New monitor = huge amounts of screen real estate....

[Othgar]

Just got my new "monitor" a 40" Sony Bravia 1080p , now I have so much screen space I have no idea what to do with it all. Anyone have any suggestions or recommendations on a UI or setting up a UI on that size screen? I'm still playing at 1920x1080 resolution, but my old UI's all look so spread out and I have no idea where to start on a new one with this much screen to work with.

If anyone has any experience playing on a screen this large that could give me some advice I'd be very grateful.

Sorry if I stuck this in the wrong spot but I wasn't really sure where to put it.

[Nibelheim]

Originally Posted by Othgar Just got my new "monitor" a 40" Sony Bravia 1080p , now I have so much screen space I have no idea what to do with it all. Anyone have any suggestions or recommendations on a UI or setting up a UI on that size screen? I'm still playing at 1920x1080 resolution, but my old UI's all look so spread out and I have no idea where to start on a new one with this much screen to work with. If anyone has any experience playing on a screen this large that could give me some advice I'd be very grateful. Sorry if I stuck this in the wrong spot but I wasn't really sure where to put it.

A few years back I ran into a similar issue, I moved into my brother's house for a long while and started to do half my WoW gaming in his lounge-room on the big screen. It's at that time I had to move away from having my Unit Frames in the top-left corner

First idea was to use a HuD, as that way all the information I'd need was at the center of my screen. So I continued to evolve it over the years into RealUI.

Take a look at IceHUD, it's very customizable and may help you get more information closer to where you're looking. Other than that, all the standard addons can be configured quite well and be placed anywhere on the screen you like. The key is to minimize the amount of movement your eyes need, and to try and get all the necessary information in an easily viewable field of view, and get all unnecessary information out of the way.

Another trick you can use is to "shrink" your UI size. You can do this via macro, such as "/run UIParent:SetHeight(800); UIParent:SetWidth(1600)"

[Dolby]

Play in windowed mode and keep wowinterface open on one side of the screen. Thats what I do.

[Othgar]

Originally Posted by Dolby Play in windowed mode and keep wowinterface open on one side of the screen. Thats what I do.

I keep wowinterface open on my 23" but I still play in fullscreen. DX11 and crossfire don't like windowed mode

[Othgar]

Originally Posted by Nibelheim A few years back I ran into a similar issue, I moved into my brother's house for a long while and started to do half my WoW gaming in his lounge-room on the big screen. It's at that time I had to move away from having my Unit Frames in the top-left corner First idea was to use a HuD, as that way all the information I'd need was at the center of my screen. So I continued to evolve it over the years into RealUI. Take a look at IceHUD, it's very customizable and may help you get more information closer to where you're looking. Other than that, all the standard addons can be configured quite well and be placed anywhere on the screen you like. The key is to minimize the amount of movement your eyes need, and to try and get all the necessary information in an easily viewable field of view, and get all unnecessary information out of the way. Another trick you can use is to "shrink" your UI size. You can do this via macro, such as "/run UIParent:SetHeight(800); UIParent:SetWidth(1600)"

I've been using IceHUD for a while now on my DK since I do alot of arenas with her. This is what I have now:



It still works pretty well but it just seems bulky I guess. I haven't edited anything yet... I know the fonts need to change and I should probably scale some stuff down too. But I got home from work and just had to play on it for a while lol

I'll give the shrinking trick a try in the morning when I log back in. Thanks.

[Aftermathhqt]

Originally Posted by Othgar Just got my new "monitor" a 40" Sony Bravia 1080p , now I have so much screen space I have no idea what to do with it all. Anyone have any suggestions or recommendations on a UI or setting up a UI on that size screen? I'm still playing at 1920x1080 resolution, but my old UI's all look so spread out and I have no idea where to start on a new one with this much screen to work with. If anyone has any experience playing on a screen this large that could give me some advice I'd be very grateful. Sorry if I stuck this in the wrong spot but I wasn't really sure where to put it.

Try my UI, works perfect for 1920x1080

[aceman67]

First thing you should do with your new Bravia, is see if its covered under the Recall notice that Sony released yesterday.

http://www.sony.ca/view/press_1048.htm

[Ither]

Such a shame to see 40 inches of real estate get unused--I've got a 30" Dell Ultrasharp U3011 that runs 2560x1600--LOVE it.

Go look at my UI, it should help you and not clutter the crap out of a large screen.

http://www.wowinterface.com/download...7-CalaiUI.html

[Othgar]

@Game92: My old UI worked perfect at 1920x1080 too lol but with this much screen it seems a little spread out and kind of bulky. I really need to centralize everything, to keep me from having to turn my head away from the center of my screen too much.

@aceman67: Thanks for the link. I just checked it, looks like I'm good. but at least if I come home and find a hole burnt in my TV I can tell sony that they may need to extend their recall.

@TheGeek: Same thing with your UI, it's just not as centralized as I want really. 40 inches of monitor is a lot of screen to look over for a bottom heavy UI. Both your UI and Game92's probably would have been great on my 23" screen. Alhough in all honesty I would rather build my own. No offense to you guys or your UIs, they're both awesome looking. I agree with Nibelheim though, for combat I need to keep everything centralized and easily viewable. Don't need a neck injury from looking from one edge of my screen to another lol.

Thanks for all the suggestions guys!

[haylie]

Actually, with that amount of screen real estate you could probably get away with pretty much anything. Just make sure all the vital information is either on each side of your character or right under his feet. Maybe with a reduced opacity so as to not obstruct the view too much. Anything else can be safely tucked away in corners.

Maybe something like this:
http://www.wowinterface.com/forums/a...5&d=1284071396

I used that right before I quit. I think it was pretty centered, and, like you, I hated having to move my eyes around to find what I needed. Just to give you an idea

[Othgar]

Originally Posted by haylie Actually, with that amount of screen real estate you could probably get away with pretty much anything. Just make sure all the vital information is either on each side of your character or right under his feet. Maybe with a reduced opacity so as to not obstruct the view too much. Anything else can be safely tucked away in corners. Maybe something like this: http://www.wowinterface.com/forums/a...5&d=1284071396 I used that right before I quit. I think it was pretty centered, and, like you, I hated having to move my eyes around to find what I needed. Just to give you an idea

That one's not bad haylie. I think (since I just got a free day off from work WOOT! lol) I'm going to play around today and see what I can come up with. I''ll throw up some screenies later if I get anything good going.

[SDPhantom]

Originally Posted by Dolby Play in windowed mode and keep wowinterface open on one side of the screen. Thats what I do.

That's what I use dual monitors for, lol

Although rarely, but it happens that I have the need for a 3rd monitor.... hmm. Is it possible for SLI/Crossfire-linked cards to have both of their outputs used at the same time?

[Othgar]

Originally Posted by SDPhantom That's what I use dual monitors for, lol Although rarely, but it happens that I have the need for a 3rd monitor.... hmm. Is it possible for SLI/Crossfire-linked cards to have both of their outputs used at the same time?

hmmm not too sure, I just automatically hooked one monitor to each card but now that you mention it I'll have to try it out.

[Nobgul]

I actually use a 60 inch lcd as my monitor. I use stormcali's ui works well.
http://www.wowinterface.com/download...7-CalaiUI.html

[Othgar]

Originally Posted by Nobgul I actually use a 60 inch lcd as my monitor. I use stormcali's ui works well. http://www.wowinterface.com/download...7-CalaiUI.html

holydamnlawl! l I don't even know what I'd do with a 60" monitor! I think I'm good with my 40 for now. Although my girlfriend did mention something about a 42" touchscreen that may or may not be in my none too distant future. I'm thinking it's going to be a choice for paint on my car or the touch screen, since last I knew my new paint job was going to be a christmas present.

Right now I'm playing around with RealUI and tweaking it, changing out some stuff and moving stuff around. It's well centered and works really well for PvP although I haven't tried it in arenas yet. I did have an oUF layout I was working a few months ago that I might pick up again though since the main reason I gave it up was that it took up a pretty large piece of screen, that is of course if I can remember what I was doing with it, or even what I did with the files lol

[Talyrius]

Originally Posted by Othgar Don't need a neck injury from looking from one edge of my screen to another lol.

If you have to move your head to look at another part of the screen then you're sitting too close to it.

[vivianalive]

Gratz you've got a screen larger then mine.
You know you can just spoil your empty space, and...

[SDPhantom]

Originally Posted by Othgar hmmm not too sure, I just automatically hooked one monitor to each card but now that you mention it I'll have to try it out.

Some cards have a VGA and a DVI port and some have 2 DVI ports. Anyway, I have a single card, a monitor hooked up to each port, and I'm running the card in extended desktop mode. If I wanted to, I can hook a TV through the S-Video to act as a 3rd monitor, but the picture quality would be horrible. I suppose this would be different if my card had a HDMI port and I had an HDTV.

[Othgar]

Originally Posted by ForeverTheGM If you have to move your head to look at another part of the screen then you're sitting too close to it.

Actually it was on overstatement, I don't actually need to move my head to see all of my screen. But I also don't want to have to move my eyes any farther from the center of my screen than I absolutely need to. After all my attention span has been known to shorten dramatically on short notice if I happen to see something shiny. So the less likely I am to look away the more likely I am to focus lol

Originally Posted by vivianalive Gratz you've got a screen larger then mine. You know you can just spoil your empty space, and...

lol that's kind of what I'm ending up with. But I like the empty space, and clear screen when I'm not in combat.

Originally Posted by SDPhantom Some cards have a VGA and a DVI port and some have 2 DVI ports. Anyway, I have a single card, a monitor hooked up to each port, and I'm running the card in extended desktop mode. If I wanted to, I can hook a TV through the S-Video to act as a 3rd monitor, but the picture quality would be horrible. I suppose this would be different if my card had a HDMI port and I had an HDTV.

Yeah my cards have DVI, and HDMI ports on both. It did work pretty well when I hooked both monitors to one card. I did notice a little bot of an FPS drop in some games but not in WoW. Probably because it's more CPU heavy than other games.

[SDPhantom]

Originally Posted by Othgar Yeah my cards have DVI, and HDMI ports on both. It did work pretty well when I hooked both monitors to one card. I did notice a little bot of an FPS drop in some games but not in WoW. Probably because it's more CPU heavy than other games.

It's actually the card's GPU or RAMDAC most of the time, not sure where the problem is exactly. Most if not all cards only support full power hardware rendering on the primary display. If a game is pushed to a secondary display and/or rendered on multiple displays, the framerate suffers.