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posted by chromas on Friday September 21 2018, @03:59AM   Printer-friendly
from the moar-pixels! dept.

[Update: WOW! Thanks for all the useful feedback! Plenty of information on the TV-as-a-monitor side of things (but feel free to add more!) Would very much appreciate it if folks could provide some input as to what has worked for them in using a laptop to drive a 4K display. I'd consider a used system. Would, ideally, like something that costs in the ~$300 range, but am resigned to the fact I may have to kick out more like ~$750. What graphics adapter do you have. Is it an integrated model (e.g. Intel HD 630) or discrete card? What model? What troubles, if any, have you had with getting proper drivers (windows OR Linux/Debian/BSD/etc.) Could you get the full 60 fps or were you limited to 30 fps? See below the fold for details on my current system and what my needs are compute-wise. --Bytram]

Summary: I need more screen space.

Which means I'll need a new (to me) laptop (portability++) which can support more pixels. I want a system that is Linux/BSD friendly. I don't have a whole lot of money to spend, so I'm hoping I can draw on the experience of my fellow Soylentils to help point me in the right direction. I'd like to avoid overspending, but I don't want to find that I've boxed myself into a corner for making an ignorant mistake.

I used to follow the bleeding edge of technology, but I've now firmly moved into the "I want it to just work" camp.

Current Display: I have a 24-inch, 1920x1200 computer monitor. The majority of my display is taken up my Internet Browser (Pale Moon) which generally has 50+ tabs. It is flush with the top of my screen and covers the entire display except for a ~2 inch margin on the sides and 3 inches on the bottom. That overlays my HexChat IRC (Internet Relay Chat) which runs across the bottom 1/3 of my screen. The remainder of the screen has corners of command windows poking out as well as various utilities like an analog clock, performance monitor, connection monitor, etc.

TV as Monitor: Over the past few months I've seen the prices for 4K (3840x2160) televisions plummet. I've got my eye on a TCL 43S517 43-Inch 4K Ultra HD Roku Smart LED TV (2018 Model) which Amazon has on sale for $349.00 with free shipping.

As I see it, I could get a display with better dot pitch than what I have now, and much more screen real estate, for relatively little money.

The vast majority of what I do is command line based, be it in a Windows (7 Pro X64) CMD.exe command window, or an occasional PuTTY session into Soylent's Servers. I do not do any video gaming. My only video needs are an occasional short clip from YouTube, or a DVD (I have neither cable TV nor do I stream video with Netflix or their ilk; no Blu-ray, either). Internet access is currently via a tethered LTE cell phone.

Current computer: Thanks to the generosity of a fellow Soylentil, my current system is a Dell Latitude E6400 with a Core 2 Duo P8700 (1.8-2.5 GHz) with 8GB RAM and a 500GB 7200-rpm WD Black disk drive. Video is handled by a NVIDIA Quadro NVS 160M.

New Laptop: My current is not going to cut it. So, I'm also on the lookout for a new (to me) laptop. I don't need much in the way of compute power. I figure pretty much any i3 or i5 should be more than enough for my computing needs. And, an Intel integrated graphics chip should be up to the task given a recent enough generation, but I'm not sure how current a model I'd need. I'm further confused by the different connection schemes and versions. I've found this page on Intel. What will I need? HDMI 1.4? Display Port 1.2? Other? Would I be able to run both a 4K monitor @ 60Hz and my existing 1920x1200 display?

With the increasing trade war rhetoric, I'm getting nervous there may be a price spike in the not too distant future. Further, I sense merchants are clearing out the current stock in anticipation of the holiday season, so I'm thinking the time is right for me to take the plunge and upgrade.

Conclusion: So, what have your experiences been using a 4K television as a computer monitor? What 'gotchas' have you run into? What things did you learn the hard way that you wish someone had told you about beforehand? What driver problems have you encountered? Did you have any issues with Linux/BSD drivers? What worked for you?


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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Friday September 21 2018, @12:09AM (5 children)

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Friday September 21 2018, @12:09AM (#737876) Journal

    I will second this suggestion. I have a 3 generations old Nvidia 730 card driving two 1080-p monitors. The left monitor is actually a Vizio television, the right monitor is an older LG monitor. I won't go into how I use my screen space, except for gaming. I multibox ten spaceships on The Infinite Black. The game is not highly demanding, graphics wise, the boxes just need to be big enough that I can read in them. My old video card couldn't cope with any demanding graphics, but it is satisfactory to my needs. A better refresh rate would be good, sometimes. Fleet vs fleet encounters can cause me to lag, but I do alright all the same.

    4k just seems to be overkill, for your stated needs. The monitor isn't cheap, nor is the video card capable of driving it cheap. And, of course, any laptop with a 4k capable video will probably carry a premium price.

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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Friday September 21 2018, @01:09AM (4 children)

    by Gaaark (41) on Friday September 21 2018, @01:09AM (#737915) Journal

    I will third this: the last time one of my dual monitors goooshed on me and I had to go back to ONE monitor? Ah feck, just shoot me!

    Dual monitors aaaallllllllll the way, baby!

    --
    --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 21 2018, @03:01AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 21 2018, @03:01AM (#737950)

      :) My son who is starting on the IT road recently wanted a 2nd screen, so we dug up an unused monitor and he is happy - no new laptop required. Using Mint 18.3 with plans to upgrade to 19 / 19.1 next year.

    • (Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Friday September 21 2018, @05:00PM (2 children)

      by fyngyrz (6567) on Friday September 21 2018, @05:00PM (#738230) Journal

      I will (literally) fourth this. My desktop is currently driving four monitors. It's OS X, not linux, though.

      I've had as many as six running on this machine at one time, but I've pulled back a bit (needed the monitors for other stuff... security system, second computer.)

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 21 2018, @10:01PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 21 2018, @10:01PM (#738379)

        PC driving four monitors is no problem: Most laptops will drive one external monitor, maybe two. The other three can be driven using USB graphics adaptors. Refresh rates are crap, but who cares if you are using them for work and not play.

        • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday September 23 2018, @12:13AM

          by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Sunday September 23 2018, @12:13AM (#738696) Journal

          Actually, you can put multiple video cards into your machine, for better performance. There are two video cards in the wife's machine right now, although she doesn't use the older, less capable card. I had two in my machine, but the physical dimensions are awkward, and the riser cable for the second video was subject to being jarred loose. Depending on they physical dimensions, and the available slots, you might put as many as four video cards into your machine, each driving it's own monitor. I haven't searched for such a beast, but you might find mainboards with even more slots to populate with video cards!