4 19" lcd monitors or 42" LCD tv?

Righ now im 5 boxing with a 9800gtx 512 mb usuing two 19" lcd monitors. I'm using keyclone with the pip maximizer feature. on my main monitor is my main WoW screen and 2nd monitor im usuing keyclone's maximizer to make each window into 4 squares. Now since keyclone takes so long to switch the screens suing the PIP feature i was thinking of just adding a 2nd 9800gtx and have 4 19" monitors so i can have 3/5 WoW clients taking up the whole monitor. after looking at the price it would be almost cheaper to just buy a decent 42" lcd tv and just do it that way.


Anyone else tried this and can give some input? any performance issues doing it this way?

I haven't seen an LCD TV with a DVI input, yet, their PC input is always VGA... not sure how good an image you're going to end up with with that.

If there's a LCD TV with a DVI input out there, I'd love a pointer to it :)

Worst case you can get a DVI to HDMI adapter for around $20.

I would opt for the 4x19". Even a 1080p LCD TV (1920x1080 res) would probably be painful. Each window will be around 960x540, and those pixels are going to be pretty friggin big. Whereas with the 19" each will be a relatively gorgeous 1280x1024 (if you can drive that res, 1024x768 min) and be much more pleasant when you have to read chat's or want to actually do something relevant (talents) on the alt.

The flipside is when you're not boxing the large LCDTV would be really nice to watch movies, etc. on.

Also keep in mind with the 19's that your desk configuration or eventual neck strain my drive you to verticle mounts which are additional cost. I highly recommend the verticle mounts as they help bring all toons into your field of view. Sure you don't generally have to watch those screens with much focus but switching around for looting, etc. can wear on you in long sessions.

Just my thoughts.

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Originally Posted by 'GizmoxLoW',index.php?page=Thread&postID=128808#po st128808

Righ now im 5 boxing with a 9800gtx 512 mb usuing two 19" lcd monitors. I'm using keyclone with the pip maximizer feature. on my main monitor is my main WoW screen and 2nd monitor im usuing keyclone's maximizer to make each window into 4 squares. Now since keyclone takes so long to switch the screens suing the PIP feature i was thinking of just adding a 2nd 9800gtx and have 4 19" monitors so i can have 3/5 WoW clients taking up the whole monitor. after looking at the price it would be almost cheaper to just buy a decent 42" lcd tv and just do it that way.


Anyone else tried this and can give some input? any performance issues doing it this way?

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You are definately going to want to wait until the version 180 driver goes live to really make a decision. That will allow multiple cards to really handle it well.

Also a 42" TV might have a hard time being driven by a single card. I know you can find them in DVI also. If for some reason one is out of your price range then there are always DVI to HDMI converters.

Last thing to note is that the resolution on a TV is very minimal.

Bottom line - go with two video cards and 4 monitors.

My own experience is with using a 32" LCD TV as a monitor. The resolution is/was 720p, so the monitor was 1280x768, I think. So even though the windows will be bigger the resolution will still be fairly crappy. If you get a 1080i TV/monitor that should be 1920x1080 so it will be able to support higher resolution but still you'll have bigger pictures with the same resolution, some higher res TVs may be around, I ain't a TV-crazy guy so I dunno. If you get a TV/monitor with an HDMI output you should be able to use an HDMI-to-DVI cable to use your DVI inputs (this is what I did).

Another thing to consider is the Dell 30" display. It cranks out a 2560x1600 (I think) res. That will get you to about 1024x768 on each which should be comfortable. Retail on em is $1,300 I think but I've seen them on outlet.dell.com for $1,050 before.

Awesome thoughts guys. really appreciate it. Im gonna go with a 2nd card and 4 monitors. all that technical stuff about the pixels being big and such turned me off to the idea unless i really had the funds to get a super high end tv or machine. thanks alot!

I run on a LG 47" hooked up via HDMI to my PC (I have a HDMI <-> DVI cable I got somewhere online). I run 1920x1080 (or so) on the TV, and run my wow windows at 1360x768. Also have a 2nd 22" monitor hooked where I run a second window of WoW. It all works great, WoW looks gorgeous on a huge screen and its nice having browser windows on the side/behind since most of the grindy or instancy stuff in WoW is pretty boring.

No big pixel problems, no chunky graphics, everything is gorgeous and great. Make sure you get a 1080p TV, run it at 1920x1080 res. I usually have a TV show (daily show, etc) also running in a small window while playing, lol

There are some great deals on awesome 1080p 120hz 42" and higher TVs nowadays, definitely worth looking into.