For 4 years now, I've had a dual screen setup at home. As a graphic designer, I find this a must - I can't imagine working without a second screen anymore.

At both my jobs, however, I had a really really hard time to convince the managers that a second screen is a small cost compared to the massive boost in work efficiency. Before the company I worked for went bankrupt, I spent three years trying to get a second screen to no avail.

At my new job, I used a second screen from home instead - but when I got a colleague to help out with my work load, she again only got one screen. Until ... my manager ended up having to work at my workstation for an afternoon. He was baffled at how much easier it was to work - how much less time was wasted opening and closing windows, how easy it was to drag and drop from one screen to another. He enjoyed it so much, in fact, that he ordered a second screen for everyone in the company. We're two months later now and everyone loves their dual screen setup, and says they'd never want to miss it.

So really, why do so many people spend loads on games and new hardware and yet cling onto a single screen even when they have the money and room for a second one? Almost no games make use of a second screen even though there are so many advantages possible. Think about having a large map open permanently, or an inventory. Sure, three screens is overkill - especially since you'd need a massive desk when it comes to full HD monitors, but surely dual setups deserve some loving too?

And for those who don't have a dual screen set up - why don't you?

They don't want to expand their porn to 2 screens?

I've never really thought about it too much to be honest. I used to think my old 19" monitor was enough till I got a 27" monitor and now I wonder why the hell it took me so long to upgrade ^^

I guess I don't really have a need for a second monitor, but I'm sure that if I did attach one I'd find a use

I actually have a tri-screen set-up - one TV and two monitors side-by-side. The TV is used to clone the main desktop when I'm playing something on the sofa with the gamepad, and the second monitor is - theoretically - used as a second desktop.

Unfortunately, the second monitor never sees much in the way of use because, as you say, very few games actually make proper use of it. I've played Elder Scrolls: Arena, Might and Magic and X: Beyond the Frontier with notes in LibreOffice on the second screen (Arena for quests, Might and Magic for quests and map, X:BTF for notes on the economy and sale prices), but unfortunately I keep needing to alt-tab out of the game to be able to edit them (unless I play in a window, which is never ideal).

In fact, the second screen sees so little use that I'm tempted to replace my aging 1680x1050 work monitor with it so that I at least have some better contrast and a higher resolution when I'm working.

For work, yes, dual (or even triple) screens are a must. My desk at work has two 27" monitors as well as the screen on my laptop. I keep Skype on my laptop screen for easy communication, and everything else on the two others.

At home however, I only have one monitor. Since I am a programmer and do use my home machine for productivity work every once in a while (albeit not a lot), I would like to have a dual screen setup there, but I simply don't have room for it. Also, I really wouldn't use it much even if I had it. It's so rare that I code on my home machine that I really couldn't justify the expense of an extra monitor, even if I did have room for it.

Generally I think that for most people's private needs (as opposed to work needs), a single monitor is just fine, and a second one really wouldn't get much use.

Important tip about multi monitor setups though: Make sure all the monitors you use have the same resolution. Preferably the same size too, but the resolution is more important. Particularly for working with remote desktops. A remote desktop normally sets its resolution based on the monitor it is first opened on, so if your monitors have different resolutions, moving a remote desktop from one screen to the other becomes a tremendous pain in the ass.

Really kills the 'atmosphere' having two bezels right where the cleavage belongs.




Good question, though, at least for RPGs. Thinking of Morrowind and Divine Divinity, it certainly would be nice to get those smaller panels - the ones a player is apt to have open most of the time - off of the world view and displayed to the side. Not sure how much coding it takes to allow such a thing.

Only using a laptop, so not much choice.

TWO SCREENS!?
I can barely pay attention to one!

Man if you were to give me two screens I'd....

I'm sorry what was I talking about?

At work, I only have a single external monitor, but I make up for it by using the screen on my laptop as the second screen.

I mostly use it when making reports and presentations; I use LaTeX for that kind of stuff which means I can work on my document on the main monitor, while showing the resulting PDF on the laptop (which automatically gets updated whenever I save my document). I haven't used it much otherwise (because the resolutions and such are entirely mismatched), but it comes in handy.

At home, I only have one screen, because I don't have room on my desk. I'd like a second one, though.

We don't need it. Having a second screen means more space needed on the desk and more power consumed, plus you need to actually buy the second screen. The question is not whether two screens are better than one, the question is if two screens are worth it. For a graphics designer that's a no-brainer, but most people will not even use their one screen to its full potential, so a second screen would be a waste.

Might be something to suggest to the OpenMW project, as they would no doubt have the means to incorporate multi-screen support.

1. It's unnecessary.
2. I have better uses for my room/space.

I had a dual screen set up some years ago, though since I'm currently working with a laptop, I only use its own screen (or the TV every now and then). Biggest gaming problem I had with two screens though was the fact that quite a few games didn't capture the mouse cursor, and the biggest example I can recall was HL2. So, you try to turn to the left and fire, mouse cursor moves over to second monitor, you click, HL2 gets minimized and you are back at the desktop, wondering if you survived that firefight or not.

Loved the setup for WoW though, maximized window on one screen, ventrilo/thottbot/messenger on the other.

I have a mate that is using three screens for flight sims. But he's also using that setup for work. As for me, never needed more than one. My rig is for gaming, mainly, so not much use for the extra monitor(s).

This.