To those with 2+ monitors on your machine: What's your use case, and how much does it actually boost your productivity?
I'm mainly curious about software developers here, or anyone else whose computer is somewhat central to their life, be it professional or hobbyist.
I only have two monitors—one directly in front of me, and another to the right of it, angled toward me. For web development, I keep my editor on the main screen, and anything auxiliary (be that a dev build, a video, StackOverflow, etc.) on the side screen.
I wouldn't mind a third monitor, and if I had one, I'd definitely use it for log/output, since currently it's a floating window that I shuffle around however necessary. It could be smaller than the other two, and I might even turn it vertical so I could split the screen between output and a terminal, configuring a AutoHotKey script to focus the terminal.
Gaming: I have a game that has tons of third party software that tracks game elements real-time that are far easier to read, contain more information, and more readily understandable than any in-game menu. So play the game on one monitor, have the apps running in windows on the second one.
3D design. Have the work window open for maximum real estate on one monitor, have pop-out menus and tools on the other for things that maybe don’t have hot keys or shortcuts assigned. Also, a small browser window for “how do I” question when I hit a roadblock.
Ahh, Elite: Dangerous. My pandemic times game. Played that shit almost religiously until Odyssey came out and tanked performance and burned me out of the game. Did manage to go into Sag A* before I stopped playing.
Performance has improved considerably for most. The only downside to that beautiful game is it’s a mile wide and an inch deep. I did all the grinds, bought a carrier, and then kinda quit because there’s nothing to do with it except more of the same. Too bad. As usual, another game where the players all get expectations set by the dev/studio, but the delivery never really gets there and they ignore what the players ask for. Still, a good game.