My recent experiences with setting up FreeBSD on my laptop have persuaded me that it might be time to think about upgrading my home systems. Having seen how well X handles multiple monitors, I’m also starting to think that perhaps I should move to a multi-monitor setup. It certainly provides a lot more “real estate”!

Presently I’m using a Windows box as my main desktop. Sadly I’m forced to use Windows for some of my work things and until recently I’ve not considered an X based desktop system to fully up to the job – a viewpoint that has now changed. In fact since making my laptop dual boot (Windows XP & FreeBSD) I haven’t really booted into windows at all! Every app I’ve needed to use under FreeBSD has been available in some guise and (to my surprise) they’ve just worked!

Of course this thought line brings up a few questions, such as which video card should I use? Obviously it has to have multi-head support, but it also needs to work well with the X.org drivers and Xinerama. Knowing that many people have such setups, anyone got a reccomendation?

The only downside is I’m a little limited on physical desk space, so a large amout of re-organisation would be required. I’d probably have to mothball my imac (which hasn’t been on in a while anyways) and find a new home for a few other random pieces of office clutter. I realise that spring is well passed, but maybe a spot of intensive “spring cleaning” would be a good thing!