You know, it’s funny.  Most of the time when someone sees my home office set up, they’re pretty impressed.  But believe it or not, I still get the occasional idiot who attempts to mock or ridicule me for using so many screens (4 on one rig and 2 on another).  Well, I don’t usually even dignify idiots like that since any developer out there worth the code he (or she) writes understands the benefits of multiple screens, or multiple machines for that matter.

I have however been asked several times recently since my home office blog posting, what do I typically use this many screens for.  So for those that have actually asked nicely, here’s my typical configuration:

The primary rig has four screens, three 24” Dells and 1 20” Dell on top.  The center and right monitor normally hold Visual Studio with the center one being all code and the one the right having a nicely arranged and docked combination of the tool windows I use.

The monitor on the left is open for application execution, browser, or generally anything else I need.

The smaller one up on top usually has my GMail open, but occasionally is used to watch DNR-TV shows.

With Visual Studio 2010, multi-screens are better than ever because I can undock a code window and move it anywhere I want.

As far as the second machine is concerned (the one with two monitors), it’s set up as a gamer rig but I also have it loaded with all the same dev tools that the main rig has.  I do a lot WCF work so it’s great for testing true machine-to-machine messaging.  It also functions to watch DVDs with and to listen to music.

So now you know.  If it actually still bothers some of you or you think I’m excessive, perhaps you should find another line of work and leave development to the geeks.

Until next time…