LCD Monitor upgrade

[Zelpo]

Howdy all ... I know this has probably been asked many many times before, but here goes ...

Looking to upgrade my main PC monitor. Currently using a LG L1981Q 19" LCD (http://www.digitaltrends.com/product-reviews/lg-l1981q-review/), but with all the (cheap!) widescreens running around today, I figure it's a good time to expand the monitor real estate :)

My head just swims when I research this. After many hours of reading newegg reviews, various forum browsing, exercising my best google-foo, etc., I thought I had my mind made up on a couple of them, namely the Samsung P2370 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824001330&Tpk=P2370) which is a current 23" model with a reasonable price, at least compared to what I shelled out for the ol' LG I have.

So I perused down to Costco, Best Buy, and the local Office Depot to check out monitors. While almost all of the current crop displays are downright gorgeous, two things are bugging me.

One: how will these things perform with games? All the attributes these monitors are based on have my head swimming, and no doubt the manufactures skew the #s to there benefit.

& Two: what's up with all the flimsy wanna-be stands these engineering wonders are connected to? Not to rant too hard on this subject, but I *almost* purchased that P2370 on the Egg sight unseen, and after seeing the stand it's attached to first-hand, I'm glad I didn't. While purdy, it barely supports the monitor! All that shiny black is a fingerprint & dust magnet, and from an Amazon vid review it scratches up good after the first cleaning. And the lack of tilt & height adjustment had me scratching my head. I know it's an abused display model, but it was leaning forward and I couldn't get it to tilt back to a proper viewing angle. So I looked at other monitors, and they are almost all like that! My current monitor will adjust to all sorts of positions like a ballet dancer, and cleans up with nary a blemish. Did these attributes go out of style, and I missed the boat?

Price wise, I'd like to limit it to ~$500, but not opposed to a cheap(er) ~$200 model if it'll fit my needs.

Does 60Hz vs. 120 Hz really make a difference with ghosting and such on games?

Looking for some opinions on what a serious PC gaming crowd is using now-a-days. I'm a bit clueless as I've been out of the monitor game for several years now.

Any opinions on the Dell U2410 (http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?sku=320-8277&cs=19&c=us&l=en&dgc=SS&cid=39715&lid=1003769)? Not sure how it'll do w/games, but damn that's one fine functional stand lol

Mucho thanks! :cool:

[Machinus]

IPS has the best color and appearance, and pretty good response time. PVA is pretty good color and varying response time. TN has poor color but is the fastest; id recommend getting a 24/26+ *-IPS panel. inputs and stand etc. are personal preference

[AliG]

you should have bought one on black friday, there were a couple of steals. I would wait until Xmas, I'd be willing to bet most of those deals will come back.

here are a couple of suggestions(in increasing of value order)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824009179
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824236047
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824005126
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824001281
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824254043
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824005127

for fun
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824005115
this is not realistic, but man is it beautiful
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824236075
I like this one purely because of the contrast ratio and that it's led, but the stand looks horrible

[Teemax]

Be careful with Samsung, some Samsung models have really bad input lag (input lag = the time it takes for the LCD to process the signal, not to be confused with response time). Unfortunately, I haven't seen a "professional review" on monitor that includes this important, but difficult to measure, characteristic.

[AliG]

there are some reviews that use some software to calculate the response time, however I have never seen anything for input lag

[[XC] Synthetickiller]

IMHO, I'd stay away from 1080p monitors. The vertical real estate you lose out on is not worth it, especially if you use the computer for spreadsheets, word docs, internet browsing. It just helps.

Here's the thing, once you go over 24", 1920x1200 doesn't really change besides the fact that the dot pitch increases (bigger pixels). I thought it would be a real issue, but going from a 24" to a 25.5", I wouldn't go back to a 24" for a primary screen UNLESS I wanted images to look sharper due to smaller pixels.

What card do you plan on driving a monitor with? If you are using HD4000 or HD5000 series, gtx260/275/280/285/295, you should be fine with a 1920x1200. I'd stay away from 1080p b/c you pay the same basically for fewer pixels.

[Teemax]

I've had my Samsung SyncMaster 226BW for 2 years now and have never experienced any input lag to speak of (because it's a TN panel, of course). Read the monitor reviews on bit-tech (http://www.bit-tech.net), they usually look at input lag since a lot of the ones they review are IPS or PVA panels.

Personally I've been looking at HP LP2475w and Dell U2410 since I'm looking for a 24" 1920x1200 IPS screen at the moment. The problem is that I hate Dell for whatever personal reasons so I make every effort to not give them any of my money... but I'm willing to relent this once if I find convincing evidence that it really is the better of the two screens.

Anyway, bear in mind that most of the cheapo TN screens out there are 72% gamut (especially the very tempting "full HD" 1920x1080 screens that are out there for about $300 at the moment) so they're useless for anything other than e-mail and youtube. A good TN panel that's been properly calibrated can get anywhere between 83%-92% gamut, depending on the actual panel, lighting conditions, and the dithering algorithm (my 226BW does very well in this regard). These "good" TN panels are very hard to find anymore, but these are the ones with colors that really pop for movie-watching and gaming.

On the other hand, remember that the IPS and PVA panels are mostly for the Photoshop-using crowd, so these are wide gamut panels, usually 102%-133%, and will only be useful in a color-managed environment. Unfortunately it also means that your colors will be awful for movies and games, and reds and greens on websites will be way too bright. In Photoshop however everything will look perfect.

If you're really looking for just a plain old daily driver, stick to 22" TN, it'll save you a bundle and you won't have to deal with color profiles and input lag. The 24" TNs are tempting, but the viewing angles are such that even if you're looking at it dead-center, the colors are untrue at the edges because the panel is so large.

If you're looking for an accurate display with good angles, stick to 24" IPS since anything larger is uber-expensive. Try to find one with an sRGB mode if you want truer colors for everyday use or look for one without a scaler if you're looking for low input lag (the only panel that I can think of off the top of my head where you can disable the scaler is the Dell 3007wfp, I think there may be others though).

Not all IPS monitors have high gammut :) And a high gamut can be "tweaked" for marketing (dithering); some TN panels claim outrageous gamut range, so take the marketing numbers with a lot of salt...

I seconded the quality of Samsung 226BW if you have the Samsung panel. I have a Samsung 226CW (basically a 226BW with a guaranteed Samsung panel), and it's a good monitor. Tested 226CW against my Dell 3007WFP and they basically have the same input lag.

As for the 3007WFP, there's nothing to disable in the scaler ;) It's an incredibly simple monitor with just 1 DVI input and 2 resolutions: 2560x1600 and 1280x800. Therefore, input lag is excellent and the 3007WFP is still a rare gem for 30" gaming ;)

[Teemax]

Synthetickiller;4167948']IMHO, I'd stay away from 1080p monitors. The vertical real estate you lose out on is not worth it, especially if you use the computer for spreadsheets, word docs, internet browsing. It just helps.

Here's the thing, once you go over 24", 1920x1200 doesn't really change besides the fact that the dot pitch increases (bigger pixels). I thought it would be a real issue, but going from a 24" to a 25.5", I wouldn't go back to a 24" for a primary screen UNLESS I wanted images to look sharper due to smaller pixels.

What card do you plan on driving a monitor with? If you are using HD4000 or HD5000 series, gtx260/275/280/285/295, you should be fine with a 1920x1200. I'd stay away from 1080p b/c you pay the same basically for fewer pixels.

16:9 ratio is primarily a step to further cut LCD production cost... You get less screen area for the same diagonal measure.

Frankly, I don't think 16:9 makes a difference in gaming or movie watching. Only when you get to productivity activities (programming, editting, photoshop, etc) that the missing vertical space hurts.

[AliG]

Synthetickiller;4167948']IMHO, I'd stay away from 1080p monitors. The vertical real estate you lose out on is not worth it, especially if you use the computer for spreadsheets, word docs, internet browsing. It just helps.

Here's the thing, once you go over 24", 1920x1200 doesn't really change besides the fact that the dot pitch increases (bigger pixels). I thought it would be a real issue, but going from a 24" to a 25.5", I wouldn't go back to a 24" for a primary screen UNLESS I wanted images to look sharper due to smaller pixels.

What card do you plan on driving a monitor with? If you are using HD4000 or HD5000 series, gtx260/275/280/285/295, you should be fine with a 1920x1200. I'd stay away from 1080p b/c you pay the same basically for fewer pixels.
I know that, but good 16:10 monitors are getting harder to find.

Everything new is 16:9, which I think is bull:banana::banana::banana::banana: for the reasons you named, but they also have much better contrast ratios than the older 16:10 monitors, and a lot of them also have lower responce times. It's a tradeoff, but I think the new monitors are more worth it in the end because it's much cheaper to get a big 25.5" etc monitor than was back when I bought my 24"

[STEvil]

60hz vs 120hz is not about ghosting. It is about how many frames per second your monitor can accept from your PC. The problem is that many of the 120hz and up monitors dont actually support more than 60hz. They use frame interpolation to "create" 120hz+. Look carefully before you buy or you wont get 120hz.

[WaterFlex]

This is much more better (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824005134)

[AliG]

This is much more better (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824005134)

more better than what? that makes no sense grammarically

If you were insinuating the 23" led I brought up, well mine had a higher contrast ratio, same 2ms gtg, same resolution, and is $100 cheaper:rolleyes:

[Zelpo]

Thanks for the replies ... should of mentioned, the monitor will be strictly for PC use, no TV tuner or HDMI needed, nor speakers etc. I just want a smokin' monitor for gaming. And a decent stand should be attached, imo.

I have no idea what gamut is & such, I'll have to do some research on this kind of stuff. I'll stick to looking for 16:10 ratios / 1920x1200.