Multiple Laptop Set up

Grumpy_chap

Thanks again for all the support and assistance.  I'll feed back once I have success to confirm. 

jamesd

Deleted_User said:

I'd love to see the OLED pixel burn on that after a year of displaying the Windows taskbar in exactly the same place (or burn of whichever OS / applications you use). Poor choice of panel for office PC work.
...
I can't see how 4 HDMI ports justifies that risk of burn-in on an expensive OLED panel.

There won't be any material burn-in from the taskbar because my preference is to have the taskbar set to auto-hide so it's normally not displayed. With the desktop icons also normally covered, a black background and used at night without a room light or in a darkened room with automatic brightness control there's far less scope for burn-in than you anticipate. It's entirely fine for how I use it for office work, it's one of the more OLED-friendly situations.

It's a better monitor than my previous 30 inch Dell "proper" monitors, where I wasn't able to appreciate the full benefit of the 4k resolution due to the size of the display. The four HDMI inputs weren't why I bought it, the superior display quality was.

In the 20 hours a day test of the 2017 hardware with unusually large static content areas the IPS screen seems to have faired the worst, becoming completely unusable due to backlight failure in 2019. I didn't see any signs of OLED burnin from their test images after 140 hours (two weeks) or 280 hours but at 420 hours the logo that was designed to defeat the picture moving display protection does show burnin effects on the red.

In the more realistic test it's notable that only the CNN tests were showing potentially bothersome non-uniformity after 102 weeks of 20 hours per day. Which perhaps says more about the merit of the earlier test than the TVs.

If you use it as in the first test, presumably for advertising displays, or with the CNN logos in their more realistic test then OLED of the 2017 generation at least is unlikely to be a good choice unless you're willing to spend money for the picture quality and accept it's a wasting asset. I doubt it's any worse overall than we were used to with conventional electron gun and phosphor displays.

This LG generation says this about their features intended to limit burnin potential:

"LG OLED TVs come with special features and settings to preserve image quality and prevent burn in and image retention. First, there is a Screen Saver feature that will turn on automatically if the TV detects that a static image is displayed on screen after approximately two minutes. There are also three options (available in Menu setting > Picture settings > OLED panel settings) that can be used to preserve image quality. The first of these is the Clear Panel Noise feature that preserves the quality of the image on the display panel by resetting the TV so that it clears the pixels. This feature can be turned on when needed within the settings mentioned above. The second feature that can be employed is the Screen Shift feature which, moves the screen slightly at regular intervals to preserve image quality. A third option is the Logo Luminance Adjustment, which can detect static logos on the screen and reduce brightness to help decrease permanent image retention."

For the initial test they presumably disabled the screen saver because it would have turned the TV off two minutes into the test. They wrote that they did have the pixel refresh and movement features enabled. They didn't mention the logo brightness reduction at all, so maybe it was turned off or not present in their generation of sets. Since the more realistic test only showed issues with logos and related content it would be interesting to know if this setting was present and used.

Grumpy_chap

Thanks for the advice so far.  

I purchased the monitor with multiple input channels:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07XTVYPYF/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I am really pleased with it - so clear compared to what I had before.  I did find switching between input channels was a bit of a faff and I was also swapping keyboards and other peripherals around, so I decided to get a KVM switch in addition.

I plumped for this switch:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0919JSWTM/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I think it is the same one that was mentioned upthread by @[Deleted User] - I did look around at various items available and this one seemed good value, not least because it dropped in price by £10   There were some cheaper units, but they had specific cables that combined USB with HDMI which I was not sure about plus the one purchased included all the HDMI and USB cables in the package so I did not have to go rummaging through old boxes to find the cables needed.

The KVM switch "seems" to work as it should and it looks quite neat and tidy.  Certainly the keyboard and peripherals all switch when the button is pressed.  The display also switches and works correctly with laptop number 2.  When selecting laptop number 1, however, the laptop does not recognise the external display.  This is annoying and I do not know why.  I now have the laptop plugged into the second HDMI input to the monitor, but that means still following the menu process to switch displays.  The simply button-press promised by the KVM switch would be much better.

I have done some trouble-shooting:

1. Plugged in laptop 2 to connect via all 4 channels of the KVM switch.  Sequentially checked each channel actually works.  Pass.
2. Used the HDMI lead connecting laptop 2 successfully as the lead connecting laptop 1.  Fail
3. Powered everything off and left to rest and switched all back on again.  Fail
4. Gone to Display Settings on laptop 1 and clicked the soft button to detect the external display.  Fail
5. Connected laptop 1 to the other channels on the KVM switch.  Fail
6. Checked the connections, pushed "home" all the leads.  Fail

I am not sure what to try next.  The laptop 1 works with the monitor - that is what I am using now.  When I add in the KVM switch, laptop 1 does not see the monitor for some reason.  I think I have excluded all the obvious things.

Can anyone suggest what I should try as the next step?  I am keen to get this working as the solution seems like it will be a good one.

jamesd

Any cable that is genuinely USB3 compatible will happily support 4k HDMI or Displayport video, since that capability is part of the specification. The very latest support 100W of power, 8k Displayport and 4k HDMI 2.1 though the power capability isn't that often found yet. The earlier stuff as well is generally found with USB sockets that are labelled as supporting Intel's Thunderbolt specification. Particularly common laptops and tablets rather than desktops.

jamesd

Just to be sure: you tried powering off everything and then powering on KVM and monitor then laptop 1 while the KVM was set to laptop 1 and it didn't work? If so, it seems likely that accepting it as an incompatibility and using Amazon's return policy may be best.

CoastingHatbox

I have never gotten a KVM to work that well with modern hardware.

I have a four way switch with three/occasionally four devices connected to it.
On occasion I'll switch between laptops and lose one of the displays.
One of the laptops suffers from terrible ghosting as I type.
The USB keyboard only works with the desktop when it feels like it.

That's with one of these:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/StarTech-com-4-Port-Switch-Computers-Built-Black/dp/B001GQ9D2I/ref=sr_1_11?dchild=1&keywords=startech+4-port+kvm&qid=1630085670&sr=8-11

I was wondering, is thunderbolt available on all three laptops?

Grumpy_chap

Thanks @jamesd

I didn't really understand the comments about cables, but think they referred to the KVM that I didn't purchase.  The KVM I have uses separate USB and HDMI cables from each laptop to the input side of the KVM.

jamesd said:

Just to be sure: you tried powering off everything and then powering on KVM and monitor then laptop 1 while the KVM was set to laptop 1 and it didn't work? If so, it seems likely that accepting it as an incompatibility and using Amazon's return policy may be best.

I think I did this before.  To be on the safe side, I have just repeated it.  Powered everything down.  Disconnected everything.  Plugged laptop 1 to KVM input 1, powered up.  Unable to get the laptop 1 to "see" the display.

I have also then disconnected laptop 1, connected laptop 3 into port 1, laptop 2 into port 2.  Works fine.  Then moved laptop 3 to port 3 and then port 4, all switches and works fine and switches back to laptop 2 when asked.  I think this proves the KVM switch is working as it should.

It does seem to be a compatibility issue.  Obviously I'd prefer not to have to return - I have e-mailed the vendor to see if they suggest anything.

I wonder whether it could be a driver issue on laptop 1?

The USB part for laptop 1 is working as it should when switched to laptop 1.  I could swap USB ports, but don't see that would change anything as this is working anyway - it is solely the HDMI that is not achieving what it should.

CoastingHatbox said:

That's with one of these:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/StarTech-com-4-Port-Switch-Computers-Built-Black/dp/B001GQ9D2I/ref=sr_1_11?dchild=1&keywords=startech+4-port+kvm&qid=1630085670&sr=8-11

I was wondering, is thunderbolt available on all three laptops?

Thanks for your comments - that StarTech unit does not seem to have any HDMI inputs so won't be compatible with any of my laptops.  I don't know what DVI is.  Perhaps I am missing something significant there?

I don't know what thunderbolt is, so I am certain I don't have that on any of the laptops.

debitcardmayhem

You don't appear to have told us what laptop 1 is (make/model) but does it have a soft fn switch to change the display output ? eg on my laptop it has fn+f7 if so have you tried that ?

Grumpy_chap

debitcardmayhem said:

You don't appear to have told us what laptop 1 is (make/model) but does it have a soft fn switch to change the display output ? eg on my laptop it has fn+f7 if so have you tried that ?

It is a DELL XPS17.

Yes, it has a fn+f1 switch between displays and also the options via right-click then display-settings.  That does not seem to work.  I can plug directly into the monitor and it all just works as it should but when the switch is added, the external monitor is not detected.

jamesd

Yes, USB is the KVM that you didn't buy, to let you know that it's OK to use that type.

Good luck with the maker and maybe Dell.