Ben Roy

The day I got back from India last time (just over two weeks ago), my desktop computer died. I thought it might be the power supply, so I ordered a new one of those. It arrived a couple days later and turned out to not be the problem.

At that point I went ahead and ordered parts for a new computer, which all arrived this afternoon. I got it put together and a fresh copy of Windows 7 installed, and am now blogging from the new machine.

My entire story thus far being tangential, the important detail is that while my computer was down I have been using my laptop exclusively. The number one frustration, which I was more able to clearly recognize once it had been resolved (ie, tonight), was screen real estate.

Hooked up to my desktop I've got two monitors running at 1600x1200. That's a fair bit of space to work with. My laptop is running at a lower resolution than my monitors, and this past week I was running without it hooked up to a second monitor. Frankly, it was debilitating.

Every window that I wanted was stuffed behind some other window. Trying to compare content or selectively copy was nearly impossible. It was a strong lesson of reinforcement of how much productivity is gained by having more and larger monitors. Not that I'd forgotten, but it was so much more poignant when I was able to experience night and day back to back.

All this to say, if you are hobbling along with a single display device (and it's not mammoth), do yourself a favor and upgrade to something very large or add on a second monitor. You will be amazed at how much more effective you can be.