Be Excellent To Each Other

I have seen these are becoming more popular, and as I am going to be working from home a lot more, I am looking at my desk setup.

AOC, Samsung and LC seem to have great offering in both 29" and 34" inch.

Are any of you using them?
The ones you use can then have 2 inputs displayed at he same time (pc & laptop), I think LG does these.
VA and IPS seem to be a personal choice, or should I look more at ISP?

I am just after feedback, as there seems to be a lot of choices

Timely thread as I've tentatively promised myself a big wide curved thingy when my new office is built. Have primarily looked at Samsung and Dell but beyond that I haven't a clue.

I too would like one of these but the amount of my desk it would take up would worry me.

I could do with the screen real estate for editing though.

I could also do with the money to pay for one but that's another matter entirely.

I went with a 4k 40" 16:9 instead of an ultrawide, and just move windows around as I see fit.

40 inch? How close do you sit?

I gort this one, if that counts. It's veh goo. And its picture is veh cleeer. Vitally, though, it hasn't got a great big chunk of the screen surface damaged through exploding superglue incident.

I have 2 screens (different sizes) at the moment, so I am thinking an ultrawide, would replace both and not take up much more room..

but only if I can have dual input at the same time. I think LG do that, but it is not listed in the specs in most places.

Nor me...

I feel a bit funny about the curved ones, I'd use it for The Graphic Design and would be concerned over 'possible slight circus hall of mirrors effect' on my things. Probably not an issue but it's my brain.

I use a 27iMac with an extra 24(?)" apple display so I've plenty of space for now anyhow.

I guess I like my VDUs flat. Like mother Earth.

I have the BenQ EX3501R. It is fucking great! Hands down the best screen I’ve ever used. Ultrawide suits me perfectly because I can have three documents side-by-side and I can have all UI elements at 100% and things aren’t too small. I wouldn’t want to go any smaller than 35” because of it. It’s not 4K, but it’s 1440p and massively better than 1080p at the distance you are from the screen. Highly recommend!

https://www.trustedreviews.com/reviews/benq-ex3501r

Oh wow, this might be something that would really benefit me. My credit card is twitching. I shall read up more this evening. (I'll still wait until Black Friday though"just in case").

It also has HDR support, when you watch films in the standard cinematic ratio there are no black borders, and also most new games support UW these days too. It was quite pricey but I’m glad I went for this over a 16:9 4k screen. I love it!

£600 quidditch!!!

Wouldn't you get better off penny and desktop-real-estate wise by having two pretty big monitors?

It looks great, but maybe outside my budget..

Does your OS have support for splitting the screen into three or do you have to manually position things? I seem to remember Windows having native support for side-by-side stuff, but wasn't sure if it does more than that?

I like that monitor but I don't like the sounds of the colours being more accurate with others.

I also don't like the price but again, that's another matter.

I think I would be better off with two monitors rather than one big one. I like my current monitor, I wish I'd bought two at the time.

Is that the same as my one? I've got the 4k Philips doodad.

Normal monitor distance.

I’ve got a third-party app called GridMove. You can use templates to set up all sorts of different grid layouts.

There’s plenty of other UW options, I just don’t really do any designing (or didn’t when I bought it). If you don’t have a strong use case for it then two WS monitors is also good, but by the time you’ve bought two is it any cheaper, assuming you want them both the same size, refresh rate and resolution?

If you’re adding another one to your existing monitor then it’s a lot cheaper.

That's not what you said about me and my two monitors that add up to the same resolution

Lol bezel

I think I will be waiting till 'black friday' to see what offers are on..

My thinking is between an LG or a Samsung, as they seem to have good reviews.. just a million model numbers

https://twitter.com/jelly_deals/status/ ... 28896?s=19

Curvy wurvy monitor

Honestly? I wouldn’t go for a 27” 1440p monitor. Unless you want to enlarge your Windows UI elements to 150% (which creates other issues), you may find the text is uncomfortably small.

My 35” is at the lower end of the scale for me. Ideally the text would be slightly larger.

I am looking at the 34" ones. just waiting for Black friday

I have a Samsung 34 inch (slightly older model, I think, might be the cf791, the newer ones might have a higher resolution and maybe hdr, mine doesn't and it has been fantastic and still is after about two years. Can only recommend it - cost around 600 quid back then, but unfortunately I don't think the prices have moved that much. Must be a bargain on the way at some point. You don't really notice the curve when sitting in front of it, but it's probably to make it easier for your eyes to move around the bigger area - it works anyway, but you can give it a test somewhere, I'm sure.

This is actually pretty important as moving windows around manually all the time really does suck.

I use Mac OS at work, and my app of choice is 'Magnet' - I'd recommend that for Mac users with big or multiple big screens. If I was using Windows I'd be very tempted by that GridMove, it looks good too, nice features.

Great tips... thank you.

This screen seems very cheap - is it because it is older tech, 2018 I think

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-LS34J5 ... 165&sr=8-4

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-LS34J5 ... B07J4CZYND

Edit: Both are similar specs. The 550 is £259 and runs at 60Hz, and the 552 is £349 runs at 75hz.

Is the refresh rate important, or is it just for games?

Well I have ordered one.. £259 was too good an offer to miss.

Well, late the conversation again but, I've been using the https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07FJP11L2/ for jesus a year now, I didn't even realise - 32 inch curved WQHD.

The only issue I have with it is that when I turn off my computer it cycles through trying to find displays through the night so every 30 mins or so it'll turn on and be like "WHAT YOU'RE NOT ON DISPLAY PORT?, WHAT ABOUT HDMI? NO? OK I'LL GO THEN." then sleep for another 30 mins, but realistically, I'm generally sleeping when this occurs so I don't care that much.

Good quality, great refresh rate - I even ordered the smaller 27 inch one of the same style recently as a second monitor (which ironically doesn't suffer the standby input searching issue).

Looking at the price and monitor, £259 for that monitor ain't bad. I think you will be satisfied!

It has arrived and all set up.

Just need to tidy the cables. Going to keep the screen on the left just for emails.

I would have used the little screen for emails but to each their own I suppose

Is it upside down again.

If you want to make it look like the bat man is hanging upside down you could rotate the image used for the background wallpaper instead

How are you finding it now Kov?

I'm wondering if one of these might suit me to be honest. I'll explain my set up so you can see why, then hopefully you can advise-me-do.

Laptop 1 - Old laptop that I needed to replace during lockdown as it was so slow. Now used for Zoom meetings (so I can use laptop 2 to type on) and to read documents on so I can use my dictation software on laptop two.

Laptop 2 - My main machine, used to complete work on and has my dictation software on it.

Laptop 3 - This will be my work laptop, I don't have one at the moment as it's on order, but I did have someone else's at the beginning of lockdown in March. These things are really small and what I would call a notebook. To the point where I can't work on it for long periods of time or to complete substantial documents. I plugged it into external monitor and keyboard which worked well.

So, one of my problems is tracking (eyes) and holding info in my memory. This is why I keep laptop one so that I can read off it and say how I want to work the information into my document without flipping between screens.

My thinking is, if I get one of these wider monitors with two ports, I could plug in laptops two and three and have the documents next to each other on one screen. I'm guessing that I wouldn't be able to copy and paste from one to the other, but I think I can live with that.

If I wanted to, I could have two documents open next to each other from one laptop too?

I am on the right lines with this? Then laptop would be obsolete (unless I kept it for Zoom). I'd appreaciate your thoughts and experiences @kovacsC @Mr Chonks @Grim...

Edit, I'm using windows on all three laptops. One and two are on windows 10, I don't know what my work laptop will have yet.

This may or may not be of interest to you, it's relevant, I primroses.

I have it similar..

I have two inputs between the screens very useful.. I either flip between machines, or have side by side. Which sounds similar to what you want. There are different options, so you can have side by side, or picture in picture (this size and position can changed. It is quite rudimentary, and done by a 'joy stick' on the back, with all the menu options. I think better and more expensive screens, can do it in a better way. But for £250 I can live with it..

I went a step further and have a USB switch with my webcam, and jabra speaker so i can swap between machines. But I also use it with a usb flashdrive to copy bits, from one machine to another.

I was looking at the the Logitech master mx3, it is expensive, but allows you to move and control both machines, and copy from one machine to another.

My setup. Laptop in a dock out of the way.

The portrait screen also flips between the two machines and I use it mainly for emails and my calendar. Dead useful for reading docs too.

The speakers are in to the monitor, so what ever machine is active you get the sound, but with split screen you can tell the monitor which machine the sound is from.

Little usb Switch. It takes its power from the monitor arm, as that has a USB port on it. The switch has my camera, speaker and power for the speakers (just to save wires ever where)

Two keyboards and mice, might look at that next year, if there is a better way to switch keyboards and mice between devices.

@krazywookie Thank you, I did watch that, but I don't think it's something that I need at this point.


That does sound like what I am looking for. I don't think I would use the picture in picture, but just want to have documents open next to each other. I have a flashdrive that I can use between machines too, but with a split screen, hopefully wouldn't really need that as much.

Is that the mouse? I'm guessing there is no way that I have have a document from each laptop open on the screen and copy and paste from one to the other?

Microsoft do something that does exactly that, name escapes me at the moment, let me see if I can find it (we used to use at work, before half the laptops were on a different VPN to the other half)

Mouse without borders from MS Garage:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/downloa ... x?id=35460

They do all need to be on the same LAN, which I assume they are in your setup?

Yes it is a mouse that does that. - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Logitech-Ultra ... ers&sr=1-1

Due to potential issues with Fallout games I decided against a ultra wide. Bit gutted, as now I play PUBG every single night in a squad and the extra view width could have been very handy !

I got the Asus Strix 32" VA 1440p. It has a very tight curve @ 1500R. Very happy with it. The curve isn't great for things like Photoshop etc but in gaming it really comes into its own. It's great fun.

@Malc @KovacsC Thank you both.

If you had a screen big enough for all your documents, do you still need multiple machines? You could have zoom on the left side, typing doc on the middle and another doc on the right, for example. Or even split it into 6 as long as it’s large enough.

I'm maybe having trouble getting my head around Jazzy's use case, but I don't see why you'd ever need more than one laptop if you have the screen real estate to view everything you need at the same time?

And if that's the case, just get a bigger monitor

I use dual inputs on my widescreen monitor to use work as the main screen and watch cricket PiP off my personal laptop as can’t install sky player on the work machine. I don’t think that’s jazzys planned use case though.