With my new gaming computer purchase, I got one of those amazing 30″ Samsung 2560 x 1600 LCD monitors. If you haven’t seen one yet, you should go to an Apple store and check out their version–it will bring a tear to your eye. With my other computer setup I have two 22″ Samsung 1600 x 1050 LCD monitors. So now that I’ve got both setups, I’m in a position to evaluate each one and tell you what you should spend your money on.

Option #1: One 30″ Monitor

At first glance, the 30″ monitor seems like a far better solution. It looks amazing and when I show somebody a slideshow of pictures taken on my high-res camera, their jaws drop. But in daily use there’s a problem–the monitor is simply too big! You can easily have multiple applications running side by side but since the monitor is flat, it makes it difficult to use the different apps unless you drag them into the center of the screen.

Take the monitor you’re sitting in front of right now and move your chair so that you’re at the right side of the screen–don’t tilt the monitor to face you, leave it facing your original position. Since you’re sitting on the right side of your screen the left side of your web browser should get smaller as it “fades off into the distance”. Like this:

It doesn’t seem like a big deal, but if you had to work on that all day you’d go insane (trust me). The 30″ monitor is just like that except the skewed perspective goes in both directions. Like this:

The only way I can use the monitor is to drag the active application into the middle of the screen, which defeats the whole purpose of having a big monitor in the first place.

I should point out, that the 30″ monitor rocks for video games. I get full immersion and–since I only see the edges of the monitor in my peripheral vision–the distortion doesn’t bother me as much. I’ve never had such a fun experience playing games.

Option #2: Two 22″ Monitors

Two monitors gives you many improvements over the single monitor experience. On the chart, you have 3 million pixels compared to 4 million pixels for the 30″ solution. But for practical purposes, you get the same working space. Why? Because the top and bottom portions of the 30″ monitor don’t get used when you’re working on applications. So it’s not much of a sacrifice to lose those million extra pixels.

Each monitor is on its own stand so you can slightly tilt the screens toward you, eliminating the perspective problem you have on the 30″ monitor. You can also buy a dual monitor stand that lets you remove each monitor’s base and attach them to the stand, locking in the proper perspective.

The biggest disadvantages of having two monitors is that there’s a gap in your field of view–right in the middle. But it doesn’t really bother me that much because I end up with two separate working spaces–usually with an application maximized on each monitor. So you never are looking at something that spans both monitors. Even with the sole application I use across both monitors (Microsoft Project), the gap in the middle doesn’t bother me much.

Conclusion

This is an easy one to pick a winner–go with the two monitor solution. It’s half the cost and for anything other than video games, it’s a vastly better solution. But you may want to wait six months because there’s a new kind of monitor coming that’s going to be the best of both solutions.

Bonus Option #3: Curved Monitor

I guess I’m not the only one who sees the problem with the two current solutions, because somebody spotted a curved widescreen monitor at CES today. This sure seems to solve both the problems. It gives you a wide space, with room for many applications. But it’s also curved so you won’t have the perspective problem like you do with the 30″ monitors.

This one is made by NEC and is targeting the gaming market, but I’m sure business monitors won’t be far behind. It is an LED monitor and has 2880 x 900 pixels of resolution (2,592,000); that’s less total resolution than either of the other solutions but the pixel placement is laid out much better. If this was available today, I’d happily trade either one of my monitor setups for it.

In fact, I may buy six of them and build myself a digital bubble in my basement. I could open every application on my computer all at once, and simply swivel my chair around when I want to use one. As long as I have a wireless keyboard and mouse at least…