Accordance and Multiple Monitors

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

Are any of you using Accordance with multiple monitors? If so, would you share how you're using it? It would be fun to see how Accordance is being used across multiple monitors.

 

Thanks!

[A. Smith]

right now I've only got one external monitor, so I use the laptop screen to run kindle and communication apps. Then I keep Paratext (in parallels vm), accordance, logos, and a pages doc with my diagrams and DA all on a specific order of full screen desktops and just swipe between as needed.

 

Before I moved overseas I used two 27" monitors and the laptop screen. I that case I had virtually the same layout except that I kept accordance and logos or Paratext in different screens rather than spaces. 

 

TBH, with stage manager and spaces, I'm not sure there's much advantage to multiple external monitors at this point. I'm confident enough in this that I'm ready to pull the trigger on the m3 if I can convince myself that 24gb of memory is enough (I don't think it is as I run a ridiculous number of simultaneous apps).

[darrylmy]

43 minutes ago, A. Smith said:

if I can convince myself that 24gb of memory is enough (I don't think it is as I run a ridiculous number of simultaneous apps)

 

It most likely isn't as you suspect. I'm on an M1 Max with 32 GB of ram and my machine always uses swap and the memory pressure frequntely hits orange in Activity Monitor. I use a lot of apps simultaneously as well (mostly for academic work but also for audio production). If you can swing it, I would at least go for 36 GB of ram (but now you're going to need to get at least the M3 Pro). Personally, since these machines are not upgradable, I would get the max ram your budget allows, especially if you're running virtual machines.

[A. Smith]

4 hours ago, darrylmy said:

 

It most likely isn't as you suspect. I'm on an M1 Max with 32 GB of ram and my machine always uses swap and the memory pressure frequntely hits orange in Activity Monitor. I use a lot of apps simultaneously as well (mostly for academic work but also for audio production). If you can swing it, I would at least go for 36 GB of ram (but now you're going to need to get at least the M3 Pro). Personally, since these machines are not upgradable, I would get the max ram your budget allows, especially if you're running virtual machines.

Yeah. The m3 pro with 36gb is the other option (and definitely the top of the budget since to go up from there requires the m3 max which would be utterly wasted on me). I don't do regular media editing, maybe photos once a month and videos 2-3 times a year (I only use iMovie and apple photos, no pro level stuff here!). I'll be doing some low level audio editing beginning next year as well, not sure the app I'll use yet. Currently using a 15" mbp 2.ghz6 i7 with 16gb memory. Even this processor isn't typically too taxed except when initiating the VM, but the memory is definitely too small. I'm sure the m3 pro is plenty sufficient with its clock speed and cores; heck, the m1 or 2 pro would be sufficient. But memory . . ..  If the m2 pro with the configuration I need (1tb and 32gb) is available when I'm able to purchase, I'm quite happy to do that and save some coin. Though, in the little bit of looking I've done, it wouldn't actually save that much.

 

@darrylmy how much media work do you do and what apps?

Edited November 13, 2023 by A. Smith

[Kristin]

7 hours ago, darrylmy said:

I would at least go for 36 GB of ram (but now you're going to need to get at least the M3 Pro). Personally, since these machines are not upgradable, I would get the max ram your budget allows, especially if you're running virtual machines.

 

@darrylmy raised a good point, and I agree about the importance of more compared to less. But given this, I figured I would chime in and mention that I am only on an M1 with 16 GB and am running Accordance on two monitors without a problem. I only recently added the second monitor and it was a real game changer for me. The computer doesn't run slow or weird, despite having a lot of Accordance workspaces and other programs open.

[mgvh]

I have Win11 and plenty of RAM in memory and on the video card. I have two 21" monitors

I usually have Accordance running full-screen on one monitor and Word or PowerPoint or whatever in the other.

When teaching over Zoom, I have PowerPoint show on the same monitor as Accordance. I share a monitor (not an app), and so it's easy to switch between the PPT and Accordance.

[Tony Lawrence]

I have a 27" iMac (2020) and a 24" Samsung second monitor. I keep Accordance open all the time on my Samsung monitor and on the other I will use Pages or Word for my word processor, or Keynote for presentations. I use the Accordance Services to auto paste into Keynote or Pages. 

 

I have a 27" iMac (2013) at home it's hard to work on one monitor. 

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

Thanks for the multiple monitor discussion!

 

I only have 16GB on my MacBook Air, but I don't do a ton of intensive work on it. I did hit a RAM limit once.

 

I've decided against the iMac with 24GB RAM. Going to wait and buy something with at least 32GB or 64GB RAM since that machine I'll be dedicating to video editing. Probably just going to keep my iMac Pro another year and see what Black Friday/Cyber Monday brings next year after Apple has all their events.

[Lawrence]

I have a 3-monitor setup at work. For translation work currently, I have UBS5 + BDAG + instant details on Accordance on one monitor, Baylor (on another platform) on another monitor, and my editing software in the middle. I tap the mouse into the editing software so I can type, then hover the mouse over unfamiliar words in UBS5 for parsing and a quick definition (pressing the ctrl key for BDAG in instant details if needed). So long as I don't click into Accordance, I can interact with it while keeping mouse/keyboard focus on the editing software.

[Sean Nelson]

7 hours ago, mgvh said:

I have Win11 and plenty of RAM in memory and on the video card. I have two 21" monitors

I usually have Accordance running full-screen on one monitor and Word or PowerPoint or whatever in the other.

When teaching over Zoom, I have PowerPoint show on the same monitor as Accordance. I share a monitor (not an app), and so it's easy to switch between the PPT and Accordance.

This is essentially my setup as I prepare for Sunday mornings.

[Mike Atnip]

I am using a triple-head setup, with 2 27" Dell 4k monitors on each side of my Surface Studio 1 (an all-in-one system). I love not having to do the constant ALT+TAB thing to switch windows. I have some workspaces set up where I can right click and do word lookups for my 11 Hebrew lexicons on the right, or to the BHQ5 with commentary and apparatus on the left, along with the MT-ETCBC apparatus and the Andersen Forbes syntax. When in Greek I have similar setups, and of course a workspace for my commentaries.
I think this setup makes the computer run on the warm side sometimes if too much is going on graphically, but for what I do it holds its own. I have had the two side monitors in vertical and horizontal positions (with workspaces for either orientation for best viewing). For Accordance I prefer vertical, but then it makes the preview difficult when using Windows File Explorer so I now run the left side horizontally. The 9/16 ratio of the side monitors would be better if it were more like the 3/2 of the Surface Studio. Both horizontally and vertically the 9/16 ratio makes for twisting my head more than I wish. As if having this luxury and I complain to have to turn my head another 10 degrees! 🙂

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

@Mike Atnip Do you like your Surface Studio?

[Mike Atnip]

14 minutes ago, Nathan Parker said:

@Mike Atnip Do you like your Surface Studio?

Yes. Like asking a Cadillac owner if he wants to go back to a Chevette. 🙂

That said, it is great for artwork. Excellent colors. Excellent pen drawing and painting with Photoshop and Corel Painter. Not so great for 4k video editing, since its very design is tailored toward graphic designers, not rendering videos. But I have done some pretty intensive 3D modeling (a large building with plenty of details) with Sketchup with no problems. And even some video rendering, but I have a Surface Book 2 that has a better GPU for that.

I have some other surface models for reading and annotating books. The Surface Go is a great little tablet for that, but the cheaper models do not have much memory. I am currently using a Surface Pro 7+ for reading and annotating with Accordance, Logos, Kindle, and PDFs. That little thing will smoke the Surface Studio 1 with its more current CPU for digitizing books using ABBYY software.

But I have been dreaming recently of the new Surface Studio 2+ with its more current CPU and GPU. Still on the light side for heavy video and gaming (which I never do anyways, why waste life?). But great for Photoshop and Sketchup and Corel Painter and the light stuff like word processing.

And Accordance!

The biggest drawback is the price tag! I, along with many others, wish Microsoft or somebody would release just the monitor so it could be paired with stronger processors as desired. I suppose there may be technical snags in making that happen, but that is beyond my understanding of what it would take to make it work.

[darrylmy]

11 hours ago, A. Smith said:

how much media work do you do and what apps?

 

@A. Smith Regarding media, I'm a radio engineer by trade and I primarily use Logic Pro X and the tools from iZotope for radio production. But even when they're not running, I run into memory pressure issues for academic work. The top apps that consume ram (in descending order) are Accordance, PDF expert with multiple PDF's open, DEVONthink Pro, Mail, Sublime Text, Finder, and (multiple research tabs from academic databases in) Safari. Hope that helps.

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

@Mike Atnip Thanks for the review!

[RayRobinson]

I recently bought a second late 2013 iMac and run it in target disc mode as a 2nd monitor. 

I run Accordance across both 27" screens with different workspaces open and am in Accordance heaven. Much better than clicking around my late model MacBook Air.

Accordance does well at window handling but there's nothing better than having it all at your fingertips across 54".

 

No problems with memory and the program runs fine. Just hoping it stays that way with updates to Accordance as Catalina is a bit long in the tooth these days.

 

Late 2013 i7, 24G ram running OSX 10.15.7 x2 with  Accordance 14.0.8

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

Nice setup! Thanks for sharing!

[Brian K. Mitchell]

This has been an interesting thread! I never imagined people were using more than one monitor.

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

I've only been using one monitor per device (but I do have three computers sitting on my desk), but I've been contemplating going multiple monitors in the future. This thread has been super beneficial!

[Mike Atnip]

25 minutes ago, Nathan Parker said:

I've only been using one monitor per device (but I do have three computers sitting on my desk), but I've been contemplating going multiple monitors in the future. This thread has been super beneficial!

If your monitors are set up for daisy-chaining, it is not that hard to do. WARNING! Once you get used to it, you will not want to go back.

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

Right now I have a M2 MacBook Air, Intel iMac Pro, and Windows PC (HP Notebook), but if Apple doesn't come through and offer an iMac with at least a Pro chip, I may go with a Mac mini or Mac Studio and go dual-displays.

 

Once I'd go for it, I know I could never go back. :-)

 

In addition to Accordance, the reason I'm curious about Parallels and multiple displays is I have two weather apps I run on my Windows notebook. During severe weather, having one on one screen and the other on the other screen would be fantastic.