3 x monitor advice

shedz · Mar 31, 2016

I know there's a lot of threads about monitors, but times changes along with monitors..
So, I'm hoping to buy 3 x monitors this weekend for hopefully less than £1K.

I have a GTX980ti video card, currently running a single 28 inch 4K monitor.

I'm looking for 3 x 24 inch 1K monitors, with thin bevels and preferably nvidia gsync.
I will also need a stand for them, the stand will need to be able to swivel and raise the monitors up/down, also it will need to be able to be pushed back to the wall and pulled to the front of my desk.

I'm in the UK, so it will have to be UK suppliers.

I'd appreciate any help you can give.

Pär Öqvist · Mar 31, 2016

Do you mean 1080p monitors?

shedz · Mar 31, 2016

I think 1080p would be best for 3, unless the 980ti can handle more?

shedz · Mar 31, 2016

Acer Predator 24" 144hz Gsync £385

Asus 24" 144hz NO Gsync £220

Would anyone recommend either of those?

Azfalt Raser · Mar 31, 2016

I have Asus 23" 1ms gaming monitors.
Personally, I would look at narrow bezel 27" 1080p monitors, if I didn't want the 980ti.
17-28fps in pCars (on low) pretty much showed me I need a gpu before monitors.

Still, the 27" monitors, you can experiment more with fov. With my 23" monitors, I have to sacrifice vertical fov to get the proper view. just my opinion.

Hope the Spa tips helped out.

shedz · Mar 31, 2016

Hi @Azfalt Raser Yeah thanks for the tips, really appreciated the help

I'll take a look at 27" monitors then, I take it 1080p on a 27" wouldn't look too bad?

Azfalt Raser · Mar 31, 2016

shedz said:
Hi @Azfalt Raser Yeah thanks for the tips, really appreciated the help
I'll take a look at 27" monitors then, I take it 1080p on a 27" wouldn't look too bad?

Very glad. I noticed you were hitting all but 2 apexes on the button

and your speed was very good. Just those 2 corners.....

I guess it really depends on your budget.
I must be nutz! I built a dedicated, crossfired, pc for FPS games - until I discovered sim racing.
Now, I'm building a mini-pc dedicated strictly for sim racing (i7,mITX mobo, 980ti gpu), so I'll have to forego the monitor upgrades right now.

The common complaint for 27" 1080p monitors.....may look a little grainy (bigger pixels than youre used too on the 4k monitor or 23/24" 1080p monitor). But once you start driving, that "look" goes away from the motion. I had the same thing on my 46" 1080p. The pixels were HUGE, but once I started driving, I didn't see it at all - thankfully.

1080p only if you don't want to turn down quality for a higher resolution 27" monitors. I don't believe a 980ti can drive 3 x 4k monitors by itself and keep good fps and high quality settings.
And having a 980ti for low settings.....just doesn't seem right.

Also, you have to be careful. Most/if not all narrow bezel 27" monitors have a thick bottom bezel. For some reason, some of them do not sit flush when set side by side due to the thicker bottom bezel. Someone showing off their sim rig, on youtube, pointed that out, so they had to overlap their monitor bezels to get rid of the gap. Personally, I don't like to overlap my my bezels....just me.

Good luck on/off the virtual track!

shedz · Mar 31, 2016

That's all great info Danny, many thanks. I'll keep looking round

Wicked · Mar 31, 2016

You can also go the middleground and get 1440p panels (2560x1440).
Perhaps 25 inches like the Dell U2515H, it's a relatively cheap, 25inch 1440p IPS panel, good colors. Great panel all around. Bezels seem alright. I own the P2414H and while the bezels aren't thin it works fine for me. But if you are looking for ultra thin bezels perhaps you want to look at something else. You'll have to decide that for yourself.

Or go for 1440p 27inch. You have a good middle ground between 1080p pixelated and 2160p you can't run. At 3x1440p you probably need to turn some settings down on more heavy games in order to maintain 60fps. 1080p would still look fine. More pixels is always better of course but it comes at a cost.

Take a look at https://pcmonitors.info/
Those guys have extremely indepth articles on everything you ever want to know about monitors. They also have a load of recommendations for people looking at monitors. Nothing specific for Simracing but I'm sure it will be useful to you.

Also, 1080p is not 1K because it's 1/4th of 4K, it doesn't work like that. 4K is a broad marketing term, there is a lot of variant of 4K. Just throwing that out there

Emery · Mar 31, 2016

Biggest problem I have with triples in 27" is getting them close enough so the rearview mirror & all instruments are visible inside taller cars (e.g. stockcars) when setting a realistic FOV. I can only imagine it is worse with 24" monitors. Fortunately we have HUDS and virtual mirrors, but they're not the greatest for immersion.

Yeah that tip about the bottom bezel is worthwhile. My monitors are ever so slightly wider there, so I've filled the gap with black electrical tape.

Make sure the monitor specs have a high dynamic range so the blacks are a range of grey to black and the whites are a range of grey to white instead of washing out. If you're getting g-sync monitors, I doubt it will be problem.

shedz · Mar 31, 2016

Wicked said:
Or go for 1440p 27inch. You have a good middle ground between 1080p pixelated and 2160p you can't run. At 3x1440p you probably need to turn some settings down on more heavy games in order to maintain 60fps. 1080p would still look fine. More pixels is always better of course but it comes at a cost.

Thanks @Wicked that really helps. So really I'm looking at 25/27" 1440p, sounds good.

Emery said:
Make sure the monitor specs have a high dynamic range so the blacks are a range of grey to black and the whites are a range of grey to white instead of washing out. If you're getting g-sync monitors, I doubt it will be problem.

@Emery Good point, I'll bear that in mind, thanks.

And now I'm thinking about 35" curved ultra wide, there's too many damn options!

PoisonHeadcrab · Apr 1, 2016

Have you considered a VR headset like Oculus Rift or Vive instead? At this point in time one might argue VR is already more immersive, fun and even more competitive in sim racing than a triple monitor setup, and it's certainly well below your budget.

shedz · Apr 2, 2016

Yep I did consider that, but I'm not really into it yet, I'm going wait until it's matured some.

Zero7159 · Apr 3, 2016

I went with three 27 inch Dell S2715h IPS 60 hz monitors with my SLI'd 970 GPUs and they are great. Very smooth, plenty of eye candy in all sims. I personally think the performance of the 144 hz and gsync monitors does not justify the significant cost increase over traditional 60 hz monitors.

tnguyen2905 · Apr 7, 2016

I would highly recommend 27 inch monitors with thin bezel, as 24 I feel is too small. If you're wanting 144hz monitors that could get expensive real fast. 27 inch 144hz monitors with gsync is expensive. If the frames are more important to you than you could get 24 inch 144hz monitors at around 250 a piece. I have a single 24 Asus 144hz monitor and its very nice but I use it for first person shooters and regular use. I have triple BENQ 27' GW2760hs monitors and I like it a lot. the bezels are very thin and it runs at 60 frames (which is fine by me).

shedz · Apr 7, 2016

Thanks for all the info, but I ended up getting the x34 predator.
In the end I couldn't be bothered with the 3 screen shenanigans, as I use this PC for work too.

Well happy with the x34 I have to say. No doubt 3 screens would be more immersive, but the x34 is pretty immersive to me, the sense of speed is amazing, and running at 3440x1440 means I can crank everything up.

Dan Costa · Apr 7, 2016

Hi op

I would follow these guidelines:

> 24" if 1080P (even at 24" the image quality is quite strange at this resolution)
< 27" if 1440P

On performance:

My single 290X (albeit, very overclocked), can handle 6400x1440P with AC, PCars, R3E at 60fps with almost all settings maxed or high.