Switching Monitors

gasdoctor

gasdoctor

gasdoctor

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Joined
16 Aug 2004
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182
I have my new gaming PC arriving soon and I’m utilising the two screens that I have for my laptop office setup. This uses a Dell docking station with mouse and keyboard.

What’s the “best” way to be able to switch between gaming PC and laptop/docking station?

I’m aware of KVM switches but not sure how this would work with a docking station (if at all)
Then main concern is would gaming through a KVM cause any significant issues (ie lag…)

I’ll keep reading articles but as always advice on here is pretty solid.
(Sorry it’s on monitor section..couldn’t think where to put it)
 
I have been looking in to this recently too. Interested in what you find.

I found a manufacturer called CKL (check out their 622DP model), who seem to make reasonably priced dual screen, 4k@60Hz KVM switches. I really don't know if they're any good in practice though, and worried about how they'll be with gaming. I can't see why they wouldn't work with a docking station.

I'm surprised there isn't more of a market for these to be honest, with people working from home a lot more now. There are hardly any decent articles or reviews or well-documented products. Most people must either be just working from their laptop screen, or switching over all their cables from docking station -> desktop every time.

You might get a better response in General Hardware.
 
I was looking at this quite a while ago and ended up building a PiKVM. That allows me to run the laptop session in a browser window on my gaming PC. No need to switch between machines at all.
 
I use Microsoft mouse without boarders, allows me to control my work laptop and gaming laptop from one mouse for keyboard I have a Bluetooth one and just switch it over if I need to type that way no physical switches needed
 
Gone for a simple HDMI switch (£8), will see how it works.
Not sure how to sort mouse/keyboard yet but probably another switch when I get fed up with having to change between gaming stuff and cheap work keyboard etc
 
Last edited:
Smithy said:
Interesting. How is the performance? Can you multi-screen? If you full-screen the browser window does it actually just feel like you're working on your laptop?
Click to expand...
Performance is fine as long as you don't have anything much more demanding than a Teams video or similar on the laptop. It's fine for general work which is what I use it for.
I don't full-screen the browser since my monitor is 4K and the laptop resolution doesn't go that high so it would probably look bad at full-screen. There is a small lag in the mouse movement for me but otherwise it's just like working on the laptop itself.
 
mattx4 said:
I use Microsoft mouse without boarders, allows me to control my work laptop and gaming laptop from one mouse for keyboard I have a Bluetooth one and just switch it over if I need to type that way no physical switches needed
Click to expand...

Microsoft Mouse is cool but doesn't solve this particular problem. I never have - or want - both computers running simultaneously each with their own monitor. This is about being able to use the same monitors between two machines, regardless of whether or not one or the other is switched on.

Buffalo2102 said:
Performance is fine as long as you don't have anything much more demanding than a Teams video or similar on the laptop. It's fine for general work which is what I use it for.
I don't full-screen the browser since my monitor is 4K and the laptop resolution doesn't go that high so it would probably look bad at full-screen. There is a small lag in the mouse movement for me but otherwise it's just like working on the laptop itself.
Click to expand...

"small lag in the mouse" sounds awful. PiKVM looks cool but I don't think it solves this particular issue.
 
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