Since I don’t have a Mac, I didn’t really have any solutions for him, but it got me to thinking about my own computer and monitor arrangement and how well it works for me. And, I have to give a lot of the credit to free software. See the image below for a look at my monitors and the laptop in its stand. Danny’s got a cool three-monitor stand for his screens. I’ll get there.

Sorry for the image quality, but it’s the best my iPhone could do.

Here’s quick rundown of my personal PC situation. My main work computer is an HP M9080N PC running Windows Vista. When I purchased it, I decided to max it out on hard drive space, so it’s got 1TB between the two hard drives along with a 700 GB personal media drive and a 160 GB pocket media drive.

My primary monitor includes speakers as you can see. I’m using a Tritton SEE2 USB 2.0 VGA Adapter to power a second monitor, which sits on the right of the main monitor. To the left, I have a Toshiba laptop that is provided by FramesDirect.com, who I work for as their SEO in residence. This laptop is connected to their servers by VPN for Exchange email, access to their control panels, VOIP system, etc. For a while, I had a separate wireless mouse and keyboard set up for the laptop, but as mentioned in my post Share a Mouse with Two or More PCs, using a free software tool by the name of Synergy, I am able to share the desktop PC mouse and keyboard across all three screens by way of IP addresses. It’s almost like having three monitors.

This has been lifesaver for me! No more bouncing between keyboards and, even better, cut and paste is supported. Yes, there is a Mac version. The only thing I can’t do with Synergy is drag something across screens between the desktop and laptop.

This gives me a lot of flexibility, but I needed more. I recently purchased this new desktop PC. It came with Vista Ultimate. If there has been anything that has made me consider going Mac, it’s Vista. Sorry, but I just hate it. Vista has been more unstable for me than XP ever was and all of the built in security warnings drive me nuts. Every time I try to open something, I’m warned about evil things that could happen. And, I’m constantly rebooting, which sometimes takes FOREVER!

I considered wiping Vista off the drive and installing XP, but opted to try some things first. So, considering the fact that I need to view sites in older versions of Internet Explorer for my work, I decided to download Microsoft’s free Virtual PC 2007 software and give it a try. Virtual PC 2007 lets you install different operating systems that you can run virtually. I installed my licensed version of Windows 98 SE and Internet Explorer 6 and it works like a charm – sound, Internet access, the works. It works so well that I plan to install Microsoft Office 2000, which Windows Vista spits out and tells me to fork over the bucks for Office 2007. Sorry, all I do is write letters and spreadsheets. I don’t need new software. I’ve got Office 2007 on the laptop and I despise the ribbon navigation. With Windows 98 onboard, I can run Office 2000 now.

The mouse and keyboard are shared. In other words, I can move between Vista on one screen over to Windows 98 on the other.

After a while, I found the two screens too limiting. I turned to yet another free download,VirtuaWin, which allows me to run virtual desktops (using both screens). What this does is allow me to boot up Vista as usual with my typical arrangement of applications running on the main screen and communications software like Outlook and Skype on the other. With VirtuaWin installed, I simply right click on the VirtuaWin icon in the bottom right of the screen (which indicates which desktop you are using by the position of the white square), select “Next” and I come to a fresh new desktop where I can run Windows 98 and any other software I need. So far I haven’t made use of more than two desktops, but the VirtuaWin download page indicates that you can have up to nine going at once and switch between them.

Let’s see, this gives me a virtual mouse across two PCs (three screens), two operating systems on the main PC (Vista and Windows 98 running virtually) and up to nine virtual desktops sharing two screens. Of course, XP is running on the laptop with cut and paste capability with the desktop PC.

Whew! Lots going on and all for free.

Here are these amazing utilities in easy to click order:

Synergy

Virtual PC 2007

VirtuaWin

So, with the help of some freebies, I’m content to stay with a PC for now, despite Vista’s valiant effort to chase me away. I’m able to share my keyboard and mouse with my laptop and desktop, run other operating systems as I need them and even work from nine different desktops (If I put VirtuaWin on the laptop, I’d have nine more!).

Life is good.

Multiple Monitors or PCs? Check Out These Must-Have Freebies! is a post from: SEO in The Desert | More about Palm Springs SEO

SMX BASH

Bruce Clay & Danny Sullivan (with attractive young woman – sorry, I didn’t get her name!) at SMX Bash to kick off the conference.

A shot of some of the folks enjoying the SMX Bash to kick off SMX West 2008 in Santa Clara.

Danny said that there was a lot of discussion over the bag to offer at SMX West, but they came up with a winner. Unlike the totes I got at every other conference I have been to, this one is a backpack with several compartments, totally cool and something I will use long after I leave Santa Clara. Congrats to the folks at SMX West!

Day 1

Danny Sullivan gives his take on Search 3.0, blended search, and 4.0, personalized search, in his keynote. Sorry it’s a bit blurry. Taken in the dark with my iPhone.

A pre-session photo of Search Engine Land’s Venessa Fox and Yahoo!’s Sean Suchter.

Danny Sullivan quizzed teams from the big four search engines and a team of search marketing all-stars on search history at SMX West 2008 Search Bowl.

The victorious Google team took the SMX West 2008 Search Bowl trophy, defeating teams from Yahoo, Ask, Microsoft and the SEM All-Stars.

Day 2

Chris Sherman handling the introductions for the keynote speech by Louis Monier on Day 2 of SMX West 2008 in Santa Clara.

Louis Monier, formerly with Alta Vista, eBay and Google, gave the keynote address on the past and future of search at Day 2 of SMX West 2008 in Santa Clara. Monier is currently Vice President of Products with Cuill.

Vanessa Fox, Aaron Wall, Andy Beal and Michael Gray on the panel of SEO and Blogging.

Rand Fishkin (standing), Vanessa Fox, Neil Patel, Barbara Boser and Michael Gray on the SEO and Social Media Marketing panel.

Jill Whalen (right) of High Rankings with friends at the networking event.

The SEO and User Generated Content panel. From left to right – Vanessa Fox, Rebecca Kelley, Andrew Goodman and Roger Montti.

The Google Groove party featured lots of food, drinks, entertainment booths and dancing.

Day 3

The final day of SMX West 2008 in Santa Clara featured a group keynote panel discussing Generation Next: Search in the Coming Decade. Gord Hotchkiss of Enquiro (far right) and Chris Sherman of Search Engine Land (second from right) moderated. Panelists (from left) included Brad Goldberg of Microsoft, Peter Norvig of Google and Larry Heck of Yahoo!

Detlev Johnson of SearchReturn moderated the Industrial Strength SEO panel at SMX West 2008.

Panelists for the Industrial Strength SEO session included (left to right) Martin Laetsch of SEM Director, Inc., David Roth of Yahoo! and Marshall D. Simmonds of the New York Times.

The In House SEO Issues panel (from left) included Bill Macaitis of Fox Interactive Media, Paul Bruemmer of Red Door Interactive, William Scully of Siemens, Derek Wheeler of Microsoft and Bob Tripathi of Discover Financial Services.

Jessica Bowman, formerly with Yahoo! and now an SEO consultant, moderated the In House Issues panel.

Danny Sullivan moderated the Linking Q and A panel. Included in the panel were search marketers and representatives from the top search engines – Google, Microsoft, Yahoo! and Ask.com.

From left to right: Nathan Buggia of Microsoft, Todd Malicoat of Stuntdubl, Rae Hoffman of Sugarrae Internet Consulting and Danny Sullivan.

From left to right: Danny Sullivan, Matt Cutts from Google, Priyank Garg of Yahoo! Search and Peter Linsley of Ask.com.

SMX West 2008 Wrap in Pictures is a post from: SEO in The Desert | More about Palm Springs SEO

Well, as usual, Google kicked butt and took home the trophy.

SMX West 2008 continues at the Santa Clara Convention Center with a keynote address on Wednesday morning from Louis Monier, Vice President of Products at Cuill, a new search engine attempting to set new standards in the filed of search. Monier is formerly with Google, eBay and Alta Vista.

SMX West runs through Thursday.

SMX West 2008 Search Bowl Winners – Google! is a post from: SEO in The Desert | More about Palm Springs SEO

He also gave his views on the current attempt by Microsoft to take over Yahoo (Danny really likes having three big players in search). He also touched on the idea of standards for the SEO industry and how it might be time to revisit the idea.

Sorry the photo is a bit blurry. That’s the best I could do with my iPhone in a dark room.

More sessions to come. I’ll try to post quickies like this as I can with more in depth articles to come after the conference.

Danny Sullivan SMX West Keynote is a post from: SEO in The Desert | More about Palm Springs SEO

First I got a shot of Danny and Bruce (sorry, I didn’t get the attractive young lady’s name).

Next, I just had to take a photo of the bag that Danny and company came up with for the conference. Rather than the typical tote type of bag that you get at most conferences (and that gets tossed in a closet and forgotten), the SMX West bag is a backpack full of pockets and totally cool! I heard Danny say on a recent episode of Daily Searchcast that a lot of thought and discussion went into the selection of this bag. It’s obvious the folks at SMX West wanted to provide something special and they did.
Thanks guys! I’ll be dragging this baby around for quite a while.

Last but not least is a shot of the SEO crowd enjoying the SMX Bash on Monday night.

The week promises to be terrific and more than enlightening!

SMX Bash Kickoff is a post from: SEO in The Desert | More about Palm Springs SEO