It’s been said that the most sound investment is Real Estate … the same seems to be true when using Apple’s Aperture. A little extra screen real estate can make your experience even more pleasurable.
How do I know? Well, I just took delivery of a 30″ Apple Cinema Display a few days ago. I bought this monitor in anticipation of receiving my new MacPro, which I’ll probably have by the time you read this.
I’ve been using a 23″ Apple Cinema Display for about 4 years now and I really thought 23″ was enough. That was till I tried a 30″ running Aperture. I had actually intended to leave the 30″ in the box till the MacPro arrived … but I just couldn’t wait (like a kid on Christmas morning).
So after two days of using the 30″ monitor I can say that it makes a HUGE difference, even when compared to a reasonably large monitor like the 23″. It is so nice to have everything on the screen at once with nothing overlapping or hiding next to scroll bars.
When you are making your Aperture shopping list you need to start with a nice graphics card, enough RAM and a fast/large hard drive but don’t forget to invest in some screen real estate. You can work in Aperture on a 15″ monitor, but it is so much sweeter on a big screen!
Next week I’m sure I’ll be blogging about running Aperture on a MacPro :)
Until next time,
Keep shooting.
Allen Rockwell
Allen Rockwell Photography
I recently picked up a Macbook Pro core 2 Duo 15". I walked in wanting to purchase a 17" and the Apple Salesperson listen to my needs and recommended the 15" for portability and a 23" HD for realestate. I admit I looked at that 30" for a long time and the Macbook Pro can handle it with Dual SLI but that is one LARGE monitor. Not even my HD TV is that large! Also you need to look at your desk space.. You do mouse a lot with a 23" and I can't image what it would be like on a 30". Then again I'm not making a living at Photograpy, it's simply a hobby. In Aperture I but the help files and printer monitor and paletes over on the 15" Macbook Pro display. It works out rather nice. Maybe when I order my Macpro I'll get a 30". I will say this, the 23" is very nice for playing World of Warcraft!
I'm running 2 Dell 20" Widescreens and so far its worked great.
Although i was in an Apple store the other day, and saw a Mac Pro running Aperture with a 30". It was *very* nice :)
I use a 23" for my main display, and a 20" Mitsubishi Diamondton for my second display.
Aperture works great with two displays -- I agree that two are better than one, no matter what the size of the first.
It may be tempting to use a much cheaper monitor for your second one (we used to call the state-of-the-art-minus-one monitor the "palette monitor"), but if they'll be side-by-side, I think it's important that they both be set to the same number of vertical pixels, and that they be similar in vertical size.
I end up with 3520x1200 with two monitors. The only reason I'd consider a 30" is if it is capable of more than 1200 vertical pixels.
While I think purchasing a large screen for real estate is great on paper, my pocket book would die just barring the load of the purchase. :(
A couple 20" LG's would be much nicer on the pocket book, at $350 a pop, you'll have even more real estate.
You'd get even more space if you set your Dock to "Automatically hide and show the Dock"...
When you are making your Aperture shopping list, you need to start with calling your mortgage professional about taking out an extra mortgage. ;-)
That's funny - have have a space on my desk that's just the right size for an 23" Cinema Display, so as you won't be needing it, please post it to me ;)
I would be interested to find out if someone has done testing of having 2 medium (or small 20") monitors vs. a BIG monitor.
Given Aperture's great features with mutiple monitors, I would imagine that working with 2 23" would be much better than only one 30". And in your case, it is even better since you now have a 23" and 30" ;)