Geeks needed! Computer screens and Tom Toms!

[Kelly Marks]

I am determined to sort out my office. Plan A was 'over Christmas' Plan B is 'before the end of January'.

I read somewhere you waste far less time if you have a bigger computer screen and a friend of mine said she got one that's 30 inches from Dell and it's fantastic. Well they all seem to be fortunes at that size - like over £700.
Can anyone tell me a) is bigger better?
b) can you recommend a good make?

Second question. Some of you may know I have absolutely no sense of direction. So the Tom Tom changed my life. My Tom Tom seems to have developed some sort of alzeimers though and is worse that me nowadays - inspite of updating the software. It's three years old now. Do the machines 'wear out'? Should I buy a new Tom Tom? Or is there anything better I should get?

I'd be grateful for advice!
Kelly

[merryberry]

Hi Kelly,

I have a large computer screen at work, and I do love it and find working on it so much easier than on my smaller 'normal' computer screen which died in a power cut. I can't tell you how much it cost, because I took it from my MD's desk who doesn't so much as turn his computer on and prefers to stick to the pen and paper. ;D (It's a Dell moniter too.)

As far as Tom's Tom's go, I'm not sure. I use mine every day, as I work for an Estate Agent in the Lettings Office. I 'borrowed' mine from my husband and we have never updated it, but it is still going strong after 6 or 7 years, apart from when I head towards Truro and it considers I am driving across a field - which I may well be!

Sorry not to have been much help, but Happy New Year anyway!

Oh, and as you can tell my the user name, Mouse and Maisy have two new friends! - One with the help of Dan Wilson! ;D

[petethebee]

Hi Kely,
I have used a Tom Tom for a good number of years both here and in various continental countries. The same one but updated every so often. It works as well now as it did when I first had it. You don't have an intermittent power supply lead to it or a duff battery do you? I assume it has developed a fault and that it has worked O.K. in the past.
Other than that you could contact TomTom themselves on the website and ask advice.
Cheers
Pete

[outoftheblue]

My satnav is about four years old and it has gradually become less reliable. Is it planned obselence?

[Kelly Marks]

Thanks (so far) guys hmm...

[Kayti]

a 30" screen is very very large. For a screen this size you "should" consider your personal H&S ie. how you are seated, distance from the screen, height of the screen etc. To put it in perspective, that is bigger than most peoples TV's were 5 - 10 years ago and look how far we were advised to sit from those.

I work in a manufacturing company and our CAD Engineers (computer aided design) who work on circuit board design for example and our programmers manage on 20", 22" and a few, very rare few have 24" screens. Others claim that 2 x 20" screens is more than good for accountancy and spreadsheet work. We use Dell but have also used HP and Iiyama without any problems.

There are very few manufacturers of flatscreen components, particularly the screen itself, you are paying for the assembly and the badging, so they are much of a muchness these days - same as the PC's & laptops. For anything under 24" it doesn't make a huge amount of difference who you buy from. Most monitors are wide screen now as well so that gives the impression of more space on the screen

It is better to spend the extra money on a good, long warranty so that if it does go wrong, you can send it back or get it repaired. For business level monitors, desktop, laptops, printers etc these items are viewed as consumables and we do find that the items do fail within 6 - 12 months of their warranty, rarely before. Having said that, we have items that long outlasted their warranty by many years not months!

The best advice is to head out to an electrical shop and compare screen sizes for yourself. Then have a shop around on line once you know what it is you actually want

:-)

p.s. no idea on satnav - i still find map reading an exciting way to live on the edge :-)

[bertie666]

Didnt you get an iphone a while back Kelly? By the TomTom App and holder and you are away ;D

www.tomtom.com/en_gb/products/mobile-navigation/tomtom-car-kit-for-iPhone/

[☺Smithy☺]

Kelly have you tried recharging the battery? I thought ours had died, tried to use it and nothing.Put it on charge and it worked perfect.Maybe if you don't use them often enough they need to be charged.

[Furiey]

I am currently using this computer on a 32" HD TV. It's very nice, but I am sat halfway across the room - it would be far too large to sit at desk distance and use.

What do you mainly use the computer for? Do you want to get more on the screen for the same size information or do you want it to be bigger so you can see it easier.

As far as resolution goes, 1620 x 1080 is high definition if you want to watch HD movies. This will allow you to get alot of info on your screen. A lower resolution will give less information on the same size screen.
If you use moving images you will want a fast refresh rate or you may get blurring, they seem to be either 2ms (faster) or 5ms now though, either of which would be ok.
22" (widescreen) is probably the most you will want on a desk.
If you do a lot of spreadsheet work you may want 2 monitors so that you can have the spreadsheet open on one and do other things on the other.
BUT, check what your graphics card can do and what monitor connections your computer has - getting a monitor with HDMI or DVI will do no good if your computer has not got that connection.
You certainly do not have to pay £700 - here's a link to DABS that will show you the sort of thing available then you can shop around and see where things are cheapest.

www.dabs.com/search?q=%22Monitors%22%2022%22%20Monitor

(ignor the firt item listed - it's a filer not a monitor, the list is sorted from low to high price to give you an idea of the range)

My normal monitor (not the HDTV) is a 19" non widescreen 2ms Samsung and I find it very good, no stuck pixels at all.

Happy shopping!