Triple screen or one large one for gaming?

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***I know this question is very subjective, but I still want you dudes input***

I got a new apartment that has enough room for a large desk, and on that large desk I want to upgrade my monitor setup (currently using a x34).
I mainly play BF1 and iRacing, so FPS is probably more important then high detail for me.
Anyways, would you guys rather have 3x 2560x1440 surround or, one large 4k 42" monitor? I have never used, or even seen IRL either option for gaming, so I'm going into this blind.
I'm using a OC'ed hybrid 1080ti, so I should get good fps regardless of what option I go for, if I turn down some settings that is..
Anyways, have a good weekend...
 
I have run 3x30" Dell 3007WFP-HC monitors (7680x1600) and 3x27" ROG Swift (7680x1440) monitors and now use a Samsung KS8500 49" 4k display for work and playing games. I wouldn't go back to three displays for gaming.
 
Dan_D Yeahhhhhh that's what I'm reading, a single 4k 43" screen just has less headaches then triple screens..
And you're happy with your KS8500? Would you recommend it or is there something coming down the line you have your eye on?
 
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3 displays for racing is great, support can be lacking, but nothing like angle adjusted surround screens. vr is nice for head tracking but the res is not there like triples. Gaming wise, my 55" 4k is almost too tall, so ultrawide resolution is possible and makes up some from the surround monitors. 1 really nice 4k is still probably less than 3 monitors. Some tv's are better monitors than others, do your homework
 
I had a 3 28" 7680x1440 setup and went to a single 55" 4k setup. There are pros and cons to each, but honestly my 4k TV I use as a monitor is pretty great. At this point I don't see myself going back to the triple monitor setup. There were a number of games that just didn't support it or it was clunky on. I haven't had any of those problems really with the 4k setup. My one issue with the 4k setup is it scales a little differently so everything is bigger, it doesn't give the same real estate in games as the triple monitor setup.
 
I recommend NV Surround if you have the room. It's easier than people make it out to be and games that dont support surround (or need too much gpu power) run fine on the center screen without having to disable surround.
 
I like the ultrawide aspect ratio for gaming.
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I had a 3 28" 7680x1440 setup and went to a single 55" 4k setup. There are pros and cons to each, but honestly my 4k TV I use as a monitor is pretty great. At this point I don't see myself going back to the triple monitor setup. There were a number of games that just didn't support it or it was clunky on. I haven't had any of those problems really with the 4k setup. My one issue with the 4k setup is it scales a little differently so everything is bigger, it doesn't give the same real estate in games as the triple monitor setup.

I agree with everything but the last part of your statement. I don't use any scaling at 4K so nothing looks odd. You don't get the same real estate as the triple monitor setup but you don't get fish eye, fucked up or poor HUD scaling and a host of other issues that go with triple displays.

try 3840x1440

I have and I'm not impressed. I like those displays for their speed and that's it. 1440 just isn't enough vertical pixels for productivity. Those monitors are also too small. The largest ones I've seen are still typically only 38" or so. The one 49" ultra-wide I've ever seen was some 3440x1080 bullshit or something like that. No thanks.

I recommend NV Surround if you have the room. It's easier than people make it out to be and games that dont support surround (or need too much gpu power) run fine on the center screen without having to disable surround.

I ran such a setup since it was first available. I found fewer and fewer games that handled it well over time.

I like the ultrawide aspect ratio for gaming.
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For gaming yes, but unfortunately, such monitors are too small for me.
 
I have used NvSurround but very few games looked great on it. Since then I got a 50" 4K TV and it excels for both work and gaming. Having 4 1080p RDPs at once is AWESOME I miss it when I go to work and use my lousy 24" 1080p screen.

Forza Horizon runs beautifully on it. Wouldn't go back to multimonitor for gaming maybet not even for work.
 
I have run 3x30" Dell 3007WFP-HC monitors (7680x1600) and 3x27" ROG Swift (7680x1440) monitors and now use a Samsung KS8500 49" 4k display for work and playing games. I wouldn't go back to three displays for gaming.

Do you think the image quality is better on the VA Samsung TV than the 3007s? How far back do you have to sit? I was looking at 49" Sony X900F.


I still have an old HP LP3065 and I'm not sure what to do for a replacement... 2560x1600 is still a good res without scaling and it has low input lag because of no OSD. Was going to wait for the LG 32UK950-W but I don't know if it's going to be usable for me without scaling, and scaling kinda sucks still.
 
I have used NvSurround but very few games looked great on it. Since then I got a 50" 4K TV and it excels for both work and gaming. Having 4 1080p RDPs at once is AWESOME I miss it when I go to work and use my lousy 24" 1080p screen.

Forza Horizon runs beautifully on it. Wouldn't go back to multimonitor for gaming maybet not even for work.

Obviously I don't play every game, but I play a lot and I've found very few issues with surround - these are the only ones I can recall and I've been running surround since it came out (think Bad Company 2 and the GTX 480)

1. Titanfall 2 would not work for me in surround. Some people seem to have gotten it to work, but I finished the game on a single screen which was fine.
2. Warhammer 40K Space Marine was another one that wouldn't scale.
3. Overwatch is force limited to 16x9 - never had an issue running it on the center screen
4. Ghost Recon Wildlands will run in surround, but only with very reduced IQ and I found it more enjoyable on center screen + ultra (too many geometry / shadow artifacts otherwise)

Keep in mind that Ultrawides are not without their own issues.
For me, the worst problem is that many games place their HUD / minimap items against the edge of the screen. Fine in 16x9 but in 21:9, I find that it's harder to see. It seems like a few degrees shouldn't matter, but it does because you often have to take your eyes off the action to check your speed/ammo/halth/etc. A few games do this in surround, but most games actually place your HUD in the center screen, within your direct vision.

There are a lot of games that run really well in surround. RPGs and Driving/Sim games are some of the best. First and third person games too, but they tend to take a lot more GPU power. If you only play the very latest, most visually demanding games, Surround is going to be tough because you will often be thinking "this looks great, but I need more fps" - so maybe you turn down the IQ or play on one screen. If you play a lot of games that are a few years older, you'll be amazed at how well they run. Just Cause 2, Battlefield 4, Guild Wars 2, Burnout Paradise, any Valve engine game and tons of others all run at super high fps on 3 screens.

I don't have room for, or interest in using a big TV for a gaming monitor. I like G-Sync and high frame rates so I went with 3x 24" 1440P monitors. The pixel density is enough (almost too much for my eyes sometimes) that I don't care about 4K and I love the flexibility of 3+1 monitors. I have no issues, no glitches apart from limitations of specific games and I'm planning on adding a second 1080Ti (Surround seems to be the best use case for SLI) to skip Turing and wait out the next gen Nvidia cards.

More pics available here:
https://imgur.com/a/lKj4zcL
 

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Of my recent setups

Eyefinity with freesync with three 32” 1440p was the best for flying in Star Wars Battlefront, but my 34” ultrawide is better for everything else including all other game modes in Star Wars Battlefront.

https://hardforum.com/threads/best-games-for-eyefinity-or-surround-gaming.1924191/

Most everything else is better in 34” ultra wide

Desktop use was best with a Dell 3014. And old games with 4:3 aspect ratios were better too.

I tried a 37” 16x9 screen but thought it was physically too large.

I personally think a 38” , 3840x1600 would be perfect, but I’m not giving up gsync. (Or freesync if AMD sold a competitive top tier card)

I don’t think I’d go back to eyefinity or surround after using my current monitor the Dell AW3418DW, but I would likely move to a 38” ultrawide with gsync.
 
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Of my recent setups

Eyefinity with freesync with three 32” 1440p was the best for flying in Star Wars Battlefront, but my 34” ultrawide is better for everything else including all other game modes in Star Wars Battlefront.

Most everything else is better in 34” ultra wide

Desktop use was best with a Dell 3014. And old games with 4:3 aspect ratios were better too.

I tried a 37” 16x9 screen but thought it was physically too large.

I personally think a 38” , 3840x1600 would be perfect, but I’m not giving up gsync. (Or freesync if AMD sold a competitive top tier card)

I don’t think I’d go back to eyefinity or surround after using my current monitor the Dell AW3418DW, but I would likely move to a 38” ultrawide with gsync.

What older games? Many old games can be tweaked to support 16:9 AR. Take a look at widescreengamingforum
 
What older games? Many old games can be tweaked to support 16:9 AR. Take a look at widescreengamingforum
Most every older game was better on the Dell 3014 vs the Dell AW3418DW.
Reason being — 2560x1600 has been supported natively by nearly all games since like 2003 era. It was the kingpin resolution since the first 30” monitors, I found more old games with 2560x1600 native support than 2560x1440. We are talking games based on the original Unreal engines like Rune and old RTS games like Age of Empires etc. company of heroes, tomb raider, Warcraft 3, etc. the old games tend to support 2560x1600 with no GUI element stretching. And even if they don’t support 16:10, you can still run 1600x1200 for old 4:3 resolutions with no stretching and minimal black bars.

Also 30” is better at 2560x1600 than 27” at 2560x1440 for physical screen size when you get black bars on the left and right of an ultrawide with old games.
 
Ultrawides aren't immune to the same problems as multiple displays either. I also agree with the above statement that a 30" 2560x1600 monitor beats a 27" 2560x1440 monitor. I went to the newer 27" displays from a 30" and I hated it. The lack of vertical screen real-estate was a deal breaker.
 
I tend to agree with Dan - simply can’t give up vertical resolution to go wide. Also, while still somewhat in its Gen 1 / Gen 1.5 stage, I’ve found that VR is a really nice replacement/alternative for a multi-monitor setup when it comes to comes to flight/racing sims, so I don’t miss a multi-monitor setup at all for those. For FPS shooters, I can see the draw to a multimonitor setup still, but those days are numbered... I predict that within 5 years they will go the way of the Dodo as advances in VR take over even for FPS games and pretty much obsolete multimonitor setups.
 
Multimonitor may come back as more of a work / productivity thing than a gaming thing. It has numerous advantages there but not so much in the realm of gaming anymore. If it were better supported, that would be one thing but it just isn't handled that well by a lot of games.
 
Multimonitor may come back as more of a work / productivity thing than a gaming thing. It has numerous advantages there but not so much in the realm of gaming anymore. If it were better supported, that would be one thing but it just isn't handled that well by a lot of games.

In the short term perhaps, but come gen 3 or 4 of VR, I can see even the productivity use case start to be taken over by AR/VR. Configurable monitors of any size/shape placement, tailored to your specific tastes/needs in AR/VR are going to be hard to beat with a multi-monitor setup. Granted its a little ways off still, but its coming.
 
In the short term perhaps, but come gen 3 or 4 of VR, I can see even the productivity use case start to be taken over by AR/VR. Configurable monitors of any size/shape placement, tailored to your specific tastes/needs in AR/VR are going to be hard to beat with a multi-monitor setup. Granted its a little ways off still, but its coming.

Well, multimonitor setups are already king for productivity. They have simply fallen by the wayside for gaming. Many corporations provide many of their users with more than one monitor for work. AR/VR type solutions are a number of years from any practical application for productivity and are even further away from mainstream adoption.
 
Well, multimonitor setups are already king for productivity. They have simply fallen by the wayside for gaming. Many corporations provide many of their users with more than one monitor for work. AR/VR type solutions are a number of years from any practical application for productivity and are even further away from mainstream adoption.

I don't get it Dan, you stated in your previous post to this that "Multimonitor may come back as more of a work / productivity thing". Eh? They never left - they have no need to come back.

Then you post "Well, multimonitor setups are already king for productivity". Fully agreed there. I have/use a multimonitor setup at work... going on close to a decade now.

I just see AR/VR taking this space over eventually... Maybe that eventuality is still a good ~10 years off as to the start of wide spread adoption, but I'm thinking it might begin sooner for those on the bleeding edge like [H] PC hardware enthusiasts. It's somewhat crude and impractical right now given the limitations of VR Gen 1... but by Gen 3 or 4, I'd say it'll be more than ready to enter into the productivity space.
 
I don't get it Dan, you stated in your previous post to this that "Multimonitor may come back as more of a work / productivity thing". Eh? They never left - they have no need to come back.

Then you post "Well, multimonitor setups are already king for productivity". Fully agreed there. I have/use a multimonitor setup at work... going on close to a decade now.

I just see AR/VR taking this space over eventually... Maybe that eventuality is still a good ~10 years off as to the start of wide spread adoption, but I'm thinking it might begin sooner for those on the bleeding edge like [H] PC hardware enthusiasts. It's somewhat crude and impractical right now given the limitations of VR Gen 1... but by Gen 3 or 4, I'd say it'll be more than ready to enter into the productivity space.

I thought about it after the initial comment and simply changed my mind. As I said, and you repeated, multimonitor setups never really left. Every cubicle at work has more than one monitor in it. That's been the case nearly everywhere I've worked for the last 10 years.
 
I keep hearing about all the problems with multi monitor gaming but not a lot of real world examples and none that can't be overcome by running on the center screen.

VR for productivity sounds great until you have to look at a physical object (paper, phone etc) or other person or if you dont mind the personal security risks that come from that level of immersion.

It does sound cool but it would be a bad for for my job as currently performed.
 
Ultrawides aren't immune to the same problems as multiple displays either. I also agree with the above statement that a 30" 2560x1600 monitor beats a 27" 2560x1440 monitor. I went to the newer 27" displays from a 30" and I hated it. The lack of vertical screen real-estate was a deal breaker.

16:10 is great but there aren't many options out there for monitors in that aspect ratio, the most recent I can think of being the UP3017 and it's a pretty slow display even for casual gaming, since it's a business-oriented product.

Personally I think 30" is a good size, but that doesn't matter if no one is making them.
 
I keep hearing about all the problems with multi monitor gaming but not a lot of real world examples and none that can't be overcome by running on the center screen.

This makes absolutely no fucking sense. "Running on the center screen" means you aren't using the other monitors for gaming at all. That defeats the purpose of buying multiple monitors for gaming doesn't it? What your suggesting is little more than a work around to play a game. By no means is that a good solution. There are many games that don't behave right with multi-monitor configurations. Many first person shooters don't run right in such a configuration. The side monitors "fish eye" too much. Other games like Mass Effect 3 can't handle the HUD scaling.

VR for productivity sounds great until you have to look at a physical object (paper, phone etc) or other person or if you dont mind the personal security risks that come from that level of immersion.

It does sound cool but it would be a bad for for my job as currently performed.

I'm not sure how VR or AR would create a personal security risk. Please explain.
 
16:10 is great but there aren't many options out there for monitors in that aspect ratio, the most recent I can think of being the UP3017 and it's a pretty slow display even for casual gaming, since it's a business-oriented product.

Personally I think 30" is a good size, but that doesn't matter if no one is making them.

30" is too small for me. I got used to multiple monitors and later on, this 49" 4K. I don't think the UP3017 is too slow for gaming anymore than these larger Samsung TV's are. As long as the input lag, refresh rates, etc. are consistent you get used to them. I wouldn't recommend it for ultra-competitive gaming but I can hold my own in multiplayer games even though I'm stuck at 60Hz with 20ms or whatever input latency. If I can't, its because I'm not good at that particular game, and not because of the monitor.
 
This makes absolutely no fucking sense. "Running on the center screen" means you aren't using the other monitors for gaming at all. That defeats the purpose of buying multiple monitors for gaming doesn't it? What your suggesting is little more than a work around to play a game. By no means is that a good solution. There are many games that don't behave right with multi-monitor configurations. Many first person shooters don't run right in such a configuration. The side monitors "fish eye" too much. Other games like Mass Effect 3 can't handle the HUD scaling.


I'm not sure how VR or AR would create a personal security risk. Please explain.

I dont see it that way at all. Some things work in surround, some things dont. I just accept that and its never bothered me but if your expectation is that it work for everything then you're going to get frustrated.

I work from home so that may tilt the value proposition my way more than it does for other people because I uses them all day.

As for personal security, maybe AR will help, but I wouldn't want to be that cutoff from my physical environment while working either at home or in an office.
 
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I dont see it that way at all. Some things work in surround, some things dont. I just accept that and its never bothered me but if your expectation is that it work for everything then you're going to get frustrated.

I work from home so that may be tilt the value proposition my way more than it does for other people.

As for personal security, maybe AR will help, but I wouldn't want to be that cutoff from my physical environment while working either at home or in an office.

As far as games go, I prefer that they work in NVSurround most of the time. That wasn't ever my experience with it. It either didn't work at all or required a lot of work to get it going. Oftentimes you'd have to make some trade offs such as dealing with a screwed up HUD or fisheye vision on the sides. Later on it never seemed to work at all or at least not to a point where it was worth messing with or worth enabling in the first place.
 
Alright, if I were to not go for a triple screen setup, what 43" or 50" 4k screen is the one to go for? I would love one that ran over 60hz, if that even exists.
 
At this point I would wait for the newer 2019 models that should be arriving in a few months. Should be faster OLED's to choose from.
 
At this point I would wait for the newer 2019 models that should be arriving in a few months. Should be faster OLED's to choose from.

Not convinced OLED TVs will make for good primary PC monitors with ABL and burn-in risk. Probably great for a game only display though.

Sony X900F is the best available for PC monitor use right now, I think.
 
I agree with everything but the last part of your statement. I don't use any scaling at 4K so nothing looks odd. You don't get the same real estate as the triple monitor setup but you don't get fish eye, fucked up or poor HUD scaling and a host of other issues that go with triple displays.

Thus my statement about games not supporting triple monitor or being clunky. Still games that worked, looked beautiful on triple monitor and there was vastly more real estate.
 
I have and I'm not impressed. I like those displays for their speed and that's it. 1440 just isn't enough vertical pixels for productivity. Those monitors are also too small. The largest ones I've seen are still typically only 38" or so. The one 49" ultra-wide I've ever seen was some 3440x1080 bullshit or something like that.



For gaming yes, but unfortunately, such monitors are too small for me.

A little late but I was referring to using a 3840x2160 regular type tv with a 3840x1440 resolution and black bars. Best of both, easy to go back to space for work. If a game supports Fov I always prefer this. I feel like my 55 is too tall for a gaming monitor at a desk and get neck strain, but the ultra wide res and fov fix that.
 
A little late but I was referring to using a 3840x2160 regular type tv with a 3840x1440 resolution and black bars. Best of both, easy to go back to space for work. If a game supports Fov I always prefer this. I feel like my 55 is too tall for a gaming monitor at a desk and get neck strain, but the ultra wide res and fov fix that.

That's why I wouldn't go bigger than a 49" for monitor use. I've tried upwards of a 65" TV and found that to be too much. Not only is it hard to take in the entire image up close, but your dot pitch for text becomes shit at that point.
 
I go either way.. my triple 40's are good because I can rotate my chair and I'm in front of another monitor. I can play triple screen and bezels are not in my primary view. I have a 49" Sony 900E that I jump back and forth with but have both and feel that's the best option depending on the game or project I'm working on.
 
As I've said many times, I think 40" is the best for productivity. For gaming bigger is always better.
 
As I've said many times, I think 40" is the best for productivity. For gaming bigger is always better.
Good for you.
I have to say that at first I thought 50" was way too big, but after a short while I got used to it and actually don't use scaling at all, so IMO 50" is best for work and awesome for play. I miss it everyday I come to the office with my 24" 1080p monitor. I do feel like i'm just using 1/4 of the screen.
 
Good for you.
I have to say that at first I thought 50" was way too big, but after a short while I got used to it and actually don't use scaling at all, so IMO 50" is best for work and awesome for play. I miss it everyday I come to the office with my 24" 1080p monitor. I do feel like i'm just using 1/4 of the screen.

I've been using the 49" for almost two years and I think its a great compromise between gaming and productivity work.
 
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