What is the OPTIMAL/IDEAL gaming setup? Multi-monitor? or 1 big one?

Vulcanworlds

Limp Gawd
Joined
Aug 28, 2005
Messages
229
So I'm trying to decide what is the optimal setup for playability and immersion in graphics and displays.

I'm considering 1920x1200x3 in either portrait or landscape (or switch between per game)
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5760 x 1200 in some games would provide great view and depth of field, however I'm cautious about this because I use a dual 1920x1200 setup and already feel like there''s enough to look at.

The only game (for me) that I see really benefit from 3x wide is BF3 or flight sims. Other games feel too wide, how are UI's in most games?

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So then there's the question of 3600 x 1920 x 3, this is another serious consideration of mine. I know this would be awesome in League of Leagends, Age of Empires III, Guild Wars 2, World of Warcraft


Or are UI's to stretched / messed up to really enjoy it across 3 monitors? Should I just invest in a 27" or 30" ?

Card wise I'm getting a 680 gtx, eventually I'll do a system upgrade and SLI another one

Current System:
Intel Q6600 2.4 @ 2.7ghz
4gb GSkill DDR2 4-4-4-8 @ 800mhz
256mb 7800gtx OC
2x1tb western digital black sata II drives
720w Enermax Infiniti psu


what say you?
 
30" 2560x1600 until the 4K come out for consumers. Also you'd want too overclock that CPU from 2.4 to atleast 3.4 if your gonna do some HIGH-RES Gaming.
 
30" 2560x1600 until the 4K come out for consumers. Also you'd want too overclock that CPU from 2.4 to atleast 3.4 if your gonna do some HIGH-RES Gaming.

I haven't ever tried to push it, and will when I need to, or upgrade if I have to.

I haven't ever considered a single 4k monitor, but maybe I would upgrade to a 30".

I have a 24" samsung 1920x1080p atm, and am looking for some more immersion.
 
Perfectly happy with my 24" NEC 19x12 and have been for years. Keeps video card pricing down is just a bonus but my friends have 30s and I find them too big at distances I like sitting 2-3 ft from monitor.
 
Won't get into multi monitor until there is better support and GPU horsepower for it.

I'll disagree that a 30" 2560x1600 monitor is ideal, in fact I moved from one to a 27" 1080p 120Hz monitor and I feel the pros of 120Hz outweigh the pros of high res when it comes to strictly gaming.
 
I personally just can't stand the bezel problem with surround/eyefinity. Won't ever get fixed with multi-monitors. I found it extremely annoying when playing almost any game when I tried it for about 2 or so hours on a friend's computer. It ruins immersion for me personally so I would try it out beforehand not only because of the bezel but the UI problems generally created. I'm just not sold on it personally.

I'd be more interested in a monitor that was ultra wide. One monitor made up of 5760x1080 or w/e it is, but unfortunately they are too expensive right now.
 
I've tried gaming on 3 monitors for a year. After that I went with a single 27" monitor for another year. Then went back to my older 24" Dell monitor. I must say that in terms of competitive gaming, 24" or under is the ideal size. For max immersion (and dizziness), go for multi-monitors.
 
Landscape eyefinity doesn't really have that bad of a bezel problem. The center monitor is the same as anybody sees without eyefinity. The bezels are there but you are seeing the left and right side which you wouldn't normally be able to.

Portrait eyefinity definitely has the bezel problem though and you might actually end up seeing less than somebody with a single monitor.

I think 3 monitors are more immersive than a single 2560x1600 monitor could ever be. The problem with 3 monitors though is that you are creating resolutions of 5760x1200 before bezel compensation assuming a 1920x1200 monitor. It takes even more GPU power to do this and that generally means crossfire/SLI is necessary and that creates a whole new set of problems.

A single monitor solution would be better than a portrait eyefinity setup since the field of view (FOV) would be the same in most games but without the bezels. I think landscape eyefinity wins because of the greater FOV in games that support it.
 
One thing I been looking at is projectors you can have 3 1920 x 1080 projectors and no lines and a huge display very costly.
 
There is no way anyone else can answer this for you.

Triple Screen gaming, like everything else, is great if you like it and if it works. It really depends on the games you play and your tolerance for messing with stuff. Some games are just not compatible (like Guild Wars 1) and some games will promise compatibility only to have it be broken (like Space Marine).

It's frustrating to put substantial resources and time into something only to have it be useless on your favorite game.

For me, the best games I've run in surround are:

1. Bad Company 2 - fantastic.
2. Anything from Valve
3. Battlefield 3 - if you have the power
4. Dirt 3
5. Deus Ex (the new one)

If you are concerned about frame rates, be prepared to optimize everything - and by optimize, I mean buy the best available (in general).

I will probably play the hell out of Guild Wars 2 while continuing to play the Battlefield games so for me, NV Surround is great and when a game does not work (like Tribes Ascend Beta) then I play it the center screen but I tend to not like to play the games as much.
 
I just finished Deus Ex 3 HR in eyefinity portrait mode, it was fantastic.

However, I decided to start the Mass Effect franchise, the original Mass Effect 1 is too old to handle eyefinity, so I had to flip my monitors to landscape and game one a single monitor.

If you went with a 6 screen setup, it is too extreme when you come into game compatibility. Always go with an odd number, with an even number your cross hair will be stuck in a bezel.
 
If you want to actually enjoy playing games more than fiddling around with sli/xfire then a single monitor/TV plus a single graphic card that can play smoothly at the highest resolution you can afford. No need to go any further than that.
 
I debated between 3x portrait and 1600p.

Ended up going 1600p, never looked back. Absolutely love it. I have a 1900x1200 side panel for internet browser and other backround apps to run on while I game.
 
Try it out - some people like me can't stand the bezels; others are ok with them.

I personally would go a 27" or 30".
 
Personal preference. I game on a 120 Hz 1080p (23") panel and I'm more than pleased with the experience that offers. It's relatively easy to drive one 1080p display at 120 Hz and it doesn't take up much space. I'm going to be keeping a very close eye on HiDPI displays in the coming months, though, and at some point I intend to look into getting a pair of 3D glasses.
 
1080p doesn't require a powerful card to run games on, but a bigger resolution will.
 
I have a 3x23 inch 1920x1080 setup, and I would say that if I was doing it again, I would go 1x 27" 2560x1600, and one side 21-24 1920x1080 as a secondary monitor.

Triple screening it up is fun, but ehh, novelty wears off when the games don't support Eyefinity all that well.
 
I've tried gaming on 3 monitors for a year. After that I went with a single 27" monitor for another year. Then went back to my older 24" Dell monitor. I must say that in terms of competitive gaming, 24" or under is the ideal size. For max immersion (and dizziness), go for multi-monitors.

Strongly agree with this.

IMO the best experience for general gaming is 30" 2560x1600 however for competitive gaming (esp twitch gaming/FPS) smaller is better to the point where a CRT makes sense if you are in the 1% at the top.
Further, general computing and everything else you do on a 30" display is amazing.

Edit: Keep in mind that 2560x1600 or 2560x1400 requires at minimum a top tier single GPU solution so if you are price sensitive you probably want to stay with a 1920x1200 or 1080p native res monitor.
 
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Perfectly happy with my 24" NEC 19x12 and have been for years. Keeps video card pricing down is just a bonus but my friends have 30s and I find them too big at distances I like sitting 2-3 ft from monitor.

Agreed. I had a 26" for awhile but it was just too big considering the distance from the monitor. I got a 23" and haven't looked back. I think 23-24" is the perfect size for the typical sitting distance from your monitor.

Personally I see no reason to go multi-monitor, either, since I don't want to constantly be looking back and forth and the GPU power required is still pretty immense.

Honestly, I would probably only go with a higher resolution than 1080p if they made them in 23-24" form factor. Pixel pitch is way more important to me than size. I long for the day when we no longer need FSAA because the pixel pitch is so fine. :cool:
 
The nice thing about 2560x1600 the AA required to make everything look straight is so minimal and even acceptable with none from my standard. Also 1080P panels have a much lower pixel density than a 2560x1600 display with 4 million pixels vs 2 million pixels on a 1080P, It's almost like seeing HD for the first time again... The clarity is just stunning and the decrease in jagged lines from the HIGH-RES is awesome. With that being said, I can't wait to get my hands on a 4K panel. It will be like HD for the first time all over again and 1080P will look like SD :)

Also if you want too game at 2560x1600 1.5 GB of memory seems to do the job for 99.9% of games. With the exception being usually bad quality ports (GTA4) , 2 GB is more than enough if you decide to go the 2 GB route, I'd say you should pick up a ATi 6950 that is unlockable too a 6970 and call it a day , it will run most games at 2560x1600 @ 60+FPS with the exception of extremely useless AA options because like I said running at 2560x1600 is already like having 2X AA enabled for free :) by the time you enable 2X AA its like 4X AA at a lower RES :)

Also if you're busy killing people who has time too stand around and look at the jagged lines on the roof of a building or power line????
 
I like gaming on one monitor but I like having three. Where I have two outside monitor displays a webpage, cpu/gpu meters, and videos.

My optimal setup would a PLP setup with a 30" monitor 2560 x 1200 in the middle and 1600 x 1200 20" monitors on the sides.
 
I have been running a 30in 2560x1600 for years and really like it. With that being said, I play mostly FPS games, and I think I would really benefit from the side or peripheral vision that I would get from 3 monitors running in landscape.
One thing about the 30in monitor is having a video card powerful enough to run it. The cards are just now (without running SLI) able to run my games at full resolution without compromising quality. With the 6950 (flashed to 6970) that I am running now I still have to make compromises to get games to run smooth.
 
they fixed that problem in CCC where you can adjust for where they are atleast. I would just make a custom TV mount and take all the plastic off.
 
I like one big screen over multiple bezel-messy monitors. Now imagine Sharp's 70 inch equipped with 4k resolution. :eek:
 
As much as I like the setup, the amount of GPU required to run such a setup will never be feasible. It took years 3-4 years of waiting just to be able to run my 2560x1600 res comfortable... that would be another 3 years down the road before it runs comfortable..
 
I've now got 3 27" 120Hz 1080p panels driven by a trifire 7970 setup. It's absolutely brilliant when it all works, but getting it all there is such a PITA that I wouldn't really recommend it. I'm not sure if 680s SLId would provide a better experience from the driver perspective, but it takes a lot of dicking around to get things right.

But when it's all working, holy crap. 3D stereoscopic gaming across 3 27" 1080p panels is bananas.
 
As much as I like the setup, the amount of GPU required to run such a setup will never be feasible. It took years 3-4 years of waiting just to be able to run my 2560x1600 res comfortable... that would be another 3 years down the road before it runs comfortable..

I Assume you mean not feasible to run as in your budget, the GPU power is 100% very available.
 
Single GPUs are just now starting to be able to run games quite well at 2560x1600 (7970/680). However based on recent news, 3840x2160 displays will come out soon. I just hope that Nvidia/ATI are ready for that.
 
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