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Razer Built a Laptop With Three Screens Because Why Not? (engadget.com)
At CES in Las Vegas today, Razer unveiled a prototype that could change the way we play. Behold: Project Valerie, the world's first laptop to incorporate three built-in monitors. From a report on Engadget: Each screen measures 17.3 inches with 4K resolution -- that's 12k total (11520 x 2160) viewing space. They slide out from the central lid chassis under their own power and autonomously position themselves to create a full 180-degree viewing area, powered by NVIDIA's Surround View technology, which enables programs to spread a single image across multiple monitors. All of the computer's wiring is internal so you won't have to worry about snagging power cords as the screens deploy. The Valerie also utilizes Razer's short-throw keyboard, an all-aluminum case and the computing prowess of the 17-inch Blade Pro. No word on pricing.
Why not?
3 minute battery life.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
They had a ThinkPad with a second physical screen before, it didn't exactly set the world's collective hearts aflutter. Granted the second one was much smaller than the primary, but they tried it and found it wasn't what the consumers wanted. I don't see why someone would want to commit to a laptop form factor with 3 screens. There are plenty of good reasons to use a laptop - I do the vast overwhelming majority of my own work on a laptop - but this seems like a solution in search of an answer.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
I use two extra monitors with my top two laptops, but they are a lot larger than these because I use them when docked at work or home. I wouldn't want two dinky little laptop monitors strapped onto my laptop, not even for free.
I actually use three screens on my desktop. And yes, I do use all three windows. One window has my code, the second the output, the third has e-mail or diagnostic crap up. Useful to see all three at once.
I hate working from a laptop because of the single screen.
I suspect Razer don't have the business user in mind though.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
So, with all that wasted space on the base, why did they go with that ugly keyboard/touchpad layout instead of using a full-sized keyboard with the touchpad below that? Most people are going to be using that thing on a desk/table so will most likely use a USB or bluetooth mouse instead of the touchpad anyway.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Maybe the world wasn't ready and it was bad timing on Lenovo's part.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Beyond gaming, I could see this as a great workstation for someone who consults or travels to client sites periodically. Client oriented VM or two running on the alt screens with normal stuff running on the other. Throw in a good wireless mouse and you would have a great solution!
autonomously position themselves to create a full 180-degree viewing area
Judging by the pictures, where the hell are they getting the 180-degree viewing area from? Are we expected to use the thing with our faces 1mm away from the screen?
Because Why Not?
Because weight, I imagine. How heavy is this thing?
Don't get me wrong. I hate this move to anorexic electronics as much as the next person, cutting off hours of battery life, upgradability and replaceability of parts, and very useful peripheral sockets in a desperate attempt to save a couple more grams of weight... but if this thing has three monitors it's got to weigh far more than can be comfortably carried by hand or used in a traditional notebook space. Imagine trying to use it on an airplane.
Speaking of which... what is the battery life of this thing? It better have an SSD, because otherwise I imagine 5% of its useable battery life would be used up in the computer bootup process alone.
Also, ever try to use a laptop in coach (i.e., "cattle car" or "steerage") on an airplane? There, having enough elbow room for a single small monitor (plus a keyboard + trackpad) is a challenge. I can't imagine what trying to roll out three monitors would be like.
...like a boss!
Now you have a reason to sit in the center seat. Until now most people usually prefer aisle or window.
Exactly; +1
The contents of this message have been doubly encrypted by ROT13
Slide out under their own power? And that's going to last, what, six weeks before it gets stuck? The screen hinge is already a primary point of failure for laptops, let's double the weight load with flimsy motors and rails! Definitely another "more money than sense" moment in computer gaming.
And a normal keypad would be nice, too. People don't game with those anymore?
Disagree, I love my W700ds and it's not even the newer 701 model. The main screen is amazingly sharp and clear as they targeted visual designers with the Wacom tablet built in and color calibrator.
I used it as a semi-portable desktop when traveling between Detroit and Manhattan every week. Too heavy to lug around for normal use but it's *perfect* for a guy wanting two monitors while staying in a cramped hotel/apartment for a week or more at a time. I can full-screen videos or vim and have irc/chat with the wife on the second monitor which is just a pain to toggle when you have just one screen. Gkrellm sits over there too quite nicely as well as the tools windows in Gimp.
The quadro is still fast enough to play kerbal space and I use the machine as a living room computer now with a newborn. Love mine and still won't part with it. Despite typing this on a Mac Pro, with a gaming system upstairs and multiple Thinkpads throughout the house. My T410 makes a great garage computer for parts schematics... Love these things!
I always imagine these like the ultra cool prototypes at the autoshow no intent to build but guranteed to get a headline on every auto magazine. looks like they landed /. On a side note no joy on the touch pad position, are we lefties so few?
This is my same setup.
The monitors are only 1080s but that is good enough for me.
When I go into game mode I use eyefinity to create a single display port 5760x1080 which works excellent.
When I am in work mode, I break the eyefinity configuration so I can maximize windows to individual screens. I generally have several terminals open on one monitor, e-mail and web browsing on another and remote desktop or misc windows on the third.
My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
I saw a laptop with two swing out "wing" monitors in the mid 2000s. Nothing this crazy, but Valerie is not the "worlds first" lappy with three monitors.
Not thin enough,
I don't game on PCs at all, and this totally caught my interest. three, 4k displays? If the CPU/GPU power and RAM and drives are there, all you'd need to carry around to make this a decent setup are a real keyboard and a mouse. I don't give the south end of a northbound rat if it isn't "thin". I don't really care if it's light or quiet, either.
After Apple's latest fiasco dumbing down their laptops, I'm not feeling all that resistant to going Windows, laptop-wise. My only Apple choice right now is a used machine off of EBay. Something that actually has ESC/F-keys and ports to connect to things. Something even further behind the CPU curve, sigh. Damn you, Apple.
[runs off to look at specs]
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Hilarious.
Probably the lightest and most correctly a laptop but not first.
Just make sure you have the middle seat :)
Meh. I tried multiple screens. It sucks having to always turn your head back and forth all day long.
I prefer one giant screen to multiple tiny ones.
Dell U3014 FTW.
I do the vast overwhelming majority of my own work on a laptop
work
I think you misunderstand what kind of company Razer is. It is understandable to think that a large amount of people would do work on a Razer laptop, but they are first and foremost a gaming peripheral company. And people who buy laptops to play video games on rarely have concerns about battery life, portability, compactness, etc.
Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
A three monitor laptop doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Why not get a 17" and a dock with two monitors?
Meh. I tried multiple screens. It sucks having to always turn your head back and forth all day long.
I prefer one giant screen to multiple tiny ones.
Dell U3014 FTW.
It probably depends entirely on what type of work you're doing. If you're mostly doing single document at a time work, or don't have to flip between applications non-stop, one large monitor is probably superior to three medium monitors.
If you are constantly flipping between applications- stepping through code and seeing what happens on the application, for example, one monitor is a pain in the neck.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
To emphasis this point, here is a list of the bits I need for my current three monitor desktop setup.
If I had a Razer 3 monitor laptop, the sum total of bits would be:
No need for Cables, stand, UPS, external USB hub etc.
So please Razer make this bad boy and soon.
Finally a reason to take the middle seat!
I would say crap execution. There are times where mixed size multi-monitor setups work, but at normal-ish laptop display sizes, a secondary display significantly smaller than the main display is going to be mostly useless.
Considering 8K is in the order of 33MP, how can you say 11520*2160, with 24 mega pixels is 12K? I would expect 12K to be 11520x6480
You can afford to fly first class so you have room to use it, right?
Authority: *stern voice* "I hope you brought enough porn for EVERYBODY"
Me: *Whips out my Valerie.*
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I think this will be great for some gamers, and probably some programmers or admins who love multiple screens already.
For me, I bought a 4K monitor that had a 30" diagonal and I found it too wide. I felt like it was actually straining my eyes to have things so far away at the sides. I ended up using my monitor in a vertical orientation because for some reason it seems way easier on my eyes and I've grown to prefer windows being stacked to look at up and down...
One possible thing that could make this experience better though is the side screens being at an angle. I feel like if the screens to the sides were not receding in distance it would be easier on your eyes... I do use a single side monitor at times and that has always worked out pretty well.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
At just under 12 lbs it comes in a full 2 lbs MORE than my old vintage gaming 'laptop' which was rather heavy and big to drag around very much. Matched the thickness tho. It is gonna be wider and taller however. This is gonna be quite the handful ... um armful. That is like several college textbooks :(
We still say 'laptop' ? Cause that just ain't happening unless you routinely wear fireproof pants :O
But would you be ok with the three monitors if they couldn't be moved vertically (just sitting *right* on the keyboard).
Also would you settle for 17.3" panels?
I'd rather have a single 27" panel than 3 17" panels, even ignoring the lack of a good stand.
It's way too awkward to be portable, and it's way too limited to credibly replace a desk setup.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
If you are constantly flipping between applications- stepping through code and seeing what happens on the application, for example, one monitor is a pain in the neck.
I would think this depends on the window manager being able to allow you to effectively partition the monitor real estate. I have 2 24" monitors, so it's not like any reasonable panel would supersede *those*, but 17.3" panels I could easily see being inferior to a single large wide display panel.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Screens slide out under their own power. Since the device is not made from a certain hitherto unknown pliable ceramic and the screens are moved by plastic gear wheels and not by equally yet unknown fields of force .. how long would a piece of shit like that last?
I suspect you're not going to see 27" on a laptop any time soon.. If I were using a laptop for work purposes, I'd rather 3 17" panels over any laptop screen I've seen to date.
But to answer your question, 27" or 3x17"; depends on what I was using it for. If it was for work, absolutely prefer the three screens. If I was using this at home, mainly for gaming, or surfing the web... one large screen would be preferred.
I use two 24" monitors and one 21"(I think) monitor in my current setup for work, so the laptop would be inferior to my current set up... but it's a laptop, it's designed to be somewhat portable. This is a laptop I might actually use for work if they got me one. I avoid using my current work laptop wherever possible.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
That means it's fully compliant with the hardware requirements for both the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift
Then why use the three screens?
Many doing dev work in business also game. This machine allows most of the desktop flexibility for both in a relatively portable package. The catch is price.
I meant that any remotely laptop sized panel would be inadequate. Having three of them would not be an adequate substitute for multi-monitor on the desktop.
I just think this is one 'middle ground' that doesn't really exist.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Of course not.. Mainly because "Extremely high" is all they can really say given the display hardware is usually among the biggest price drivers in a laptop to start with..
If you are asking what the price is, forget it, you cannot afford it.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Touchpad below keyboard causes unintentional movement unless there's an easy disable button for the touchpad.
Such as any key on the keyboard. In Xubuntu, try Settings > Mouse and Touchpad > Devices > Touchpad > Disable touchpad while typing (0.3 s).
If you can afford this laptop, you can also afford a netbook to use when on a plane. Keep the 12 pound monstrosity in the overhead compartment.
I have 2 24" monitors, so it's not like any reasonable panel would supersede *those*
Really? If you think a 30" 2160x1600 screen is (or could be) superior to two 17" panels, then why wouldn't a 40 - 50" 4k screen be better than your 2x 24"? More square inches, (probably) way more pixels, and cheaper than the aforementioned Dell U3014
It probably depends entirely on what type of work you're doing. If you're mostly doing single document at a time work, or don't have to flip between applications non-stop, one large monitor is probably superior to three medium monitors.
If you are constantly flipping between applications- stepping through code and seeing what happens on the application, for example, one monitor is a pain in the neck.
If using focus-follows-mouse, no-click-to-raise and overlapping windows (i.e. X11 behavior), a single monitor can be even faster. Mulitple monitors seems to be effective for those that blow up windows full-screen, which isn't me.
I have two monitors in front of me, but I almost exclusively use only one of them. The other really only displays status data from a couple of servers.
HDMI cable + room TV for gaming/video and laptop screen for comms. Leatherman to disassemble whatever 'countermeasures' have been used to try to prevent you from disconnecting the pay-to-view box. Your way is more polite, however.
Meh. I tried multiple screens. It sucks having to always turn your head back and forth all day long. I prefer one giant screen to multiple tiny ones. Dell U3014 FTW.
I once ran 4 24" monitors laid out end to end and I hated it both for what you mention and also what I need always seemed to be on the farthest monitor which took "forever" to get to.
Now, however, I found standing them up in portrait mode is perfect for me since I'm working on code all day and it lets me see even more of it at once. I've also found that 3 seems to be my magic number as that is what I have connected to my laptop, but I have a 4th on my desktop and I find I don't use it much.
So as others have said, it just depends on what you are doing and how you use them.
I travel on vacation with not only my laptop, but a usb displaylink monitor. https://www.asus.com/us/Monito... Most times I don't need to troubleshoot anything with the servers at work, but sometimes the extra real estate comes in handy. I wouldnt mind having a way of detaching an extra monitor for day to day use, that way im not lugging aroung the extra weight, but also be able to reattach it and carry around as part of the laptop, without lugging around a completely separate piece of equipment.
There has always been a category of computers called transportables lying between the size-weight-speed of a laptop and desktop. Something you can setup and pack in a minute and fit under an airplane seat.
They had a ThinkPad with a second physical screen before ... they tried it and found it wasn't what the consumers wanted
As any Razer engineer will tell you: the problem was that the ThinkPad did not have enough monitors.
This will never be built for so many of the reasons other posters have already mentioned (weight, power, practicality, hinge design). The first clue is "no price or availability announced".
Things like this are the CES version of the concept car at the motor show.
At least the people next to you can enjoy the view.
Same here, but since I switched to a 1080 (from a 290x), the Nvidia drivers come with an app to limit maximized windows to individual screens.
No more need to switch between surround and regular mode anymore.
I doubt it'll work, but you could try running the setup to extract the files and see if it works on your radeon
Program Files\NVIDIA Corporation\Display\nvsmartmaxapp.exe
Actually, I've been waiting years for a laptop with a 21" or 23" lcd screen.
I'll take that, and a full size keyboard. And maybe a detachable laser mouse. Or a mouse pad (aluminum) that swings out from the laptop for a laser mouse. I hate touchpads...they seem to have been created by someone who never suffers from the need for clarity during a file / folder selection operation, especially on a "live-ish" machine.
Nice try...
and they don't show the deploy? This takes a special kind of idiot to do that.
Not a production model. Think of a car show where prototypes and concept cars appear. They may never make it to production, or not at all as displayed. That doesn't have to be the point, the point is to show something new/different and see where it goes. It may be thought of now as a "gamer" rig, but what they really care about is making something they can profit on, so if they make something that can sell enough units at a price they feel worth it, they will make that.
As has been pointed out, we don't know the specs at all. Assume for a moment it's rugged, and modular enough though to be seriously upgradable - SSD/HDD not soldered in, modular bay for various items like a hot swappable battery, SSD/HDD, well designed multi-part MB, etc. and that it's fully Linux friendly. Lastly, assume they commit to making upgrade boards available every 2-3 years, or that they will allow others to make them.
Pendulums swing both ways and imo going somewhat old school here may be a big winner. A lot of people are tired of thinner is better when it's little more than a $1k+ disposable item that never gave you what you wanted in the first place!
it only became practicle in Japan integrated as a screen projector cell phone, yet combined with clustering software or even p2p with X11 protocol we just descend Application Server technology to distribute locally.
I myself own and use 3 modified Androids networked RAID mirroring because it is easier for one to break and continue working with the others that arent broken. Tri-head 180 degrees would be cool for one but when you think about power consumption then I prefer redundancy and uptime with performance. 3 laptops shrunk down is what Androids are to me.
sounds perfect for all of those gamers who spend their day hanging out at McDonalds.
The sport drink cupholder.
I would love this. Install Linux and add a cordless mouse and I have a replacement desktop, and can play games when tired of editing code.
Battery is a useless waste of space and weight, though. Replace the battery with an extra drive and a heavy duty cooling unit, I'd just carry a power cord.
A 17" laptop monitor will pull down about 750mA to 1.5A of current on 12V. Now triple that and we're around 2.25A to 4.5A just for the monitors alone. A standard laptop battery would last only an hour or two at that rate of discharge. Add all the other peripherals like motherboard, mouse, kb, SSD, Wifi antenna, touchpad, and the total draw of this system wouldn't last 30 mins to 1 hour. The only way it would be feesible would be to triple the size of the battery pack which would add even more weight to an already arm straining monstrosity. It's a beautiful concept but completely impractical. More money than sense indeed. Anyone who buys this would have buyers remorse within 3 years if they treat it with white gloves and don't break the monitor mechanisms prior to that. For the astronomical price tag associated with something like this you would be much better off something else... anything else.
No word on pricing huh? How about a video of it actually deploying, instead of 10 minutes of blahblahblah.
One size doesn't fit all. I've got some people here that still like three old 19 inch 4:3 monitors due to their workflow with three separate windows (3D stuff represented in 2D so mouse is on every screen at once!) so they don't care about the bezels. I've got others with two widescreen monitors set vertically due to what they are doing. Another with one vertical 28 inch, two horizontal 24 inch. A lot of others that seen to think two 24 inch 1920x1200 screens set horizontally are the way to go. One big screen to make all those people happy would probably have to be well over 40 inches.
Also with MS Windows, since multiple desktops are not very practical (yes, I've used a Matrox implementation with Win2K, a "powertoy" that was unstable as shit and an Nvidia implementation that is still available) additional monitors become a reasonable substitute even if your screen is huge.
I set up six bolted to the wall in the back of a truck (3x2 config). I think the operator works on a swivel chair on wheels for a reason.
The hardware side was actually very easy to deal with, even with a KVM switch. Two Nvidia cards of the same model is a cheap and reliable way to do up to eight screens in both MW Windows and linux. HDMI or Displayport cables are less hassle to thread through things than DVI or VGA, plus it's easier to find a long HDMI cable in a small town than any of the others.
Portrait mode is the best!
A few of us have 3 displays at the office - mine are all portrait, while co-workers have varying configurations, such as "tie-figher" or sideways "T" or whatever else. No one is using the "+" though with portrait in the middle.
Touchpads wouldn't be so awful if they at least emulated thumb-trackballs like mid-90s laptops did. Sometime around 1999, they all quit emulating trackballs & started being optimized for use by an index finger (instead of a thumb). Why can't manufacturers at least expose the raw touch data, so a custom driver could give us back faux-trackball ballistics?
Example of thumb-optimized ballistics: recognizing that the thumb isn't equally-agile in all directions... straightening out arcs, spreading out horizontal motion vs vertical motion, etc.
For me the thing is that if I have two monitors, I'm still using virtual desktops to switch things around a lot, it becomes more work than just using one monitor. With three monitors, then I wouldn't need to change virtual desktops very often.
So two just gets in the way.
will there be additional vga, dvi and hdmi outputs?
BEHOLD SIX SCREENS ON-THE-GO!
laptop.
You keep using that word, but I do not think it means what you think it means.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
... and that's for portable, but not mobile computing. Essentially when you want to have a computer on a table where you have electricity, but you still want to be able to carry it around.
Essentially you want something like that in a rather rugged case, so it'll withstand some abuse. It doesn't matter how light or thick it is, as it won't be "carried around" with someone, but specifically carried from place A to B, probably as part of some larger setup.
For example this could take part in stage productions controlling the lights, or a video mixer.
However this form factor has one large disadvantage over the classical "portable" one. The keyboard is non-detachable. So you'll always have to be at a fixed distance to the screen. You move the keyboard independently of the rest of your computer. That's not very ergonomically.
i have a real workstation in the office, thanks.
I mean - i could imagine very limited use cases where you want to have something like a movable office which you may need to set at a customer site as soon as you arrive there.
But 17' is already big, and unless you have a table somehwere unfolding this thing is a no-go.
Looked interesting until they got to the weight of this beast. That's far too heavy to carry.
No, seriously. It's a legend.
Because Razer simply has NO such thing as quality control.
This is why Razer products are lucky to last a few months from date of purchase.
If it was almost ANYONE besides Razer releasing this thing, I'd look at it.
But it IS Razer. Not going to waste good money on their crap.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
A lot of flights don't allow 12lb of carry-on luggage.
I figured they did this because they're secretly owned by Gillette. Their next laptop will have five screens and a lubricating strip.
Can't say I find this compelling. I had a workstation with four monitors back in 1990, courtesy of X11. Fun for a while but I've never been motivated to set up a multiple-monitor arrangement since, for programming or research or writing. I know many folks seem to think it's the greatest thing since sliced bits, but the appeal is lost on me.
That may have been the one I was looking at a few years ago - I definitely remember discussing with Lenovo over getting a small (10-ish) order made which were equipped for radio-silence operations (there had been a fatality, assigned initially to an RS violation).
We never ordered, but we did give it serious consideration. In the end, multiple laptops and external monitors were a more resilient solution.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
I want to see it fold up and unfold. I don't want to watch people talking about it. I want to see how this thing closes into a more or less normal laptop form factor.