Using Two Monitors Makes You More Productive? 602
Double Vision asks: "In my job, I work with several software applications at once. I find that constantly switching back and forth wastes a tremendous amount of time and causes me to lose focus. My video card supports two monitors, so I found a discarded monitor in my office and hooked it up. This has made it much easier to do my job. However, we are getting ready to go through an equipment audit, which means I will likely lose my additional monitor unless I can justify keeping it. How can I make this case? Is anyone aware of studies that support my claim that two monitors makes me more productive?"
Here's a study (Score:5, Informative)
Two Screens Are Better Than One [microsoft.com]
The best part is that it was done by Slashdot's nemesis.
Re:Forget extra monitors (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Here's a study (Score:3, Informative)
It works wonders (Score:2, Informative)
Personally, I've got a widescreen laptop, and the added screen real state made me start wondering if I should switch to two monitors to increase it even more! Now I have an old CRT screen to the right of me, usually it has all my documentation/references open while I work. For art programs, especially, it is just unbelievably valuable, been thinking about getting an LCD screen for a while, because the CRT is currently too bulky and too small to place where I want it to be (its like 2 feet away, not quite how most people use it). Not to mention, during breaks, I just switch the secondary to watch TV on it, while I can still do small bits of work.
Yes I'm productive during my breaks as well, its easy when you do something you enjoy.
Re:Forget extra monitors (Score:3, Informative)
It sounds like you have never actually used two monitors at once. It's only about 10,000,000% better than virtual desktops.
Re:In my experience... (Score:3, Informative)
Uh... Google, anyone? (Score:3, Informative)
it's a no brainer. (Score:5, Informative)
I actually started using a dual head setup years ago (think pre-AGP days) when I had two PCI cards pushing monitors and Windows 2000 had just finally gotten a semi-automatic way to span them. And I've never gone back.
You'd think "ALT-tab" wouldn't be such an effort... until you don't have to do it.
My wife made fun of it, until I upgraded my CRTs to 19" LCD. Giving me a spare CRT to hook up to the second video port on her nVidia card. Then she found the ability to have research and documentation up on one screen, and whatever she was working on on the other. She's also never gone back.
At my work they have been moving us to Thinkpads for almost all of our production network boxes (test racks are a different matter). They got us docking stations with monitors for when we were in the office. Then I realized instead of that I could use the laptops screen as primary and the docking station screen as a second monitor. On top of that the LCD's they got for us were some nice Dell model that you can rotate to portrait mode. You don't want to know how much faster and easier is it to scan a dual column diff when you have portrait mode...
From a money perspective, if a second LCD monitor costs your company $150, and you make $40 an hour all it has to do to pay for itself in a year is save you 3 hours and 45 minutes. Over a 200 day work year.... Meaning about 1 minute and 12 seconds a day and it pays for itself.
Debugging (Score:2, Informative)
"opportunity cost" (Score:1, Informative)
I know this is
At my work we got a choice (Score:3, Informative)
When doing layout design, it's a very visual, graphical thing. However, the layout is being done to match a schematic, which we also need to have open for reference. Plus there are other utilities and tools in the software for managing your list of layers you're viewing, lists of design rule violations to be cleaned up, etc. Having the layout maximized on one screen is great, while the schematic, etc. are on the other screen for reference.
I'm a positionally oriented person when it comes to windows in my workspace. When I had just the one monitor, I used to arrange the windows around toward different corners and edges of my screen. They were sized big enough to see, so they were very overlapping in the middle. It's a Linux station, so I had my window behavior set for "focus follows mouse", but not to automatically raise windows. I set a hotkey to raise/lower windows, so I could just point to an exposed edge of the one I wanted and hit the key to raise it. Or I would sometimes just point in the middle of the screen and start hitting that button to cycle through the windows I had going on.
Re:Here's a study (Score:3, Informative)
try virtual/multi desktop instead of 2 monitors (Score:3, Informative)
Again, unless you absolutely must simultaneously see a ton of data which can only be efficiently done with 2 or more monitors, you'll probably have to snowball your IT department into thinking you need the extra monitors. One thing you might try is to tell them you have epilepsy and a quickly changing/flashing display window could trigger an episode.
2+ displays are easier but saying it's required is gonna take some work. IMO.
LoB
Re:Trivial ? (Score:5, Informative)
It's tempting to think of the government as being some monolithic entity, but it isn't.
Re:Trivial ? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Just tell them (Score:5, Informative)
The best thing he can do is set the manager up with a second monitor so he can see the difference. I am an avid multi monitor user. Friends and family that use my machines have gone to the same set up on there machines. At work, I did the same as this guy and eventual converted the entire department. All but one person (the new guy) now have 2 monitors.
now im up to 4 monitors. I wanted 3, but it was just as easy to do 4 as it was 3. If I had to make a cut, i would drop one. But nobody else is willing to give up there set ups.
If you can't convert others, at the very least mention the advantages now before the audit gets to your monitor. Be proactive at telling your supervisor that its needed before the auditor tells him its not needed.
Re:Trivial ? (Score:2, Informative)
Bill Gates (Score:2, Informative)
Re:In my experience... (Score:1, Informative)
syns: syn: You'll need to user your own vals for thismachinesnamefromsynergyconfig, 192.168.1.3 (the server's IP), and username (to whatever your home linux path is on the client box).
Syn's pretty cool. I keep wanting to do a workbench / home 4 or 5 screen setup. Old sun box, 2 laptops, my dual-screen workhorse... and synergy. Yum.
Productivity & Monitor size studies (Score:2, Informative)
http://images.apple.com/pro/pdf/Cin_Disp30_report
http://weblog.infoworld.com/techwatch/archives/00
http://www.petefreitag.com/item/552.cfm [petefreitag.com]
enjoy