TANE dual monitors 144Hz refresh?

[Approach_Medium]

Hi;
I currently run TANE on this system:

MSI p67A Intel i5 2500 @ 3.3Ghz
16GIB DDR3 @ 1600Mhz
GIGABYTE GV-N75TOC-2GI G-SYNC Support GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB 128-Bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 Video Card
Samsung 2494HM 24" monitor

I am considering replacing a very old 15" analog monitor with another 24" similar to or better than the Samsung I now have.
So, my question is whether or not TANE (current version) will support dual monitor operation in full, or are there serious limitations?
If TANE does support dual monitors, can I get good enough performance from the 750 Ti to support decent frame rates on dual monitors?
If I buy a monitor capable of 144Hz refresh, can I run one at that rate, and the other at 60HZ, as the Samsung 2494HM does not support it.
If I can't use 144Hz refresh, will buying a monitor that will support it be a complete waste (until I upgrade the video system), and what about response time?
The Samsung 2494HM is 5ms, but I can buy one that is 1ms and 144Hz. Will that fast response time be a problem if I only run at 60Hz?

At this point, my budget will not allow me to upgrade/replace the entire system, but I could go with the new monitor, so long as it won't require additional immediate upgrades in order to get it to work properly as a dual monitor system.

Thanks

CP

 

[Vostrail]

With a quoted response time of 1ms, this sounds like it is a TN display panel (as opposed to IPS). If that is the case then its narrow viewing angle would make it not well suited to a dual monitor setup, unless you positioned it directly in front of you with your existing (hopefully IPS) display off to one side.

The high refresh rate should not pose a problem in itself, and indeed many such monitors have lower selectable rates (e.g. 60 and 100 Hz). But ultimately it is your video card that will limit your performance. I don't have direct experience with the GTX 750 Ti (I'm sure there are other 750 Ti owners on the forum who can chip in), but whatever frame rates you currently enjoy, I would expect that to be roughly halved if you try 'full' dual monitor operation, by which I assume you mean spreading a full screen image across 2 adjacent 1080p displays. However, you should be able to run multiple windows with, say, Trainz Surveyor running on one screen and Content Manager open on the other, without a significant performance hit.

A 1ms 144Hz display is aimed primarily at the eSports (e.g. first person shooter) gamers, for whom ultra rapid response takes priority over maximum visual quality. For TANE, and with your current set-up, a 60 or 100Hz IPS panel (4-5ms response time) would be a better and most likely less expensive match. But if you really want the full wide-screen experience at a decent frame rate and with good graphics settings, you are probably going to have to upgrade your graphics card when your budget allows.

Just some thoughts.
John

 

[Approach_Medium]

Thanks John;
You helped me out here. I appreciate your technical details. I'll take a look at the two monitors (one is 3ms, the other is the 1ms) and see what they offer. I don't play FPS (or eSports) games, and I do know that the 1ms response monitors are significantly more expensive, so I think you pretty much summed it up for me. I would be best to stick with the type of monitor I now have (which has a good viewing angle) and spending the extra money on a faster video card, or maybe even a whole new system some day. I would assume that going with two separate video cards would not cause the performance hit that splitting the 750 Ti into two HD outputs would. That said, the performance hit using dual video cards would most likely come from the CPU and memory systems.

I also need to balance out my budget between computer upgrades and amateur radio. Either one of these hobbies can run a bank account dry.

Edit: Checking specs, I learned that my Samsung 2494HS is a TN monitor with 5ms response time. I can see that its viewing angle is not all that great, but the monitor is set up directly in front of me. So, if I get an IPS monitor as my 2nd, and put it to one side of the current one, I should be able to take advantage of both types. I expect I would need to keep the refresh rate the same for both monitors while playing a game like TANE, but I don't think that would be an issue.
CP

 

[Vostrail]

I wouldn't bother looking at the 2 video card option as TANE does not currently support the SLI set-up. Assuming that your monitors would both have 1080p (full HD) resolution, then you'd ideally want a graphics card that was deemed 'VR Ready' in order to get decent performance across the dual screens. Cards in this bracket, such as the GTX1070, are not cheap but hopefully prices will start to come down next year.

John

 

[itareus]

I run 4 IIyama monitors from a 3 year old 2gb card (not on my Trainz machine so can't give details at the moment) but it cannot be classed as 'top end'.

But be aware that while Trainz (TANE) can work fine on this setup you cannot realistically use more than one monitor, in as much as you cannot move in game screens to another monitor. However you can have the Launch Menu screen and Content Manager open on a second monitor which is useful when you are working in Surveyor. If you are a content creator and using Blender then 2 monitors are (almost) essential.

Chris M

 

[JCitron]

I run 4 IIyama monitors from a 3 year old 2gb card (not on my Trainz machine so can't give details at the moment) but it cannot be classed as 'top end'.

But be aware that while Trainz (TANE) can work fine on this setup you cannot realistically use more than one monitor, in as much as you cannot move in game screens to another monitor. However you can have the Launch Menu screen and Content Manager open on a second monitor which is useful when you are working in Surveyor. If you are a content creator and using Blender then 2 monitors are (almost) essential.

Chris M

This is the setup I use with T:ANE on my 27-inch Samsung and the browser and other stuff on my smaller and older 23-inch Samsung display.

There was/is an option that I tried once to span across the two displays. This didn't make much of a difference other than make the interface bigger and menus smaller, which in the end made everything more difficult. I suppose it wouldn't be so bad if there wasn't the big gap and bezels between the two monitors as that was a big detractor from the continuous connection between the two screens.

John

 

[Approach_Medium]

I decided on the NEC MultiSync EA244WMI-BK, which is an IPS type monitor. Res is 1920 x 1200 and it has a 5ms response.
I did pay a bit more than I had wanted to, but decided to spend the extra cash to get NEC, which is considered to be one of the better brands with respect to build quality.
I don't know whether I will have the NEC as my 2nd monitor, to the right of the Samsung 2494HM (TN technology), or if I can put the NEC directly in front of me, and have the Samsung off to the right, but angled so that I would still be looking directly at it. That all depends on what the Samsung will look like in that position. I have been experimenting with it today, and realize that its TN technology begins to show its weakness when the angle of view is even slightly off of direct (90 deg). My desktop is actually too small for me to have one monitor directly in front of me and the other off to the right, so even the primary monitor will have to be shifted left. That might work OK, since even if the Sansung shows poor color, so long as it can still display clear text, it might work for me.

As for TANE; it would have been nice if N3V had given us the capability to put the menus in Surveyor onto another monitor, as I often need to close them when I'm working, lest the tool I am working with hits one of them and changes the menu without my realizing it. That has happened to me while working with the Up & Dn terrain tools, so I usually just close the menus while working.
Still, it will be nice to be able to keep Firefox, CM, and other apps open on the 2nd monitor while working in TANE. Of course, I cannot run TANE in Full Screen mode if I want to have access to the other apps I have open, but that isn't a problem in Surveyor.

Since we're talking monitors, can anyone tell me whether I should have VSync set to Full, or None (Half doesn't work for me - too much flicker).

 

[Vostrail]

Regarding VSync, probably the best approach is to try both and see which one works best for you. If your frame rate is always less than the monitor refresh rate (e.g. 40 fps on a 60Hz monitor) then VSync 'Off' is likely to be better. If, however, your typical fps is above the monitor refresh rate, but with occasional dips below, you might get a smoother experience with VSync on. Neither setting will do any harm so go ahead and experiment.

John

 

[JCitron]

You can run T:ANE full screen but windowed so that it has the min-max buttons on the top of the frame. It's the best of both worlds as the application runs the full size of the display, sans the little bit for the frame at the top, with the ability to access the needed applications on a second display.

The topic of redoing the interface to allow us to move the work windows to another monitor, such as the mini-map for example, has come up in the Trainz Dev. The capabilities are there within the game code, however, it has to be implemented and that means some complex rewriting of the interface. It's not that it can't be done, it's just not on the highest priority at the moment.

John

 

[Approach_Medium]

You can run T:ANE full screen but windowed so that it has the min-max buttons on the top of the frame. It's the best of both worlds as the application runs the full size of the display, sans the little bit for the frame at the top, with the ability to access the needed applications on a second display.

The topic of redoing the interface to allow us to move the work windows to another monitor, such as the mini-map for example, has come up in the Trainz Dev. The capabilities are there within the game code, however, it has to be implemented and that means some complex rewriting of the interface. It's not that it can't be done, it's just not on the highest priority at the moment.

John

I was trying to figure out what you meant by "Full screen windowed", but it appears that my only problem is that my Windows 10 taskbar isn't set to hide automatically. If I don't hide the taskbar, then TANE isn't really full screen. It will not automatically hide the Windows taskbar when maximized. Other apps, such as VLC media player will do that, but it is then true full screen mode, and not windowed. If TANE would allow switching in and out of full screen mode from within the game, that would be more useful. But I guess I'll have to live with what I've got. It's not really an issue - just one of those little things.