A few changes

[Horus]

I have just made a couple of changes to my PC set-up, one change is that I have had to buy another portable hard drive as one of the two I have has failed. They were both 1 TB in size which is large enough to back up my images and video files on each drive, OK a bit belt and braces, but better safe than sorry. I am a bit disappointed by the one that has failed which was a Western Digital 3.5” and I thought it would be a fairly robust drive being a lot bulkier, but this has not proven to be so. My other portable drive is a Samsung 2.5” and it is very small by comparison, but seems to be better than the Western Digital one. I decided this time to get a Maxtor 2.5” for no other reason than it was available for Amazon Prime delivery for just under £50, so I should get that later today.

The other change is my monitor set-up, I usually have two monitors side by side and can move stuff across between them both. However I have for a long time had a little moan to myself when viewing portrait style images on my wide screen monitors, as you will know portraits are actually viewed a lot smaller because you only get to see the portrait height in a landscape size view. I decided to resolve this issue by turning my left hand monitor through 90 degrees and then changing the way it is set-up for viewing. I can now open up a portrait image on my main 24” screen and move it across to the rotated monitor and I can then view it a lot larger than before, in this case to fill a 22” screen.

[Grandad]

That is a good scheme H I agree that it is annoying when you see such a small image of a portrait picture on a 16-9 screen. When I was selecting some Luxor pics to make a slideshow I only used landscape shots for that very reason.
I have a spare 22" monitor in the loft and I may copy your set up. It makes a lot of sense.

As for backups, I am using a 500gb Seagate 2.5" at present. Not massive but I don't have too much video so it is more than adequate. You have reminded me however to do a backup, Thanks

BTW, is the coffee cup part of the backup procedure?

[Horus]

I tend to do the same when selecting images for a slideshow Grandad as they always spoil it by changing the aspect ratio.
Go for it with the spare monitor, if you are lucky it may have the TV 'Vesa' type 4 hole plate on the back so you can just rotate the fitting, if not I am sure you can cobble something up Remember to check your video card outputs on the back of your PC as you will probably have used the better option for your current monitor, you may have all three HDMI a flat looking slot, VGA (Video Graphics Array) looks like a small 'D' shape and DVI (Digital Video Interface) rectangular looking with lots of small square holes. You can use any of the spare plugs to feed video to your spare monitor from your PC although you will also need a seperate power supply for it to work. To use it as I am doing you will need to change a few monitor settings, but if you are not sure I can talk you through it.

Seagate are another good and well known drive and it would have been my choice on a faster delivery
The coffee cup is part of Microsoft Essentials

[Kiya]

Horus it looks a great set up ...........I think my brain would just get it in a muddle trying to set that up

PS....coffee ? looks more like a tea to me

[Horus]

You are right Kiya, tea in a mug

[LovelyLadyLux]

I use a laptop mostly but I could always turn the laptop on it's side

Very impressive set up H. I'd need you here to get that set up for me - doubt I could do it on my lonesome.

[Horus]

I use a laptop mostly but I could always turn the laptop on it's side

Very impressive set up H. I'd need you here to get that set up for me - doubt I could do it on my lonesome.

I would happily set it all up for you LLL, but you can still plug a seperate monitor into a Laptop you know all you need is the monitor and lead.

[LovelyLadyLux]

I didn't realize I could plug in a separate monitor but that would be too difficult to balance on my armchair as my LAPtop definitely IS a LAPtop

[Horus]

You can plug all sorts into a Laptop LLL, a mouse, a monitor, a spare backup drive, even link it into a TV and view your photos in larger detail

[LovelyLadyLux]

I've never hooked my laptop up to the TV......wouldn't have a clue how to do anything like that

[Horus]

LLL, if your TV is reasonably modern it will have one or more HDMI sockets on the back and it will look the same shape as the one outlined in red in this image, your Laptop should also have a similar shaped port somewhere on it.


You would then need a ‘Standard’ HDMI cable to connect the two together like this one.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/AmazonBasics-H ... hdmi+cable

You need a fairly long one like this one so you can sit away from your TV set. Now all you do is to plug one end into your TV and the other into your Laptop (both ends are the same) once you have connected the two together you should be able to see everything on your Laptop screen duplicated on your TV screen. You can even partially close your Laptop and if you plugged in a mouse to your Laptop you could use it just like your home screen and work with it like that using the mouse on any flat surface.

However I prefer to link a Laptop to the TV in the way described so I can view my photographs on a large screen if showing them to family and friends, so basically anything you can see on your Laptop is also duplicated on your TV screen. You can even connect your camera to the TV directly and view your images on the memory card, but you would need another lead that has a ‘standard’ HDMI at one end a ‘Micro’ or ‘Mini’ HDMI at the other end depending upon what is on your camera.