If you look around most modern offices, you’ll notice that most computers have two or more screens. Most commonly on the desks of people who control diaries or planning, but the benefits are so good that even admin computers tend to have multiple screens now too.
Having a second screen on your computer allows you to move applications onto the second screen to allow you to see more at the same time. This is really useful if you jump between apps; for instance, you might have your email open on one screen and consult your calendar open on the other screen. Or you might be doing research on the web on one screen whilst writing a document about your research on the other.
It’s thought that having a second screen can add 50% to your productivity, so it’s well worth the investment.
On most laptops adding a second screen is very easy. Simply get a screen with the right connection ports and hook it up to your laptop. Some laptops have HDMI ports, so get a screen with HDMI in. Some laptops have USB-C oval connectors and these can use a USB-C to HDMI adapter or a special USB-C cable, but be careful to check compatibility before you buy. If you would like help to check, then get in touch with us or another computer specialist.
There are two modes: Duplicate mode or Extended Desktop Mode. Duplicate mode is not very helpful as it just copies one screen to the other, this is mainly used when running a presentation with a large screen or projector. Extended desktop is the most useful mode for productivity as this allows different apps on each screen. To change the modes, get the screen plugged in, hold the Windows logo key and tap P (for Projector) to bring up the display mode slide-out, then click on Extend. Or you can find the same settings in the control panel. On Mac this is found in the preferences screen, some times on the dock or sometimes up in the top right by the time.
Desktop computers are a little different; some modern computers have multiple video sockets already, such as VGA +HDMI or HDMI + DisplayPort. There are adapters for most of these to get to HDMI or whatever input your monitors have. If your computer doesn’t have multiple video ports then it’s possible to add ports using an add-in graphics card. Basic NVidia cards like the Quadro range are great for business computers and with the right card you can support 3, 4 or even more monitors depending on your needs.
It works best, and looks nicest, to have matching monitors. Having different sizes or shapes of screens can cause odd behaviour when moving windows, so if you’re setting up from new then get two the same.
On our web designer workstation we use three screens as this allows us to have site code open, a graphics app open and also see the finished web site all at the same time so you can see in real time what changes will look like. In share trading and air-traffic-control systems it’s common to have six or more screens.