KVMs and ultra-wide displays and working-from-home, oh my!
May 10, 2020 3:51 PM Subscribe
I want to upgrade my home office desk with a KVM switch so I can use one keyboard/mouse/screen for both my personal PC and my work laptop. While I'm changing things, I also want to upgrade at least one display on my personal PC, which I'd then share with my work laptop via the KVM. I haven't properly researched new monitors in close to 15 years. And of course I have relatively particular needs and I'm not sure how to balance them.
I'm a software developer who does CAD and design/visual art as a part of my assigned duties (and all of the above for fun, off the clock, too). I'm also a bit of a gamer, though I play more simulators than twitchy first-person shooters. Right now, I have a display setup that I mostly like: one Dell 2407WFP and two Dell U2414Ms. All three are 24" 1920x1280 displays, and they're mounted on a stand, the 2407WFP in the center in landscape with the two U2424Ms in portrait to the left and right.
Due to my company's entirely-understandable IT policies, I can't touch work data from my personal computer. I've been working from home from my kitchen table, using an extra keyboard/mouse and the laptop on a stand. It works, but it's not great. I only have one display (laptop has a 15" 4K display, which is nice, but small), and besides, it requires a significant amount of tear-down to use the kitchen table for eating at lunch and dinner every workday.
I'd like to get a KVM switch such that I can set up the laptop on my desk, and then switch the USB devices (keyboard, mouse, webcam, audio), and center monitor between my personal machine and work machine. This would allow me to use my ergonomic setup for work, and clear off the kitchen table!
Of course, I can't let it be that simple: I am definitely looking at high-update-rate, ultrawide, maybe curved, monitors. Color is more important to me than raw refresh rate, so I'm pretty sure I'm looking at IPS. I know I want at least as much vertical size and pixel density as I have now, so 1440P if not full UHD/4k. I play enough games that I'd like to have 120+Hz options on the table. At my work desk, I connected my laptop to a Samsung 4k60 28" display, which was nice enough, but a bit shite as a monitor in terms of color quality and etc -- not something I'd pay for, given the choice. Most of the resources I can find online assume that if you want a high-end display, you're using it almost entirely for games, and while I do play games and want a monitor that's good for games, "high refresh rate" and "big pretty curved screen" are secondary to "good color reproduction" and "something I can stand to write code and do design on many hours a week."
Two big questions I don't know enough to answer, but would like to:
I'm a software developer who does CAD and design/visual art as a part of my assigned duties (and all of the above for fun, off the clock, too). I'm also a bit of a gamer, though I play more simulators than twitchy first-person shooters. Right now, I have a display setup that I mostly like: one Dell 2407WFP and two Dell U2414Ms. All three are 24" 1920x1280 displays, and they're mounted on a stand, the 2407WFP in the center in landscape with the two U2424Ms in portrait to the left and right.
Due to my company's entirely-understandable IT policies, I can't touch work data from my personal computer. I've been working from home from my kitchen table, using an extra keyboard/mouse and the laptop on a stand. It works, but it's not great. I only have one display (laptop has a 15" 4K display, which is nice, but small), and besides, it requires a significant amount of tear-down to use the kitchen table for eating at lunch and dinner every workday.
I'd like to get a KVM switch such that I can set up the laptop on my desk, and then switch the USB devices (keyboard, mouse, webcam, audio), and center monitor between my personal machine and work machine. This would allow me to use my ergonomic setup for work, and clear off the kitchen table!
Of course, I can't let it be that simple: I am definitely looking at high-update-rate, ultrawide, maybe curved, monitors. Color is more important to me than raw refresh rate, so I'm pretty sure I'm looking at IPS. I know I want at least as much vertical size and pixel density as I have now, so 1440P if not full UHD/4k. I play enough games that I'd like to have 120+Hz options on the table. At my work desk, I connected my laptop to a Samsung 4k60 28" display, which was nice enough, but a bit shite as a monitor in terms of color quality and etc -- not something I'd pay for, given the choice. Most of the resources I can find online assume that if you want a high-end display, you're using it almost entirely for games, and while I do play games and want a monitor that's good for games, "high refresh rate" and "big pretty curved screen" are secondary to "good color reproduction" and "something I can stand to write code and do design on many hours a week."
Two big questions I don't know enough to answer, but would like to:
- How is visual art and code on a curved-screen monitor? I used to work with some IT folks who used ultrawide/curved displays at work, and liked them, but they weren't primarily writing code. I think I have a slight bias away from curved screens, but I'm really not sure. If your use case is anything like mine, what display did you end up with?
- Given I'm looking at big monitors with high refresh rates, what on earth do I do about the KVM situation? Looks like StarTech and a few others make DP1.2 KVM switches that can do 4k60, but they don't support higher refresh rate (I know 4k120 is out there, and I have no idea where the super/ultrawide 1440P displays fall in terms of DP bandwidth requirements). One potential option would be to use a KVM switch for the USB peripherals, and make sure whatever display I purchase has at least two DP inputs, so I can switch between home PC and work laptop that way. More buttons to press when changing modes, but avoids the "nice monitor hobbled by crappy KVM" problem, and would let me buy a less expensive/less capable KVM... I have overthought the heck out of this and have not come up with any satisfactory conclusions, so I'm curious what input you all have!
For what it's worth, some monitors have built-in KVM features, e.g.: https://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-monitors/#a-very-big-screen-32-inch-4k-monitor
posted by bfields at 4:13 PM on May 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by bfields at 4:13 PM on May 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
The best thing I bought this year was a 32" 4k monitor. It's great for programming, allowing me to view 4 source code files side by side with a readable font size. This means I don't need a second monitor, and I can use my work laptop's screen for email/chat.
(The monitor was a discontinued HP Omen bought from Costo for about $300.)
posted by monotreme at 4:33 PM on May 10, 2020
(The monitor was a discontinued HP Omen bought from Costo for about $300.)
posted by monotreme at 4:33 PM on May 10, 2020
Response by poster: If bfields' Dell pick was a 100Hz+ monitor, I'd be ordering it Right Now. Seems like I may just be caught in the midst of perfect-vs-satisficing angst considering $1k-ish is a big gear expense, especially given current economic uncertainties. Then again, maybe high refresh rate is what I should accept sacrificing, since it checks all the other boxes. Thoughts?
posted by Alterscape at 4:51 PM on May 10, 2020
posted by Alterscape at 4:51 PM on May 10, 2020
I would get a flat panel if you work in design. Most people don’t have curved panels, and you should design for most people.
posted by oceanjesse at 8:48 PM on May 10, 2020
posted by oceanjesse at 8:48 PM on May 10, 2020
This thread is closed to new comments.
I use a simple USB switch to control who gets the keyboard/mouse input, and the front panel controls of the monitors to select their input. Linux loses and only has one monitor, but I have two monitors for each of the Windows use cases.
I can even "cheat" it a bit. If I am letting Linux take one of the windows normally intended for Windows 10, I can use the Keyboard short-cut "Shift-WinKey-Arrow" to bring the focused Window (the one highlighted in the task bar) back to a different monitor than it opened in originally.
I usually only switch between modes when I start the work day, at lunch and at end of work day, so I value flexibility over one click switching.
On preview I see that odinsdream has used Synergy which I did also for a while. But I worried (perhaps with no cause, I admit) about data leakage.
posted by forthright at 4:05 PM on May 10, 2020 [1 favorite]