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How big of a monitor for Fusion 360?

U

Upnorth

Super User
I'm currently running dual 21" monitors for fusion 360. Works good but I want to get a bigger monitor for the main one that I draw on. My question is has anyone used a full HD 1080 monitor in the 27" size for fusion 360. If so what did you think about it?

My internet search says to go with a 24" monitor but no bigger than 27". 4K monitors are too expensive right now so I'm only looking at HD.
 
I use a 30" Dell which is certainly getting to the "maybe a bit big" level. Make sure you get as high a resolution as possible. Size is only useful if it has the resolution to match. A large TV is NOT the same as a large monitor. You can adjust the scale to make the text readable. You cannot fix not enough dots.

Brian
 
I use two 27” monitors, one is a 4k for drawings and the other is a 2560x1690 for less-critical tool bars and other low-res information.
 
bhowden said:
I use a 30" Dell which is certainly getting to the "maybe a bit big" level. Make sure you get as high a resolution as possible. Size is only useful if it has the resolution to match. A large TV is NOT the same as a large monitor. You can adjust the scale to make the text readable. You cannot fix not enough dots.

Brian
Click to expand...
I'm pretty happy with my 43 inch 4K Hisense TV used as a monitor.
It may be because I'm blind in one eye but 8.3 million pixels seems to be enough for what I look at.
And was around 350 bucks at Costco.
 
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After reading some CAD specific reviews I bought a BenQ monitor primarily for CAD & secondarily photo (not gaming). It wasn't horribly priced & I've been very happy with all aspects of it. I can get the model# but at +2 years I'm sure its already outdated. I use 2 monitors for work out of necessity but don't have the desk real estate at home. The BenQ has a split screen function which works surprisingly well but mostly I'm just quicker to flip apps the odd time required.

What usually bites 3D CAD guys is not so much the monitor but the graphics card & the rest of CPU package. Put your scoping effort & money into that otherwise its like putting shiny hubcaps on your car expecting to go faster.
 
Processing power does make quite a different the more complex your model is, from what I understand fusion 360 is more CPU dependant than GPU dependant, so if an upgrade is in your path spend the cash on the processor and get a mid tier GPU
 
My 32" curved screen purpose bought for Flight Simulator 2020 doubles as my CAD monitor. I think its fine. You can always downsize the window if you think it's too big.

Although I'm no Fusion wizard, we did use HUGE screens to run Catia before I retired. Everyone forgets about windows to show many things at once.

As others have said, the resolution matters much more than the screen size.
 
phaxtris said:
Processing power does make quite a different the more complex your model is, from what I understand fusion 360 is more CPU dependant than GPU dependant, so if an upgrade is in your path spend the cash on the processor and get a mid tier GPU
Click to expand...
I don't think fusion requires much in the way of processing power. Doing normal shop stuff works fine on my 12 year old gaming computer with an ancient graphics card. The only time my old computer seems really slow is when rendering. My new computer is lightening fast compared to the old one. Startup time is much faster on the new PC with a solid state drive also.
 
My main computer is a 15” laptop, with as high a resolution as was available (5 or so years ago).

Sure it would be nice to have a bigger monitor, but this seemed to work more than fine. So it was a trade off between portability and size.

Much more useful to me was a space mouse navigator, that made navigating so easy that screen size didn’t seem to matter.
 
Upnorth said:
I don't think fusion requires much in the way of processing power. Doing normal shop stuff works fine on my 12 year old gaming computer with an ancient graphics card. The only time my old computer seems really slow is when rendering. My new computer is lightening fast compared to the old one. Startup time is much faster on the new PC with a solid state drive also.
Click to expand...

Small things with low numbers of body's work fine on older PC's, once you open something with lots of bodies and start changing variables the lack of processing power really shows up
 
StevSmar said:
Much more useful to me was a space mouse navigator, that made navigating so easy that screen size didn’t seem to matter.
Click to expand...

Please tell us more about your mouse and why you like it so much. I'm still using a regular Logitech Gaming Mouse and I keep hearing that CAD mice are WAAAY better. But few explain why.
 
At home I use a 27" 4k monitor for SolidWorks. I personally wouldn't go any smaller in either physical size or resolution, but I also not infrequently work on relatively large and complex parts/assemblies.

I've also got two 27" 1080p monitors in addition to the single 4k. One is vertical/portrait mode on the left side - set up for reading reference material/how-to's, help files, etc. The other is positioned horizontally above the 4k, and usually has excel or other notes or calculations systems.

If I had a blank cheque for a monitor setup, I'd probably go for a dual 32" curved 4k setup, possibly with one or two vertical monitors on the sides for documents.

I've got a spacemouse, but find it mostly useful on large assemblies. My carpal was flaring up quite a bit some time ago, so I picked up an Elecom Huge trackball and swapped it for my mouse. It feels like a more natural way to manipulate models than a mouse, and I haven't used my spacemouse since.
 
Susquatch said:
Please tell us more about your mouse and why you like it so much.
Click to expand...
Getting a SpaceMouse was a revelation!!!! If I was to choose between a bigger monitor or a SpaceMouse, I’d get the mouse

Instead of using a mouse to navigate, it’s a control that allows you to navigate easily and intuitively. Funny, because it is so intuitive I can’t remember the exact way I use it.
It make it soooo easy to:
- zoom in/out.
- rotate left/right.
- pan around.
The only view control I use is “zoom to extents” when I get lost and I need to reset the view.

I have an older version of this control:
SpaceMouse Compact
Perhaps I’d get the wireless one now, if the wireless is rechargeable.
The buttons are configurable so you can add commands to them (if I recall correctly 4 commands per button?).

Edit: The SpaceMouse sits in one spot, it’s not like a mouse that moves side to side. More like a joystick than a mouse. So perhaps wireless isn’t really desirable like it is for a mouse.
 
I use three monitors. For electronic design this works okay; schematic on one, PCB on another and the third for everything else ( part searching, data sheet, spreadsheet or whatever.

There are times it would be handy to have more visual space, but I don't have infinite room for monitors. Go BIG or go home.
 
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