I currently use my laptop next to a monitor with 21" but I am thinking about an upgrade. I casually play some light games, nothing competitive. The rest is a lot of reading, office or coding work and some multimedia.
What is a nice setup in your opinion? One big screen with 27" or two smaller ones with 22" or 24" each?
I did some research and found for a 24" screen 1080p and for a 27" screen 1440p as a minimum. So I figured a 24" 1440p screen would look awesome. Do I miss something about this finding? Is 2K too much for 24" to even notice it?
The problem I have is my desk is only 65cm wide and I frequently have a book or a piece of paper between me and the keyboard+monitor. The monitor uses 22cm and the keyboard another 14cm so there is just enough space for a piece of paper. Many of the modern monitors have huge standing feets and there are not always good measurements given.
I also thought about a monitor arm but I don’t know if that would help with my small desk or just create more hassle after all.
I can vouche for the monitor arm, feels like I have more room without the stand.
So, for a given resolution, size affects how far back you want to sit. a 1440p on a 32" monitor is actually a coarser resolution than a 1440p on a 24" inch. But, if you slide the 32 inch further back, then your eyes won’t see a difference at all- and 32" too close causes you to turn your neck more, but 24" causes you to strain to see small things.
So the question becomes, does your desk put your monitor closer? go with 24". does your desk have the monitors sit further away? 32". or, alternatively. which do you prefer? I prefer 32’s further back. but my desk is also a workbench for electronics and 3d printing and, uh. shenanigans.
if you go with multiple monitors, I like them being all the same monitor with a thin bevel, or at least identical bevels. it just bugs me otherwise. As a side note, if youi’re doing a lot of office documents, or coding, You may wish to get one mounted on something that can be turned vertical- the vert format allows full 8.5x11 pages where horizontal doesn’t work that well. (or a third monitor with one turned horizontal. budget decides that…)
Thanks for the detailed response.
I think I will try to use my current screen with a monitor arm to see how I like it and think about the screen size and resolution for a bit longer. But I think two smaller screens allow more versatility with turning and so on. But you probably want to have the same resolution and screen size if you have two screens, even if one is vertical, right? Otherwise you probably get weird jumps when you move the mouse across the border. And yes, definitely small beszels lol
While replying I realized that I heard that you can’t easily split an HDMI signal. So do you know how to easily use two screens with a laptop? Probably you need an USB-C dock with two HDMI ports for that. I should really think about that before settling for a possibility.
Yep.
If you go to 2+, I find it best to have identical monitors.
2x 27" 1440p or 2x 24" 1080p
Or if you can swing it, I’ve been LOVING my ultra-ultrawide. It’s equivalent to two 27" displays (32:9) as opposed to the standard 21:9.
I think I am too tight on a budget for a ultra-wide. But why would you not consider a 24" 1080p screen?
I did :) second part of my first line!
Sorry I confused that in my question, my bad. I mean a 24" 1440p screen.
Two smaller monitors over 1 large one would be my preference personally, just cause it allows more freedom in how you divide your content. You can have a game fullscreen on one screen and other windows (discord, browser, OBS etc.) on the other without having to run your game in windowed mode to see the other content, or you can have the 2nd one vertically and have a text document there while having other stuff on your main one and so on. Currently I have 1 24" 1080 monitor, and my tv (55" 4k) hooked up to my PC, but I do plan picking up a 2nd 24" 1080 one later this year :3
Also as someone who also has a small desk I am gonna recommend you get a monitor arm, to free up desk space for sure
Very true, this is definitely easier with two physical screens. Will you swap your 4K TV out and just use the two 1080p monitors instead?
I just checked and my current older monitor does allow a VESA adapter so I might pick up a monitor arm for now and see how I like the possibility to tilt and turn my screen and think about the size and resolution for a bit longer.
I plan on keeping the tv hooked up, cause honestly I mostly use it for watching/playing stuff from my bed rather than a secondary display, because as you can probably guess that’s a rather awkward experience lol :3 though I do occasionally use it to shove secondary apps onto
I might pick up a monitor arm for now and see how I like the possibility to tilt and turn my screen and think about the size and resolution for a bit longer.
And that’s fair. I imagine being able to position your display with the additional freedom of the monitor arm would make it easier to visualise the possible monitor configurations you may want
Yeah that’s why I was asking lol. But for that use its perfect to have it directly hooked up to the PC. And yes, sometimes it can be nice to have a big screen for some random apps.
I didn’t know my current one could be mounted so I always thought I have to buy a new one before I can even think about an arm. But now trying the arm first with what I have sounds more reasonable.
But idk which arm to buy now lol. I think two separate arms with gas springs are more flexible but it might look weird if I end up using only one. Using a vertical tube allows attaching arms as you need but I think it restricts the vertical alignment more than two separate arms. Anyway, I have to figure that out somehow. Thanks a lot!
It depends more on the specs of your computer imo. If you have a GTX 1050 you should probably should stick to a smaller 1080p display. If you have something that can actually run your games then yeah get a bigger 1440p.
That said I had a 25” 1440p display for years and I loved it. Just high enough ppi that you don’t need scaling in windows. But you can absolutely tell the difference in game. You pretty much don’t need anti aliasing. 2x and the game looks flawless.
That said I’m a heavy multi tasker and I need two screens.
For gaming the GPU is for sure very important. But office work and so also a iGPU should be able to handle 1440p right?
But yes, using two screens with the same size but different resolution will always feel weird. I should consider this and settle for one resolution and size.
Oh yeah, no problem. I ran dual 4k displays of of Intel HD 4600 for years.
I’d say spend decent money on your main monitor, then just find some random trash picked display for a secondary later on. I’m using my 28" 4k 144hz display next to a 1280x1024 display. Having two different resolutions isn’t too bad, but you will want their scaling settings to match. Windows handles mixed scaling resolutions relatively well, but some programs still dont.
Yeah I think I will do that. I will get a double monitor arm and use my current monitor (it has the screwholes for VESA, I just found out) and use that for a bit to test out the tilting and turning and height change. Then I will try to figure out if I want a 27" or just go with a 24".
I saw a 24" IPS 1440p 180Hz screen for AOC so I will keep that saved for now.
I used to be a dual monitor user, but nowadays I’m using a single large monitor because I had to rearrange some things in my work room. For work a single monitor is fine, but I’m also doing some Twitch streaming, and multiplayer gaming, and for that I actually am now thinking of going back to two monitors.
The other important thing for me personally is resolution. If I’m working with text, 4k is absolutely necessary, for gaming UHD is fine.
Monitor arms do help with desk space a lot. However, you should also keep in mind that you will need some clearance behind the deck for the “elbow” of the arm.
The other option to save space is a shelf stand, which raises your monitor a little above the table and allows you to store something under it.
Thank you very much, my desk can be moved so no problem there. I did consider the shelf but I read comments that very wide feet are too wide for some shelfs so you are limited by the shelf.
My question about ultrawide (except that they are out of my budget) is, how do you handle games that won’t scale? Do you just center it and live with black parts left and right? But an IPS panel can’t deliver real black so is it no distracting to have dark-grey bars left and right of your game?
I’ve no idea, never really had an ultrawide.
I also have a pretty small desk, and I use a desk mount monitor arm. It’s got two arms holding 2x 27" 1440p monitors, which works great. I usually have papers or even another laptop on front of the screens.
Though I recent started to contemplate switching to a 4k ultra wide, since I don’t play any competitive games realy, and the single wide monitor seems like it would be sweet for the single player games I do play.
What I don’t really understand about using ultrawide monitors and gaming: Not all games can scale, how do you handle that? Do you just live with dark-grey to black bars left and right of your game?
And thanks, I should really consider a monitor arm!
That’s a fair point, I didn’t see what supports it or not. I guess I like the idea of it more than anything. I guess I have more research to do!
