Using 1 Gaming Computer For 2 People?

True Vox writes "My fiance and I have recently taken interest in City of Heroes (she's currently got a character on my account). She's got a cute little netbook, but nothing nearly powerful enough for a 5-year-old MMORPG, let alone if we take interest in Champions Online! I am reticent to buy a new gaming computer simply for what amounts to a passing phase. Has anyone had any experience using one computer to control two monitors with two sets of input devices (e.g. two keyboards and two mice, or one keyboard, one mouse, and a 360 gamepad, perhaps)? I have seen one solution that might work, but not much information from users that I can find. In short, does anyone have any experience with setups like this?"

Comments

Computers are cheap - just get another box.

[Phizzle]

Check out some of the refurbished systems available online and from places like Frys. You can get some raging deals on a solid mid-range box. Thin Client is absolutely abysmal as a gaming solution. This way you two can share a hobby and not drive each other nuts.

Re:Computers are cheap - just get another box.

[DarthVain]

I second that. I get a kick out of what I hear these days about PSUs... Retarded. People going out and buying 700, 800, 900, even 1000 watt systems, is basically a waste.

If you could see what I used to run on my old Dell machine which had a measly 230 watt PSU, I am talking like 6 HD, dual proc, dual optical, and enough USB crap to sink a ship.

The difference is between quality and crap (no idea if Dell is any good these days, likely not).

My last build I did a LOT of research on PSU, and believe me there is NOT a lot out there. There are a handful of gurus out there that know what they are talking about, I mean like that I could find from scourging the whole internet. However what information they had was spot on.

First the number they sick on the side of the box (900WATT!!!) is pretty much useless. Also brand names mean next to nothing. So good luck! lol. Basically there are only a few manufactures in China that build them ALL. They are then re-branded to whatever the buyer wants. Some manufactures make better PSU that others, some use higher end components, however it can be difficult to figure out which is which.

Efficiency is about twice as important as actually stated wattage (which is usually a lie anyway), and stability is about twice as important as efficiency. What this means is that when you computer goes from no load, to heavy load, and the PSU starts sucking power and shunting it to your components, how much does it fluctuate? You might be surprised to see how badly some of these oscillate up and down, and those dips can cause system failure and even damage components in severe cases.

Anyway thats as far as I want to go into it as it is a pretty complex thing, but there is a community out there though hard to find. I know I was pretty blown away by the truth about PSUs. Most of the companies mislead, and outright lie on their specifications it is pretty absurd.

Huh?

[DavidChristopher]

Sounds like you're complicating things a bit.

What you're not saying here is if you want to run multiple instances of the game at the same time. What kind of PC are you using now? It had better have a LOT of horsepower. 9/10 times, the simpler solution (a second gaming PC) is the smarter answer.

Keep in mind, Windows was not designed as a 'time sharing' system - at least not in the way you're thinking.

Hmmm

[scubamage]

Honestly, a 5 year old game could most likely run on the cheapest of cheap systems at best buy. Go spend the 2-300$ (yes, they have them that cheap) and fish around your local recycling center/craigslist for a monitor. When you're done with the phase, sell it on craigslist for a hundred bucks as a set, or keep it as a media pc. You're on a geek website bro, there's always a use for another PC. Always.

Multiseat is your solution

[Jeremy Visser]

It can't be done with Windows (at least not to my knowledge), but multiseat on Linux these days is a cinch. Google has tons of resources on the topic -- basically it involves a bit of xorg.conf hacking, and then Bob's your uncle.

I myself have done it before on an amd64 dual-core 2.2GHz system with two video cards, a GeForce 7600GT on PCI-e, and a GeForce 6200 on plain PCI. Worked beautifully. I could multiplayer FlightGear by running one instance on each seat. Each user can log on and off independently with their own keyboard and mouse.

This is a (blurry and fuzzy) picture of my setup (1280x1024 JPG). You can see glxgears running on each screen -- handled by the same computer. Cool thing about using two video cards is that each user gets his own GPU -- running two FPSes simultaneously (I tested Nexuiz) had absolutely zero slowdown.