymandias. All I need is about 50 more screens, and a mutant cat, and I'll be all set. Oh yeah, and a world domination machine...

Ok. . .so I'm leaning towards the twin 22's. But I wonder how my single video card, which currently handles SL running balls to the wall, will handle the more than double the pixels. Granted, most of the action is going to be on the SL screen.

I KNEW I should have held out for a 280.

I agree with the others: go with the pair of 22's.

I use two monitors. Sometimes I run SL on one and everything else on the other one . . . and, sometimes, I run two SL sessions, one on each monitor. Quite handy. My video card is an nVidia 8500 [actually I have a pair of these; but multimonitor does not work with nVidia cards unless you have DirectX10 compatible cards running under Vista or Windows 7 . . . and my 8500's are only DirectX9 compatible running on Win XP. ]

When two SL sessions are running simultaneously, they run somewhat sluggishly until both have rezzed everything. After that the experience isn't too bad until you teleport someplace.

[Aside to Chosen Few: I envy you your 4 monitors; but would be satisfied with two monitors larger than 30" each. If only I had the money. Ah well.]

It should be fine. The 9800 has a max resolution of 2560x1600, or 4 megapixels, per head. At 1680x1050 per head, you'll be using less than half of that, just 1.7 megapixels. That's nothing.

To give you an idea, my two 24" are running off an 8800GTX, very comparable to your 9800. I've got no trouble running one, two, or even three SL viewer windows at the same time. I've never actually tried more than three, but it would probably work.

Usually, I've got SL on one monitor at close to full screen size, and Maya and/or Photoshop on the other, also at near full screen size. It works great. Depending on which 9800 you've got, yours might work even better.

Also, just to emphasize the point, I should mention I've got another machine hooked up to the secondary inputs of the two 24", with a KVM switch for my keyboard and mouse. I use it for my audio workstation, and for certain obscure apps that are XP-only. The video card in it is 6 years old (256MB Quadro FX3000), and it has no trouble at all driving the two big screens. I do run SL on it occasionally. It can't use Windlight, since the card is too old to support the advanced shaders, but other than that, it's not too bad at reasonable settings.

That same machine had previously been driving those two old Samsung 19", off a 64MB GeForce 4, before I replaced that card with the Quadro. It worked well enough in its day. The Samsungs are 1280x1024, so they've got 75% the amount of pixels your 22" will have. Surely if a GeForce 4 can drive those, your 9800 won't have any trouble with the two 22".






I'm not sure where you're getting that. GeForce cards have been able to drive multiple monitors since the 4 series (and even earlier if you knew how to hack it to make it work), and Windows itself has come with dual monitor support since 98. There's no reason you shouldn't be able to run two monitors off your single 8500. What happens if you try?

The only snag you might run into is connectivity. The 8500 has one digital head and one analog head. You'll need a DVI/VGA adapter if one or the other of your monitors lacks the proper form factor inputs. If you happen to have a digital monitor that can't handle an analog signal, or vice versa, then you might be out of luck. But those are rare unless really, really, really old. In most cases, the adapter works just fine.



I'm not sure where you're getting that either. The entire GeForce 8 series is DX10 compatible. That was pretty much the main selling point of the 8 series when it first came out.

XP only supports up to DX9, so DX10 is kind of a moot point if you're using that OS, but understand it is operating system that's the hold-back there, not the card.



If anyone actually made a 30" with specs to match my 24" Eizo's, I'd own it. But unfortunately, no one does. For whatever reason, 24" remains the upper limit if you want high contrast, high brightness, broad gamut, and quick refresh.

If you're planning to watch HDTV and/or Blu-Ray content on your computer, you might prefer the single 25" because it can display all the pixels of 1080p content. If you just want to see lots of stuff at once, the pair of 22" will be better. Of course, two 25" monitors would be better still but cost a lot more.

One other thing to consider. Until recently most widescreen monitors were 16:10 aspect ratio, so you would have resolutions like 1920x1200. Recently some 16:9 monitors have started to appear, probably because the TV market is driving the flat-panel manufacturing business. 16:9 is nice for WATCHING hi-def because the content exactly fills the screen, but is less ideal for WORKING with it because there is no screen room left over for controls. Also, you get less screen height for working with other things.

Will your video card handle two displays well? As with so many things, it depends. If you've got an NVidia 8800 or better you'll be fine; with a lower-end card you might take too big a frame rate hit to be happy.

And if the 19" works fine, why retire it? Maybe you should buy a new 22" or 25" and keep the 19" as a second display; you don't have to have two matching monitors. But if having two that match makes you happy, or you want to move the 19" to another computer, don't let me stop you!

Heck i would go with the 25"
i wish i had gone with one but i couldn't find one around me worth a crap so i settled for a 22" wide
i used to use two monitors and really i would rather have one really good sized one over two decent sized ones..but that is just me..

I'm talking about using SLI with 2 monitors . . . I guess I wasn't clear.

I'm currently running dual monitors using 1 of the 8500s with SLI shut off, and I've been running dual monitors for several years now. My monitors are old CRTs (21".

You are correct. I just helped a friend install an 8400 GS and I read on the package that it was DX10 ready . . . and did a big double take.

So, indeed, the only impediment to my running SLI mode with dual monitoring is the operating system. That *might* get me to spring for a copy of Windows 7. I should probably check out the RC.

Yeah, I know . . . but I really want 30" plus. I already salivate over anything larger than 21". 24" would be good . . . but I want bigger . . . oh, and cheaper. <g>

I run with two monitors with no trouble.

I would go for two 22in as opposed to one 25 in. Or better yet two 24in. The HP 2475w or two 2275s would be what I get..

I am running two 2475s and they are perfect for sl and photoshop.

.d

This is what I did - got the wide screen for an Xmas present and so my still decent 19" became my second monitor.

ok. been needlessly staying out of this, but it's time i came in and pointed out the obvious, not to mention easiest, answer:



hands down, you go for the pair of 22 inch monitors (or larger, if you like) and kick one of them over to me... heck, i'd even be willing to take your old system off yer hands...

I have a special "in" here so I get first dibs on his old system

Heh.

The reason I'm retiring the 19 is my daughter's monitor just died. She had a really crappy 15" wide that frankly isn't even worth fixing. In my house, unless it's a gift time, or someone deserves a reward, there is a "trickle down from dad" sort of thing that goes on. Since I've been making a living with computers for a long time, it really IS necessary that I try to keep up with the technology curve. Really!

I'm running a single 9800 w 1g ram. (Sheesh. My first PC had a 1g hard drive.)

Shopping is trip is in a day or two. I'm leaning towards the pair of 22's, but. . .now I'm thinking that perhaps the 25 is a good idea. Hopefully I'll be able to add another soon. I DO have an HD TV behind me, and there's a cable that runs around the room from the cable box. But currently, no tuner in this computer. Which is odd since I've been putting tuners in computers since the early days of CUSeeMe--which is the application that originally turned me to the dark side from my beloved Amiga. (Never mind. Hurts to talk about it.)

And this computer has Vista Ultimate, which has Media Center built in.

All I need is a compatible tuner. . .

Decisions. . .Decisions. . .

Even SLI is capable of dual monitors in XP, Vista and Windows 7. With SLI off you can power 4 monitors, with SLI on 2. Dual monitor has become a common place and half the systems we sell at our shop have it.

as others have mentioned if you go dual, check not only that you have the input connectiors you need (both at the PC, and monitor ends) and that your preferred resolution is supported over BOTH those connection types. ( I know I personally despise mismatched resolutions )

if you're heavy on the movie use, it's easier to pick up a 25 now, and another smaller cheaper one later for dual use. if it's all about the information bandwidth, go with the duals.

(PS you'r'e right, you should have held out for the 280, they are NICE, and the SLI setups are way easier)

Sigh. I know SLI and dual monitors will run on Vista and Windows 7.

I also am led to believe--by my experience and by this note found at the end of the Download page for the latest nVidia driver--that SLI and dual monitors will NOTwork together under XP Here's the note clipped from nVidia's site:

==========================================
*Note: The following SLI features are only supported on Windows Vista: Quad SLI technology using GeForce 9800 GX2 or GeForce GTX 295, 3-way SLI technology, Hybrid SLI, and SLI multi-monitor support.

==========================================

Just to be absolutely sure, I now have a message into nVidia support to verify this.


I would love to be wrong about this.

you don't have to run them in SLI mode though, so it IS switchable (although there were supposed to be some third party drivers that enabled dual monitors for Dual SLI under XP but I haven't looked at it till the new 280 gets bought.) so the scenaro is that you could run them separate, with two cards (one on each) and then switch on SLI for single monitor for apps that make use of the SLI support

I also run dual monitors. You guys may laugh at this though. They are 2 - 20 in. flatscreen viewsonics CRT's. About 3 years ago I was working in a business building downtown.
And they had a computer recycle bin in the basement. Alot of the businesses in the building were
tossing out all their old stuff and upgrading. So I had free reign to grab stuff out of the bins.
So I taught myself how to rebuild old computers from spare parts. And that is where I got
the viewsonics, free of course. Not much for esthethics but the monitors still work great.

I gave away all the computers I built as none of them were powerful enough for what I do.
I do need to upgrade my current one though as it is about 3 years old. Has a single core amd
3700 which I got for a deal and had the comp built custom. I still have a ati x1300 in it with 512 MB of ram and 2 gigs on the mainboard. Definitely underpowered by todays standards but is still hanging in there admirably. I like to hold back as long as I can but the last straw fell when I found out I couldnt use the new 3d parts of CS4 until I upgrade.

On the monitors though they work awesome. A bit ugly but for anyone out there on a budget
or just thrifty they work great and you can get them for free. For movies I have a 37 in. HD
tv than I can plug my comp into with the right cable.

Im not sure how far along the newer flat screen monitors have come along. "Flatscreen" as in the entire shape as opposed to the literal flatscreen of the CRT's. But at the time I did my research I found out that the flatscreen CRT's are excellent for precision graphics work.
And at the time even better than the new flat shaped monitors as they were not as precise and they also tended to run hot. They are probably much better by now.

Whatever you do dont buy a CRT new. They still sell them new believe it or not even though most everyone else is tossing them out to keep up with trends.