for those Multiboxing entire groups .... question ?

... for those that box entire groups whether a 5 toon group or 6 toon group depending on game ...

My background is hardware boxing ... FYI .. not software boxing .. but question is specific to software boxers

Do you find it is more efficient to run a "MAIN" PC with one instance ... then a secondary PC with the rest of the toons stacked on it in auto follow

or do you find it more efficient to all be on one PC?

it seems with mouse functions and trying to type on keyboard to guild /kin and ooc channels that the 2 pc setup is better / easier maybe ? or am i missing some point that would push one PC over the top

thoughts and debate would be appreciated

PS have not played in awhile and sold most of my hardware boxing stuff and prolly going to build new rig or rigs to do it software style

I run two PCs with my main on one and the 4 slaves on the other (WoW)
I mainly do it because my processing power is limited, so i have to spread on 2 machines.

What i like about it.
- If for whatever reason i have a lockup due to too many toons or whatever, i can still use my main.
- i can run my main in full settings, with no detriment to the slaves

What i don't like about it
- swapping keyboards whenever i need to do something that can't be boxed well (picking a herb or whatever)
- loading, updating, setting mods or whatever on 2 machines


If i had t a bit of cash i'd get a beefier machine and just play all on 1 with 2 screens (main Fulls screen and 4 shared on the other)

I run two machines with my 4 alts on PC 2. My boxing software does software-KVM mouse/kb control so I don't have to switch hardware, I just mouse over to PC2 and click/type whatever I need. Primarily, I like 2 PCs so I can run my main + GameCam/Fraps/whatever and don't have to worry about performance issues. My boxing software also allows precise mouse-click broadcasting without having to run alts at the same size as my main, which greatly improves performance on the alts.

I'm about 99.91% PVE, but if I did I would still run 2 PCs due to the lag/performance issues in larger PVP engagements.

I also like having two PCs because I can do IM/mail/web/movies on my second monitor on PC1 and still do everything else.

Really, it just depends on how much disposable income you have for hardware (though you could spend about the same on two or three 80% PCs as you did on one beast of a PC) and what functionality is critical to your playstyle.

I 5box and 10box on the same computer, previously it was a chore 10boxing and I could only ten box after zoning into a raid or starting at the stone and having the other 5 man group take a summons until I got an upgrade. Mixing two computers addressed the 10box issue easily, but the upgrade made it trivial to do on one computer.

I use camtasia and it works fine and I didn't even notice it (except when working with the application itself) even when 10boxing. Though I was only grabbing one slave's view 10boxing.

I have a separate server that I send prefmon, combatlog, chatlog, and multiplexer logging to.

I have recently gone to a three monitor setup. The traditional master + slaves, with half of a monitor is dedicated to spying on the performance & logging alerts (splunk!), vent, web use wowhead. The other half is a chunk of viewport from the master's session (all the unappealing combat, quest, chat, graph crap).

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Originally Posted by Zub

If i had t a bit of cash i'd get a beefier machine and just play all on 1 with 2 screens (main Fulls screen and 4 shared on the other)

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so if you have the cash go with one pc and 2 monitors?

i play lotro ( which is more intensive than wow on a machine ) so will have to run 6 instances of lotro on one machine

if i go this route ill prolly get the follwing:

either a asus 58 or rampage 3 MB

980 extreme with 6 cores ( so i can assign one core to each instance of lotro )

24 gigs of matched ram

an ati 5970 maybe 2 in crossfire

6 x 3gb/s 64 gig SSD drives for one instance each of Lotro

1 x 6GB/s 64 gig SSD for OS

so with that said i think the machine will be plenty beefy enough to run two monitors while i play one for main and other for slaves

im just trying to decide if its worth it for any reason to build one machine stand alone for main and one machine pretty much like above except one less SSD for 5 slaves ...

are their any advantages to two machines ( one for main one for slaves ) im missing or disadvantages ?

Taking beefy machine out of equation are there advantages to all being on one machine ( or disadvantages ) im missing before i decide

*** im a former hardware boxer but do not wish to do the 6 machine route anymore takes up too much room even though with a vetra mega switch prolly easier than software boxing except your stuck with PS/2 keyboard and mice :( ----- so im going software this time

I originally started out hardware boxing on 5/6 PC's playing WoW, DAoC, Aion, AOC, etc. I found honestly that playing all on one PC was MUCH easier to manage, and I could use certain things to my advantage like on the fly switching of your main character. I couldn't do that easily when I had to kink my head over 3 feet to one side if I wanted to run one of my alts if I was hardware boxing.

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Originally Posted by Nisch

I originally started out hardware boxing on 5/6 PC's playing WoW, DAoC, Aion, AOC, etc. I found honestly that playing all on one PC was MUCH easier to manage, and I could use certain things to my advantage like on the fly switching of your main character. I couldn't do that easily when I had to kink my head over 3 feet to one side if I wanted to run one of my alts if I was hardware boxing.

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this is what im trying to figure out ... yeah 6 monitors laid out in a semi cirlce around you can get rough on neck and back

so when all on one PC you can switch to which is your main ?

what about if one char wants to chat with other players they all dont type it at same time do they?

if you want to switch which char is asking a quesiton to say an OOC channel is that easy enough ?

I guess the main QUESTION is .... to the community ... IF YOU had a beefy enough machine would you run them all on one pc with two monitors or still use 2 PCS one for main and one for slaves?

I went from 2 PC's to 1 PC with 2 monitors. I definitely prefer 1 PC.

I went from two PC's, with two keyboards/mice/monitors.. no software.
To one PC, with five accounts.

I've not had an issue with five accounts on one PC.
The requirements increased with WotLK, and I upgraded the system.
And the current system has been great since then.

I for sure prefer single PC, and a big monitor.

I like having everything contained to 1 PC personally. You only have 1 head- so honestly you can only look at 1 monitor at a time. With this in mind I like having all my windows on 1 monitor as well.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Trushot

this is what im trying to figure out ... yeah 6 monitors laid out in a semi cirlce around you can get rough on neck and back

so when all on one PC you can switch to which is your main ?

what about if one char wants to chat with other players they all dont type it at same time do they?

if you want to switch which char is asking a quesiton to say an OOC channel is that easy enough ?

I guess the main QUESTION is .... to the community ... IF YOU had a beefy enough machine would you run them all on one pc with two monitors or still use 2 PCS one for main and one for slaves?

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Well I have 6 monitors, in two levels of 3......it's still annoying.

http://www.danhanisch.com/daoc/nischcomp-0424-1.jpg

Yes, you can run any of your alts as a "main". With ISBoxer, it automatically does the FTL setup, so all your keys work, assists work, etc, without any configuration. Very impressive. Just hit your hotkey, or click on the screen you want to switch to, all your "now" alts follow your "new" main, and all spells/assists/attacks work the same, all changed on the fly.

With ISBoxer, it doesn't always broadcast. You can setup keymaps which are special keys that are broadcast and do certain combinations. Otherwise, there is a hotkey you can set which turns broadcasting on and off. so it works like hardware boxing and software boxing, all at the same time.

I didn't think I had a beefy enough machine at first, but I upgraded to a solid state hard drive and it made ALL the difference in the world. It's really a great setup running all on one PC if you set it up right, leveraging it in your favor.

@nisch

that fan looks pretty dangerous mate ...

Nisch there is a HELICOPTER ON YOUR WALL.

On a less serious note...

I've been using 1 PC with ISBoxer for about 1.5 years. I am in the middle of building a new machine and I will then have 2 to
play on. The only reason I will be using 2 machines is because I would like to FRAPS some situations with high graphics
where there may be a lot of action and I don't want a performance hit or my recording FPS to dip down too low.

I just finished up a new set up and am running an i7 950 OC'd at 4.0ghz, 16gigs of ddr3, and 2x ati 6870s. Running all 5 accounts on 1 machine and on ultra gfx settings with fraps np np. I may eventually lower the gfx a bit once I get into AV again on my new set of toons... but until then, I will be enjoying playing my chars all on ultra settings :P

PS GFX update makes the game look absolutely beautiful.... * its been 2 years since i last played. back for cataclysm. xD

I do one reasonably decent computer. I have 2 monitors, but usually run all instances on one monitor and have the second one for watching video, reading websites, etc. It definitely gets strenuous on my neck turning back and forth when I play; heck, even looking up at the minimap can become obnoxious which is why I have my minimap overlaid atop my center of screen.

The advantage of single machine boxing is one less thing to maintain, I guess. And my current PC is pretty efficient - it draws maybe 75% of the power of my old machine, so 2 machines would likely (even if lower spec) draw more electricity. I don't really see any disadvantages to single machine boxing as long as you have the hardware to handle it.

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Originally Posted by Fenril

Nisch there is a HELICOPTER ON YOUR WALL.
.

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lol......it's actually a very effective way of storing radio controlled helis. ;)

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Originally Posted by zenga

@nisch

that fan looks pretty dangerous mate ...

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Are you speaking of the one in the middle of the computers? It's actually quite secure.


if you're speaking of the "one" hanging on the wall...........well that's just living life on the edge :o