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[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?
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 21 2018, @04:26AM (2 children)
With a TV LCD, yes. All LCD's labeled for "Television" actually perform overscan.
Now, I can anticipate your next question: "why?"
The answer is because of "legacy". Television broadcast signals were created presuming overscan in the receiver (because it was a CRT and all but studio 'monitor' CRT's were setup to overscan) and so all "TV" signals are produced assuming that the receiver overscans.
Also, because TV's overscanned, other, enterprising, folks decided they could use the overscan area for transmitting other data (it, afterall, would be invisible to the viewer, because "overscan"). So if modern LCD TV's didn't overscan to compensate for the signal assuming it does so, you'd have your tv picture sitting in a box with all kinds of moving dots around it where other 'stuff' (one big one that did this was the text overlays for the hearing impaired, they get transmitted on several of the lines at the bottom of the picture that are in the "overscan zone". And most "joe sixpack's" wouldn't understand why their "movin pitcur" has all these 'ants' crawling around on the edges.
The same reason is the cause for why most TV's now have "zoom" modes that cut off the edges of the picture so it "fills the screen" because "joe sixpack" could not understand that a film aspect viewport was not the same aspect ratio as his newfangled "movin pitcur box" and those black bars on the edges did not really mean that he wasn't getting "all the pitcur he paid fo".
(Score: 2) by martyb on Friday September 21 2018, @02:31PM
TIL! Thanks so much for the clear explanation of the history and cause for the overscan. Makes perfect sense the way you explained it. It's replies like this which make all the time I put in posting stories and doing QA worthwhile. Thank you!
Wit is intellect, dancing.
(Score: 1) by ChrisMaple on Saturday September 22 2018, @01:07AM
I've seen signalling in the flyback (blanking) time, but having signalling in the overscan region seems quite peculiar. After all, overscan in CRT systems is typical, not guaranteed.