Do Big Screens Make Employees More Productive?

prostoalex writes "If your company uses 17" or 19" monitors, 30" monitors will make the employees more productive, Apple-sponsored research says. MacWorld reports: "Pfeiffer's testing showed time savings of 13.63 seconds when moving files between folders using the larger screen — 15.7 seconds compared to 29.3 seconds on the 17-in. monitor — for a productivity gain of 46.45 percent. The testing showed a 65.09 percent productivity gain when dragging and dropping between images — a task that took 6.4 seconds on the larger monitor compared to 18.3 seconds using the smaller screen. And cutting and pasting cells from Excel spreadsheets resulted in a 51.31 percent productivity gain — a task that took 20.7 seconds on the larger monitor versus 42.6 seconds on the smaller screen."" Calling such task-specific speed jolts "productivity gains" seems optimistic unless some measure of overall producivity backs up that claim, but don't mention that on the purchase order request.

Answer is

[MECC (8478)]

"Do Big Screens Make Employees More Productive?"

yes.

Re:Answer is

[Aladrin (926209)]

It isn't really so concrete, though, is it? I'm perfectly happy with my 19". Would a 30" really help? Maybe... If I had a 30", would a 50"? What about a 100"?

Maybe 30" isn't the magic number, either. Maybe 30" is really TOO big and would cut my productivity because I have to constantly move my whole head to view the screen, instead of just my eyes.

I have a 37" LCD HDTV as a monitor at home. (Mainly for games.) I find I have to sit all the way across the room (Like 8' away) in order to properly view the screen. I'd get the same benefit from a ~ 22" screen that is much closer, and there wouldn't be all that wasted room space.

At work, I'm not even sure a 30" screen would fit on my desk... I seriously doubt it would make me more productive.

Also, it's worth noting that the upgrade from 15" to 19" didn't do much for my productivity at work.

Re:Answer is

[tomhudson (43916)]

Two 19" monitors will give you the same flexibility, at a much lower cost point - AND you can angle each viewing area separately. You can't do that with a single screen.

BTW, twin 19" screens are my setup at both home and the office (the home box is set with xinerama off, the work box with it on).

Re:Answer is

[orangeyoda (958347)]

Two moniters is much better than a bigger screen, I currently have four on my work machine, and two at home. My friend projects his home machine through a homecimema setup onto his livingroom wall, it's about 6ft x 4ft , any performance gain is lost on neck pain after trying to find My Computer somewhere near the air vent .

Re:Answer is

[CastrTroy (595695)]

It only helps to have 2 monitors rather than 1 large monitor because the window managers handle 2 monitors much better than 1 large monitor. The maximize feature becomes useless if you're using a 30 inch monitor. Maybe we need new window managers to take advantage of the larger screens. I think the fact that they used Macintosh machines definitely changes the results, because the maximize button doesn't really maximize. WHich makes a lot of sense if you have a 23 inch apple cinema display, but doesn't make much sense if you use a 17 4:3 resolution monitor.

Re:Answer is

[TheRaven64 (641858)]

My laptop has a 15" screen, and at work I plug it into a 23" display. Here, I've had the opportunity to work with a machine that has dual 30" displays. I am a lot more productive on the 23" screen; more so than I was when I used to run two 19" monitors at home.

Using one large monitor is a lot better than using two smaller ones. You have a lot more flexibility than with two; you can split it into two uneven parts, or three different sections more easily. I often have code I'm writing, documentation I'm writing, and documentation I'm reading open, for example. Two things really help:

1. Exposé. Switching windows quickly without it is a pain. It isn't needed as much on larger screens though.
2. The zoom button working correctly on OS X. I don't ever want a window to take up the entire screen. If I did, I wouldn't bother with a multitasking GUI. I want it to grow to the optimal size to contain the contents.

I am a bit surprised that this comes from Apple, because one area where OS X scales badly in terms of screen size is the menu bar. OPENSTEP managed much better here by having the right mouse button pop up the application menu under the mouse wherever you were, making invoking the menu an O(1) operation (rather than O(n) in terms of screen height on OS X).

Re:Maximized windows is an anti-pattern

[Tim Browse (9263)]

In fact, I'd say, that the decision to maximize in a limited display is a sign that they're not so dumb after all.

Well that's nice. I'm sick of hearing about how maximised windows are stupid and useless, and how I just don't understand. People who still say that never seem to imagine this scenario: I'm about to do some programming for a few hours. I don't want to see anything else while I do that, so I'd rather I get to maximise, e.g. Visual Studio and block out everything else. But according to these people, I should not maximise my window, but leave other apps visible so I can drag and drop between them, or just not use the whole screen area because it in some way offends their sensibilities. (Newsflash to these geniuses: you can still drag and drop to other apps from a maximised app - try hovering over the Windows task bar while dragging sometime).

But then, some people can't bear the fact that the way they work might not be the super optimal best way of working for everyone else, and so decide not to accept it. Personally, I use Windows on a two monitor system (which I find does help my productivity compared to a single monitor, thanks), maximise apps often, and use Alt-Tab to context switch, often so fast that people watching can't follow what I'm doing. Is the best way for my Dad to work? Probably not. Sure, I'll point out alternative working models to people, but that doesn't mean it's easiest for them. The Mac desktop model usually drives me mad, with hard drives/CDs hiding behind all the other windows, etc., but lots of Mac users love it. So what? People are different. Film at 11.

On the other hand, having a 23" HD format monitor now makes me question Fitt's Law, which breaks down when the menu is waaay over there.

Me no understand.

Fitt's Law:

The time to acquire a target is a function of the distance to and size of the target.

Surely this explicitly takes into account the menu bar being waaay over there? Or have I misunderstood?

Re:Answer is

[twistedsymphony (956982)]

I think it really depends on the task you doing. For instance:

Dual Monitors:

• Programing/Coding
• some forms of 2D Graphics
• Stock trading
• database development/management
• some forms of word processing
• General Multi Tasking

Basically any scenario where you're doing a lot of side by side comparisons, moving data from one place to another or Channing something on one end and watching the results somewhere else. Multi monitors helps keep you from constantly switching between things.

One Large Monitor

• 3D Graphics
• Gaming
• Media (movies/slide shows etc.)
• Some forms of word processing
• some forms of 2D Graphics
• CAD solidmodeling/drawing

Basically any scenario where you need to do a lot of comparisons of the same object on both a large scale and a small scale, or just getting a large view of something that fills your vision. Any scenario where you're constantly zooming in and zooming out will benefit from a single large monitor by allowing you to leave it mostly zoomed in and using your eyes to move around or change focus to the whole picture instead of your mouse. Games and media benefit from this due to giving you a good immersive feel by filling your vision.

There are other scenarios, and hybrid scenarios: like the gamer who keeps an IM client and stock ticker open or the person who likes to play a movie in the background while they do other work. But the type of display that works "best" changes depending on what you're using it for. Perhaps the best universal scenario would be a 30" main display with a 19" secondary.

I would definitely agree that there's a point of being too big, but I don't think you could associate an actual size with it. 30" might be too big if you're only sitting 20" from it Similarly I've got a projector in my basement that's got a 114" image but I can comfortably use that from my couch 180" away. So size is relative to how far away you're set from the screen.

Re:Answer is

[MobileTatsu-NJG (946591)]

I just wanted to chime in because I think you've got two of them reversed. Where I work, the 3D guys have two monitors and the 2D guys have 30" single monitors. The reason for this is that a 3D app requires having several other apps open. For example, I typically have Photoshop open on one monitor while I have Maya open in the other. I need to be able to get back and forth between them without a lot of minimizing/maximizing. The 2D guys have 30" monitors (Apple, btw.) that run at a very high resolution so they can see all of the pixels they possibly can while they're painting. (It's not uncommon for their paintings to be several thousand pixels wide.) In their case, they rarely have to have more than one app open. I'm more productive with the two smaller monitors and the other department's more productive with the ginormous screen.

Re:Answer is

[im_thatoneguy (819432)]

I think this is going to change dramatically in the coming future. First off, all internal applications (Like unwrapping) in a 3d app can be put into an internal "Sub monitor" so those aren't a problem. With Z-Brush and Modo offering such high quality 3d paint tools I think we're going to see painting on the mesh far more common, resulting in more single monitor applications. The current situation of multiple applications being required is slowly disintegrating.

One thing I can never understand is when people ridicule the idea of a larger monitor (I'm not suggesting parent was, just a standard reaction). I always get incredulous stares even with my 23" and exclamations at its size but I always respond: How productive at work would you be with a TV tray table for a desk? Some how people have been convinced that 17" of work space is all you need! Our "work space" is minuscule even with a 23" screen. I would say 23" is a minimum not a maximum.

Unrelated. This is far less of a problem with windows which only requires one click to switch between applications. The one feature where I feel that Mac OSX seriously lags behind windows is the ease of switching back and forth between two applications. Perhaps apple's survey highlights just how inefficient OSX is for a multi window user. And since this is 90% of what my OS does (the other 9% opening applications in the first place) I think they should focus more on their interface than the trying to solve it with a larger screen.

As a user of a large screen I do think Microsoft and Apple need to add a new feature to OSX and Windows. The half Maximize. There should be two extra buttons on the opposite top side: [Maximize Right][Maximize Left]. The two buttons would quickly resize the window to take up half the screen.

Re:

[hcdejong (561314)]

Two 19" monitors will give you the same flexibility

Close, but not entirely. I've worked with multimonitor setups daily for several years now, I currently use a 21" plus a 14", and have come across several situations where one big monitor is better than two small ones.
- writing documents. With a 21", I can view two entire pages (A4 in my case) side-by-side. On a 19" that's possible in principle, but the zoom factor's not comfortable for long periods. 21" is the minimum size for this to work. The palettes get

Re:Answer is

[mwvdlee (775178)]

I think it all depends on what you do with it.

When doing graphics, you'd probably work better on the largest single monitor you can find.

When programming, two monitors will probably be quite convenient.

Playing a movie on two separate screens wouldn't even compare to a single big screen.

A game will just look enlarged on a larger display, whereas you'd probably get a wider view, and thus more information, on two separate monitors.

And, according to Apple's research, a big screen is pretty good for basic OS/offics tasks.

I'm sure there's more examples that go either way.

Re:Answer is

[Nik13 (837926)]

Actually, I did look at replacing my dual 21" setup for a Dell 30" UltraSharp widescreen LCD (2560x1600). Nice big screen with high resolution and all. Even the price was not too bad as they had it on sale (like 600$ off).

But then I realized I also needed one of the very few DVI dual-link video cards which weren't very cheap back then (over 200$ for the cheapest)

But this thing can't really be shared on a KVM switch easily (find a KVM with dual DVI ports, and preferably with spdif while you're at it - good luck!) Try sharing that between 4 PCs, even if you have the right video cards in each PC. Even such a KVM existed, 4 new special video cards + special KVM would likely cost more than the 30" display!

Needless to say I'm still using my pair of 21's.

Likely, Apple's display would be just as much of a PITA.

re: flexibility of dual displays

[King_TJ (85913)]

I'm actually in a situation at home where I can compare both side-by-side. I have a PC with XP on it running two 20" wide-screen LCD panels, and across the room, I have a new Mac Pro with a Dell 24" LCD display. (Ok, granted, not quite a 30" like they use in this study ... but should be close enough for the purpose.)

Despite having 40" of total space on one system, vs. only 24" on the other, I *still* prefer the single 24" display, all things considered.

The fact that you can angle each viewing area separately is more of a nuisance than a benefit, IMHO. I'm always finding one of the displays gets bumped so it's not sitting right up against the other one, and the gap between screens is distracting. I also find that with dual displays, I tend to want to angle them just slightly inward so they have a slight "wrapping around my viewing area" effect, rather than looking straight on at both of them. But again, that always seems to get bumped out of place if someone wants to play with the controls on one of the panels or whatever.

With dual displays, I'd also be happier if games would start making use of them. As it is, I don't think I've ever gotten a piece of software other than MS Flight Simulator to take advantage of dual monitors. (I recall seeing somebody's instructions for making Quake 3 use dual monitors for a wide-aspect game spanning both of them - but it required software rendering, which made it horribly slow.)

Re:Answer is

[Sax Maniac (88550)]

It depends what you are doing. I |###|do a lot of music editing, and
going to a 24" Dell has been a go|###|dsend. Maximizing a score means
I can see more staves/measures at|###| once, and spend less time scrolling.
If had 2 19" monitors, there woul|###|d be an unpleasant bar right down
the middle of my score, and invar|###|iably that would bisect a measure
which makes things a lot harder t|###|o read.

Multiple monitors, oriented vertically

[frenetic3 (166950)]

One piece I think people skip over is the benefit from rotating certain monitors to be oriented vertically. Most non-media-related computing tasks rely more on the y-axis (emails, code, web pages.); being able to see 100+ lines of code on the screen lets you have a lot more context.

In addition, it helps to be able to maximize multiple windows rather than have one giant screen space and to have to manually resize (or use the clumsy tile windows capability.) If I had one 30" monitor it would drive me nuts; instead I have 3 20" Dell LCDs both at home and at work and it makes a huge difference to be able to maximize two windows on the left and center monitors and to leave the right monitor for email/IM/VMs. (I also usually have about 40-50 windows open at once, which some find strange -- a bunch of python shells, Komodo, Visual Studio, VMware, remote desktop, other text editors and tools, skype, AIM, winamp, photoshop, etc.)

The actually productivity boost comes from not needing to alt-tab, and thus avoiding the concomitant mental context switches; it's great to be able to look at a google search or API reference on one window while actually writing code instead of flipping back and forth and back and forth.

-fren

Re:Answer is

[joss (1346)]

I used to use 2 monitors all the time, I greatly preferred it to
a single large montior for exactly that reason.. also I often
need to use a virtual desktop to configure a server or the like
where anything other than maximised is a massive pain to work with.
However, I've recently switched to a triple monitor setup, and its
far superior to dual monitor. There is a large psychological benefit
to having a single central screen for whatever it is you are meant
to be concentrating on and then having documentation/emails/IM/remote desktops
or low priority tasks switched to the sides.

Re:Answer is

[hcob$ (766699)]

Maybe 30" is really TOO big

Please turn in both your "Geek" and "Man"(if you actually have them) Credentials at the door!

Suprisingly enough...

[Digitus1337 (671442)]

30" screens will also make Apple a lot more money. Funny how that works out.

Re:Suprisingly enough...

[lixee (863589)]

In other news, a study sponsored by Phillip-Morris says smoking makes you look cooler, thus attracting the opposite sex.

why not dual or triple displays?

[Kartoffel (30238)]

I certainly feel more productive on dual screens vs. a single display.

LCDs are also more productive than CRTs, because they free up more desk space for heaping junk, err... I meant, organizing my work.

That depends...

[Overzeetop (214511)]

...on the work your doing, and if it can be partitioned into multiple spaces efficiently. CAD work, it turned out for me, wasn't any more efficient on two screens, but was more efficient on a large widescreen. Since the tools take up a small portion of the screen, a second monitor was mostly unused (unless you count a calendar and email program constantly viewable as useful). A single, large monitor means more drawing data available / more detail shown on the screen, and reduces zooming and panning for operations. If I could drive a 30" from my laptop, I might buy one. I use a 24" WS 'cause it matches my current laptop resolution (seamless transition from work to road use), and it wasn't insanely expensive (30"ers were over $2.5k when I got the 24).

Re:why not dual or triple displays?

[Dare nMc (468959)]

> I'm even considering getting a 3rd screen,

I have dual screens, and synergy [sourceforge.net] mouse/keyboard sharing that makes my laptop behave like the 3rd screen, highly recomended, even gives that extra processing power of a second computer. Also add a tray to stand the laptop up.

Moving files?

[maxwell demon (590494)]

The time I need to type mv file /some/new/destination/ may depend on the size of the keyboard, but surely not on the size of the screen.

Re:Moving files?

[JonathanR (852748)]

Yes, but if you can touch type, you can move your files and read s;asjdpt at tje sa,e to,e...

I don't really care...

[Ibanez (37490)]

...what you all think regarding whether it's truly a jump in productivity or not.

*copies link, sends to boss.*

Idiotic example

[Vengeance (46019)]

Sure, I'll agree that big screens can make one more productive. In fact I'd rather have two big monitors than one attached to my machine. More real estate is a good thing.

But the given example, of dragging and dropping files, has got to be the stupidest thing I've read today, and I'm already at work.

Refer to Amdahl's Law

[DrDitto (962751)]

Apple should refer to Amdahl's Law [wikipedia.org] to see that a 50% speedup of something that only accounts for 1% of your overall time really ain't that big of a deal!

Re:Refer to Amdahl's Law

[The-Bus (138060)]

50% and 1%? So you're saying there's a 51% speedup! Excellent! I'll forward your request right down to purchasing and you'll have two monitors on your desk on Monday. I hope to see 102% improvement!

Signed,

Rich
(your manager)

Depending on what you're doing, yes...

[evilduckie (854758)]

One of my clients, involved in cartography (making maps), showed me his brand new 30" screen and said he had upgraded from 20" because on one single project, he was losing about 25% of his time scrolling around. So I'd have to say it not only made him more productive, but it also eventually paid for itself.

Re:Depending on what you're doing, yes...

[clickclickdrone (964164)]

>cartography (making maps),
Please say that didn't really need explaining.

Re:

[gEvil (beta) (945888)]

I thought it was a fancy way of saying he makes carts...

Re:

[0110011001110101 (881374)]

I thought he took pictures of cars... *damn*, right when my dream job was at my fingertips.. stupid maps!

Re:

[clickclickdrone (964164)]

You should worry, I thought race relations meant you worked for Formula 1, hanging out with the blonde chicks, top drivers, parking the F1 cars after the race, that sort of thing.

Oblig Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

[BMonger (68213)]

Rosencrantz: I don't believe in it anyway.
Guildenstern: What?
Rosencrantz: England.
Guildenstern: Just a conspiracy of cartographers, then?

Re:

[LoudMusic (199347)]

One of my clients, involved in cartography (making maps), showed me his brand new 30" screen and said he had upgraded from 20" because on one single project, he was losing about 25% of his time scrolling around. So I'd have to say it not only made him more productive, but it also eventually paid for itself.

BINGO!

I'm a sys admin for an ad agency. My 15(+/-) artists beg for dual displays or bigger monitors just about every month for this very reason. "If I had a bigger monitor I could get more work done." I h

Monitor Size

[tds67 (670584)]

I spit on this male-sponsored study. Size doesn't matter...it's what you do with it that counts.

Quite a bit more...

[RabidMonkey (30447)]

I ran one monitor at work for a long time (17" - the head IT guy keeps rejecting my request for a 19"). They won't let me put a second video card in my computer, so I threw up a linux box and use X2VNC between them and now I have twice the usable space and I am much more productive, especially when coding or doing trouble tickets. I spend way less time alt-tabbing around looking for my terminal sessions - they're all on one monitor, as well as my browser, etc, leaving my 'work' tools on the other so I can move between easily.

The downsides I see are a) cost and b) people getting a 30" monitor, complaining they can't see anything, and running 800x600. I think that would break my heart and mind a little, but it wouldn't suprise me. People around here still run 800x600 on their 17" monitors, and complain that 1280x1024 is too small.

But, now that I think about it, having a 30" monitor wouldn't necessarily help - when you maximize a window, it fills the whole screen, which still puts you back to alt-tabbing. Maybe a better window manager/gui that you could break the screen in to regions, so that when you maximize a window, it would only fill the top 40% or something. Or the ability to pin windows to a location, os you don't have to maximize them.

I think my point is that more screen real-estate, be it one huge monitor, or 2 (or 3 as I sometimes setup) is very much more useful.

God, I babble a lot.

Re:Quite a bit more...

[JesterXXV (680142)]

so I threw up a linux box

You had to swallow it to smuggle it in, didn't you?

A 30'' monitor at work

[Rik Sweeney (471717)]

would make sneakily watching porn a lot more worthwhile.

Here's a wildcard of an idea

[dbIII (701233)]

moving files between folders ... 15.7 seconds compared to 29.3 seconds on the 17-in. monitor

A GUI is not a suitable environment for everything guys - I've seen so many people stuff about clicking everywhere and sorting by extension when they could just use a very simple command to move things in up to one tenth of the time. Computers are there to do the heavy lifting for us if we just tell them the rules. There are a lot of good uses for big screens and multiple screens - but a glass typewriter version of a filing cabinet is given as the example?

29.3 Seconds?

[shoolz (752000)]

Anybody that takes 29.3 to do a file-copy operation needs treatment for their Parkinson's disease, NOT a bigger monitor.

Not just productivity savings...

[s31523 (926314)]

First, I find 2 or even 3 17-19 inch screens are better than one big one.

In terms of productivity there is a noticeable difference when I work in our lab with one monitor versus at my desk with 2. Especially when debugging code.

For me, however, the savings is more in paper than anything. I used to print requirements, interface documents, reference material, etc. Now with 2 monitors I can maximize the document I need on 1 screen then do the design/code stuff on the other. I have substantially reduced my paper consumption as well as other office supplies like highliters, pens, etc.

I'd like to debunk this 2 screen thing now

[baggins2001 (697667)]

I have spent four-five hours trying to get 2 screens hooked up to my linux system. So far no luck. So I figure I'll spend at least 2 more hours.
I have the 2 screens but so far I haven't been any more productive.
The screen with "Check Signal Cable" bouncing around, isn't really doing me any good right now.

Yes, but so does training

[Overzeetop (214511)]

How many times have you seen a computer user who is constantly picking and clicking with their mouse to do the simplest of tasks? I've seen veteran users select text from where the cursor is to the end of the line with the mouse, then click Edit then Cut, then click the point in the document where they want to paste the text, then click Edit then Paste. Shift-End, Ctrl-X, Click at insertion, Ctrl-V would have saved even the fastest mouse-jockey 15-20 seconds on a very common action. There are hundreds of shortcuts - just learning a dozen will save several minutes in a typical day.

Different tasks require different screen real estate, and sometimes bigger is better. But for office app productivity, the low hanging fruit is training.

The Deeper Issue

[august sun (799030)]

Is anyone else appreciating the rich irony of forwarding a story to your boss about how to marginally improve worker productivity which we all read on /. during business hours*? Because I'm loving it and I'm sure my boss would get a kick out of it as well. Right before he added /. to the verbotten list.

*at least here in the US

SHUT UP!

[wonkavader (605434)]

SHUT UP! Everybody just SHUT UP! This is NOT the time to examine or question these results! This is the time to show your boss this scientific, scholarly article and get him to decide to give you a great honking big expensive Apple screen!

Now Sshhh! Sshhh! Quiet.

Print. Walk to office, walk through door, show boss article, exit through door, walk back to desk, sit down, go back to reading slashdot.

More real estate is the key

[hellfire (86129)]

The article has things oversimplified. It's not a larger monitor that makes you more productive. It's more real estate that makes you more productive. With that 30 inch monitor came a higher resolution. A 30 inch monitor at 800x600 is not much more productive than a 15 incher.

A larger monitor is easier on the eyes, and if it's easier on the eyes, you can make the resolution higher, thus gaining more real estate and being able to put more windows on your screen.

Dual monitors always increase real estate so it's easy to see how they increase productivity. Getting a larger monitor doesn't always increase productivity unless it includes an increase in resolution.

Once again this proves that it's not the size that matters, it's how you use it.

Re:

[xtracto (837672)]

Double the size makes quadruple the cost when it comes to LCD's.

Indeed, that is why I preffered to get 2 17in LCDs instead of one 23. From my perspective I got more "desktop" state for less cash. And also, I can use one screen to show the Running program while the other is holing the IDE or run one program completely maximized and while the other screen has the small apps (winamp, browser, etc etc).

One question I have always asked myself is how does the multiple screen setup works on the multi-desktop envi

Re:

[ben there... (946946)]

He said "higher resolution". So characters would be smaller. Work area would be larger.

You said "higher DPI". So characters would be larger. Work area would be mostly the same, just with big characters that take up some extra space.

Higher resolution != higher DPI. ;-)