Advice about a new setup for my personal gaming and workstation PC?

[VOID93]

Hello all! I was wondering if I could get some advice about a change that I was going to make to my personal workstation and gaming rig. My system is as follows:
------------- Ryzen 7 3800x---Corsair H100i Liquid Cooler---EVGA Hybrid Cooled RTX 2080 Super---16Gb (8+8) Gskill Trident RGB Memory 3600---Samsung 970 Evo 500Gb---Seagate Baracuda 3TB---RM850X PSU---ASUS ROG Crosshair Hero VIII -------------

Currently I have one single 1440p 144Hz gaming monitor and, while that is great, I am an active computer engineering major and programming via half-screen windows gets annoying. Logically, I would like to graduate to duel monitor setup. I don't have a lot of money to spend on this and I do not really care about performance on this second screen. Here's the deal, My MoBo has open PCIe slots and, to make this as smooth as possible, I was planning on getting a throw-away, low power cheap GPU like a GT 1030 or something and just throwing it in one of those slots. From there, I would get a cheap 1080p 60Hz monitor of the same size as my current one and then I would plug and chug! I have NO experience with how adding a monitor impacts performance and I did not want to run them both off of the one GPU that I have in case it would impact performance while gaming (like if I wanted to play a YouTube tutorial or something like that while I actually PLAYED said game on the main monitor). I assume that to avoid a performance impact I would have to add another GPU which I do not mind doing since some of them are REALLY cheap and even passively cooled (no extra volume). I will include a picture of the empty MoBo slots for reference.

THANK YOU!!

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0716ZH99K/ref=ox_sc_act_title_2?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07WGQTV49/ref=ox_sc_act_title_3?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1

^^ These are the two new additions that I was looking at using (super budget) ^^

 

[owcraftsman]

You do not need an additional GPU the 2080 Super is more than enough to handle two monitors.
Its doubtful you will game spanning both monitors as the center of gaming would be where the bezel are which would not be good, so only one will be used stressing the GPU as you do right now when gaming. It takes very little resources to run the second monitor if all it's doing while gaming is an open browser and some system monitoring tools. I've been gaming like this for a decade or more and never take a hit with FPS due to second monitor heck I ran three 1440p for a couple years playing BF4 on 1080Ti and my FPS was on par with everyone else running one monitor. Spanning all three monitors was doable, but I had to turn down the eye candy and sacrifice 20-30FPS to do 6480x1440p. I gave up on that because switching back and forth between 6840 and 2160 was a pain in the rear but it was fun while it lasted.
I would get an additional 1440p for the 2nd monitor so desktop scaling is identical which makes life a lot easier especially when throwing open windows around from one monitor to another. Decent 1440p monitors can be had for cheap.
I have my best monitor (G-Sync/144hz) as the primary display and 2nd one is cheaper but decent for color accuracy I like to match panel types too if main is IPS then secondary display is IPS as well. For me this make for the best overall experience for the day to day stuff.
You'd be better off spending the money on memory (32GB or more) or Fast SSDs (No spinning disk Hard drives) as you suggest for best performance as a workstation.
Keep in mind using the PCIe & extra M.2 slots eats up PCIe lanes and could lower your main GPU to x8 instead of x16 bus interface which would lower your FPS in game.
In other words there are only so many PCIe lanes available so do your research before you proceed.

 

[VOID93]

You do not need an additional GPU the 2080 Super is more than enough to handle two monitors.
Its doubtful you will game spanning both monitors as the center of gaming would be where the bezel are which would not be good, so only one will be used stressing the GPU as you do right now when gaming. It takes very little resources to run the second monitor if all it's doing while gaming is an open browser and some system monitoring tools. I've been gaming like this for a decade or more and never take a hit with FPS due to second monitor heck I ran three 1440p for a couple years playing BF4 on 1080Ti and my FPS was on par with everyone else running one monitor. Spanning all three monitors was doable, but I had to turn down the eye candy and sacrifice 20-30FPS to do 6480x1440p. I gave up on that because switching back and forth between 6840 and 2160 was a pain in the rear but it was fun while it lasted.
I would get an additional 1440p for the 2nd monitor so desktop scaling is identical which makes life a lot easier especially when throwing open windows around from one monitor to another. Decent 1440p monitors can be had for cheap.
I have my best monitor (G-Sync/144hz) as the primary display and 2nd one is cheaper but decent for color accuracy I like to match panel types too if main is IPS then secondary display is IPS as well. For me this make for the best overall experience for the day to day stuff.
You'd be better off spending the money on memory (32GB or more) or Fast SSDs (No spinning disk Hard drives) as you suggest for best performance as a workstation.
Keep in mind using the PCIe & extra M.2 slots eats up PCIe lanes and could lower your main GPU to x8 instead of x16 bus interface which would lower your FPS in game.
In other words there are only so many PCIe lanes available so do your research before you proceed.

Thank you for your response! I had not considered a lot of this. One of the secondary reasons that I wanted a second GPU was in case my water cooled 2080 super fails or something goes wrong and I just need "A" display adapter to get the job done and boot to the desktop for example. But maybe that is just me being paranoid. In terms of desktop scaling, if I were to take a standard HD monitor like this one: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07T4SHYQ8/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=A2HXSVC1MJRJ87&psc=1 --- would there be a way for me to fiddle with any Nvidia control panel settings to make scaling more viable? When I say I can't spend a lot of money I MEAN it XD. If the honest answer is that I should prolly wait and save up for another 1440p monitor because it is just too much hassle then that is totally cool. I was looking for just that kind of advice!

Thanks!!

 

[1337Goat]

When I say I can't spend a lot of money I MEAN it XD.

I know your pain bro.

I recommend buying used. 1440p isn't popular the way 1080p or 4k is, so it's very likely you can just buy a used one.
I wanted a small 1280xsomething monitor as a smaller side monitor for the same reason, so I just went to FreeGeek and got something for literally $20.

If 1440p is important, it might be a bit more, but if you buy used, you might see big savings either way.

Just make sure it doesn't have scratches.

 

[owcraftsman]

Thank you for your response! I had not considered a lot of this. One of the secondary reasons that I wanted a second GPU was in case my water cooled 2080 super fails or something goes wrong and I just need "A" display adapter to get the job done and boot to the desktop for example. But maybe that is just me being paranoid. In terms of desktop scaling, if I were to take a standard HD monitor like this one: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07T4SHYQ8/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=A2HXSVC1MJRJ87&psc=1 --- would there be a way for me to fiddle with any Nvidia control panel settings to make scaling more viable? When I say I can't spend a lot of money I MEAN it XD. If the honest answer is that I should prolly wait and save up for another 1440p monitor because it is just too much hassle then that is totally cool. I was looking for just that kind of advice!

Thanks!!

I feel ya, having a backup plan is always good however at any point if a 2nd GPU is needed you can throw one in to get booted no need for day to day especially if it affects performance in a negative way.
+1 Aegir hit your local Craig's List > Goodwill etc...