Multiple displays are starting to become rather commonplace. Whether you’re a programmer or graphic designer and just need the screen real estate, or just an office worker who wants to keep IM constantly visible, multiple monitors definately increase productivity.
If you’re like one of many technology junkies today, then your computer of choice may be a laptop, which severely limits your multi-mon options. Today’s laptops (and even netbooks) usually have an extra monitor port, but lugging around a full-sized LCD monitor with your laptop isn’t a feasible option. What if someone made a tiny little monitor that you could stow away in your laptop bag?
Nanovision did the thinking for you and introduced their MIMO UM-710 monitor, which is a cute little seven-inch secondary monitor. It is based on USB technology, so it is incredibly easy to hook up, and works on just about any modern computer. Unfortunately, your host computer needs a decent amount of horsepower to drive this thing, as we’ll soon see.
Features and Specifications
(compatible with Intel-based Macintoshes only)
- Screen Size: 7-inch wide
- Resolution: WVGA (800×480 pixels)
- Brightness: 350 cd/m2
- Contrast Ratio: 400:1
- Number of Colors: 16.7 million
- Video Signal: USB 2.0 High Speed
- Connector: USB Mini 5-pin B type
- Input Power: USB Power
- Feature: Auto Pivot
- Product Dimensions: 195 x 97.5 x 180.2-219 mm
- Shipment Dimension: 301 x 212 x 110 mm
On the next page we assemble the monitor and take it for a spin…
Before you can connect the display, it should be assembled. The MIMO comes with a small stand, USB cable, driver CD and a plastic knob. The back of the monitor has a threading to accept the screw on the back of the plastic knob. Just arrance the monitor so the screw fits between a slot on the included stand, and secure with the bolt. There are a few buttons on the right side of the monitor: power, brightness up and brightness down. You cannot hold down the brightness buttons, and must press them once for every level of brightness. I just keep it at the brightest available, and it still isn’t as bright as my main monitor.
Connecting the monitor to your computer is very straightforward. There is only a single USB port (located on the bottom of the display), which much be connected to any standard USB 2.0 port. You should be able to thread the USB cable through the base, but there is an inline ferrite core that prevents this. It would have been nice if a right-angle USB cable were included, so there wasn’t an unsightly cable dangling from the bottom. The monitor even receives its power from the USB cable. Once the software is installed, the display powers on upon connection of the USB cable. It takes a few seconds the first time it is plugged in, but then you can extend your desktop to the new monitor.
The monitor has an odd resolution of 800×480 pixels, so it will likely be much smaller than your normal desktop. You can only move your mouse onto the new monitor by finding the right “hole” on the right or left side of your primary monitor, so this desktop arrangement is best for windows that you don’t have to drag around very much. It works best with Windows Sidebars, gadgets, IM and chat windows. Personally I like the FrontView applciation from iMedian, which comes with the ThermalTake DH-102 HTPC case, reviewed here.
The MIMO UM-710 uses the same technology in DisplayLink video adapters (read our review here). As a matter of fact, we didn’t have to install any drivers on our test machine because we used the same machine to test the DisplayLink USB graphics adapter. In theory, the monitor has all the capabilities of your host video card, but the video signal is compressed, sent over USB, and decoded on the display.
On the next page we analyze if it’s worth your money…
I noticed that my CPU usage went up noticably while this monitor was connected, but was manageable when the screen didn’t change very much. Although you can play video on this monitor, CPU usage goes up dramatically. Even on a modern notebook, all other functions suffered considerably while video was playing. This is due to how the software works with the monitor. You can actually reduce the workload of the host computer by reducing the color depth to 16-bit, however.
Using the monitor in landscape mode is rather odd. For one, there is no auto-rotate function. Once the software is installed, you can right-click on a little icon in your taskbar to change the orientation and color depth. Once the monitor is configured to 480×800 mode, the virtual position of the desktop is lowered BELOW your normal desktop by default, which decreases the “desktop pocket” that your mouse can fit through reach the second monitor. You can easily correct this by opening Display Properties and dragging the monitor’s position to what suits you best. I found that the landscape mode works better for IM and chat windows, but moving your mouse back and forth is a real pain (basically just aim for the bottom right corner of your main monitor).
The display works well for applications that don’t require many screen refreshes, and isn’t recommended for video or gaming at all. The monitor isn’t the brightest thing in the world, and doesn’t have the best viewing angle either, but it is adequate. It certainly is cute and will certainly turn some heads. I also noticed some weird multimon caveats, like some applications not initializing if the monitor wasn’t plugged in. Uninstalling the software was buggy, too. For its price, you could easily purchase a regular monitor, so its really meant to be very portable. It works with Windows Vista and XP, and drivers exist for Macintosh (but only works with Intel-based Macs).
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