Virtual Monitors Question

[wes.crockett]

Hi All,

 

This question is what prompted me to finally make an account here...

 

I currently run 3 monitors for work and 2 for my home PC (same desk, just use laptop for work and switch inputs for my desktop when I'm done working.) and it works fine for my needs. My ideal setup, though, is a single 42-50" 4k monitor. For work, my laptop would drive it OK but my PC certainly can't game at 4k, nor do I care to.

 

Ideally, I would do a center wide display with 2 displays above it. I know, when using large panels, you can do the 'virtual' monitor splits, but how does that work for refresh rate? My 1070 ti does OK with my 1440 monitor, with a side 24" vertically next to it. If I set up a 50" LCD that is 4k overall, but is only gaming on a sub-set of those pixels, how the heck is that handled? Would it really just be gaming at 4k in terms of performance impact?

 

Any input on this? I am not one who needs 144htz (obviously, my 1070 ti can't get 144hts at 1440p) but I would like to maintain 60's in the games I play.

 

(This is a PRACTICAL setup, not a ULTRA-PERFORMANCE setup...)

 

Any input on how this would go? Would love to see if Linus and team could do a video about a way to achieve this.

[Kilrah]

You can game at 1440p on a 4K monitor... and if it looks too crud once stretched that big you can always run your games in windowed mode.

[wes.crockett]

2 hours ago, Kilrah said:

You can game at 1440p on a 4K monitor... and if it looks too crud once stretched that big you can always run your games in windowed mode.

For sure. That makes sense. I just wasn't sure if I was running the screen at 4k, but gaming on a subset (1440 equivalent) in an area of the overall screen (bottom center) while having comms, browser, etc open in the other portions, will the GPU be taxed significantly more than just a native 1440 screen. Maybe a more concise question, if gaming at 1440 in windowed on a 4k monitor, what overhead and I being taxed for the pixels not being used by the game window?

[Mihle]

8 hours ago, wes.crockett said:

For sure. That makes sense. I just wasn't sure if I was running the screen at 4k, but gaming on a subset (1440 equivalent) in an area of the overall screen (bottom center) while having comms, browser, etc open in the other portions, will the GPU be taxed significantly more than just a native 1440 screen. Maybe a more concise question, if gaming at 1440 in windowed on a 4k monitor, what overhead and I being taxed for the pixels not being used by the game window?

Don't have numbers, but not much more, probably almost not measurable. Unless you do something that actually use quite a bit of GPU. And less than having those extra stuff alone on the 4k monitor and having another monitor running the game.

 

I personally would not go as large as 50" at normal monitor distance unless it was like 8k, but that is me. Longer distance I would be fine with it. Its up to you tho.

 

Just for reference, a 50" 4K Monitor/TV would have the same pixel density as a 33" 1440p monitor.

[Kilrah]

I'm happy with my 49" 4K

[wes.crockett]

13 hours ago, Kilrah said:

I'm happy with my 49" 4K

and a RTX 3080  

 

Do you game at full screen or do you divide the screen up as virtual monitors?

[Kilrah]

Full screen in 4K.