Apr 14 2008
Multiple Monitors Increase Productivity
To the surprise of no one who has ever used multiple monitors, recent studies show that multiple monitors increase a user’s productivity 20%-30%. As the Slashdot article notes:
For those of us who use multi-monitors, this is not shocking.
The Microsoft article states:
Give someone a second monitor, let them use it for while, and then try to take it away. It just isn’t going to happen. They’ll never go back to a mono display. Researchers in the Visualization and Interaction for Business and Entertainment group (VIBE), found that increasing a computer user’s display space made it easier for them to complete their tasks.
I have
used multiple monitors for more than four years now and wholeheartedly agree that using multiple monitors improves my productivity by the 30% shown in the study. The only drawback that I have ever encountered in using a multiple monitor set up is that I have multiple monitors only when I am in my office. When I am away from the office I find myself often wishing that I had a second monitor to use. In fact, I have used MaxiVista to co opt a second monitor get to get the extra desktop space.
I wrote a short column on using multiple monitors. This can be found on my Files page.
If you have never used multiple monitors before, I strongly encourage you to try it out. I have never met anyone who used multiple monitors that ever wanted to go back to a single monitor.
So I’m finally giving this a go, after hearing this advice at ABA Techshow and again on this blog. I fired up an old 19″ LCD and connected it to my MacBook Pro. Very easy to configure the multiple monitor setup using System Preferences. Seems like a good thing, though will take a while to get used to and figure out how to optimize.
I wonder how people use the multi-mon setup…Word processing in the principal monitor and email & web in the secondary?
What’s amazing is how inexpensive these monitors have become. A search at pricegrabber had 19″ LCD’s at $159 and 22″ LCD’s at $219.
Back in the oldne days (late 80’s, early 90’s), the court house had a couple of peole that had these huge orange monitors. It allowed them to have 4 normal CICS sessions up. Instead of having to toggle between screens, you could see everything all at once. For some of the work, this proved invaluable.