> I think we reached peak multiscreen ~2010 and it's sort of falling out of favour these days

When we upgraded monitors at work I took several of the old ones to see how many monitors I could connect. I got up to 5 I believe (with one being a new ultrawide). It was impossible to use them all productively. At best they could serve as live status for some Jenkins job. Two monitors are useful, but now you can just use one ultrawide (I like to use two cables since it makes Window management easier, but you can use software for that too). I like to have one extra in addition to an ultrawide, but it's often unused.

I use tripe 4K monitors all the time and it's a very productive setup. Left is video conference, far enough away that I can use it without glasses if I want to, front is development work, browser, email, right is the live view of the application that I'm working on. And at $500 each the price really isn't an obstacle if you are using them professionally.

> It was impossible to use them all

You could always take up trading:

https://library.tradingtechnologies.com/trade/ttd-managing-a...

> ... productively.

Oh well.

I use Spectacle for window management on a 49" ultrawide and it works great for dividing the screen into 3 segments. Having one window centered helps avoiding too much horizontal movement of my neck as well (which I've been recommended to avoid by a physiotherapist).

Can you go into more detail as to how using two cables makes window management easier on a single ultrawide?

Most environments snap windows to borders of logical screens.

If the OS believes the ultrawide is actually two 4:3 monitors, you'll get one such snapping range right in the middle.

If you connect the monitor with one cable, the OS believes it's one single 21:9, but if you connect them with two cables, the OS believes it's two smaller monitors.

Is this true for just MacOS or do Linux (GNOME specifically) and Windows also work the same way?

I don't know anyone with an ultrawide so I can't try this myself.

All of them work like this, but some linux environments and on windows PowerToys Zones support splitting the screen in different, custom ways.

Windows also works this way, IDK about linux. FWIW Samsung's ultra wide monitors are supposed to support splitting the screen up into multiple areas for the purpose of window management, even when using a single cable.

I guess I work in a very different industry to most here but 3+ screens is still very much the norm for those of us working in financial markets. However Mac desktops/laptops are very uncommon.

> maybe with an external graphics card if supported,

That's a big if. Mac OS X only supports AMD cards and AMD didn't provide a Radeon driver yet for the M1. It's not clear what is going on, we know the amdgpu driver works an arm64 just fine https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20404547 and that contains the most hairy bits namely starting the bastard so I can't see what the hold up can be.

Over the last 10 years, I've migrated from three screens down to two screens and am currently down to one and a half screens. (I currently run my code editor and a browser on a 4k monitor and airplay to my 11" iPad where I keep a terminal app fullscreened.)

I think it's because resolutions have gotten better. 2010 I was running one screen for editor, one screen for browser, and one screen for everything else.

Nailed it about peak multiscreen. I was on three screens when everyone was on one, then on the highest consumer DPI monitor in 2009 before Retina or Windows OS support, and now I'm on a single-monitor display with a laptop. In 10 more years that will be the format: Laptop below, 8k 40" atop.

Or just a cellphone that plugs into a monitor.

I would think that would already exist if it was actually compelling.

But having to plug your computing device into a monitor and keyboard to do any work is just a downgrade from a laptop that always has a monitor and keyboard. It's a bizarre portability trade-off that's even less exciting as laptops become thinner, lighter, and more powerful.

Are you saying it doesn't exist, or just that it's not compelling?

I'm typing this comment on a phone connected to a standard monitor, running a desktop-like experience [0] and it's surprisingly usable!

Hardware - Samsung S8 (2017), generic USB-C to HDMI adapter, bluetooth keyboard and mouse.

[0]https://www.samsung.com/au/apps/samsung-dex/

I do this with my Samsung note 10. Also when I plug my Samsung tablet into my usb-c monitor I get a nice desktop. Lastly, purism’s phone supports phone-as-desktop as well

PinePhone as well - the PostMarketOS even shipped with a HDMI/ethernet/USB dock for this. :)

I use a 7-monitor setup — four landscape in a 2x2, a portrait on either side, and a very small one at the end (just for monitoring my front door camera). It works great — I can dedicate an entire portrait monitor to Slack, for example, and I can just make a tiny head movement or chair swivel much faster than surfacing windows or switching virtual desktops. I tried a single large flat monitor, but when the center was the right distance the corners were too far away to read comfortably, and this way they are all angled directly to me.