LCD Monitor Spec Q's

KVW

Im picking up a monitor in the next week as my old CRT is just not cutting it these days. Few questions on LCDs.

Contrast Ratio - How high is high enough? I will be doing gaming on this, but only older stuff, the occasional new game like Starcraft 2 whenever it comes out and maybe some WoW if the expansion is any good. Other than that, I do the occasional photoshop stuff, no major graphic designer or anything here though. I dont watch movies, but do watch anime and the occasional other downloaded video like game trailers or whatever.

Whats an acceptable contrast ratio? Cheap monitors can range from 700:1 to 1000:1. Ive seen some that are like $30-50 more and have 2000 or 3000:1 ratios, which seem a lot higher. Is there much difference between a monitor with 800:1 and 700:1 or 1000:1?


MS - Whats a good ms? Should 5ms be sufficient for the most part? Ghosting is a problem from what I understand with higher ms rates. I assume 8+ms is just a waste of time looking at. Should I focus only on monitors with 2ms?

Brand - Ive read Acer is not the greatest brand name for LCDs. Should I stick to Samsung brand LCDs? What about LG or Benq?

Artereis

I just got this monitor this week. I have absolutely zero complaints. Bestbuy doesn't carry the 20" in its stores, but I spent a good couple of weeks going in and checking the 22" out. If you're lucky, they'll have one hooked up to a demo computer so you can tweak the settings.

Honestly, I can't really see myself going much larger than a 20" widescreen, but your preferences will no doubt vary. A lot of the really high contrast ratios you're seeing are dynamic, where the monitor dims the backlight to help extend the contrast. My monitor was advertised on Newegg as a 3000:1, but apparently they've upgraded the models, because mine has a sticker claiming 5000:1. The stand could use a redesign. It's got a slight sideways wobble depending on how hard I hit my desk while typing, etc.

This is my first forway into the LCD market, and LG has made me as happy as I could expect to be. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend the monitor to anyone.

Another thing to note about Newegg. They rotate their free shipping specials on a regular basis. I missed the free shipping on this monitor the first time around, but it came back again in I think less than two weeks. I'd keep an eye on whatever monitor you decide on (if you choose to do Newegg) and see if it ever snags the free shipping.

Oh, I guess for the sake of variety, I can talk about this NEC monitor. My little brother picked it for his computer before heading off to college. It has a glossy coating on the LCD, which appeals to some people. I couldn't complain about the picture, but I was only there for two days. I would have heavily considered it if I wanted to stay at a 4:3.

Tzyr

When I was looking for monitors, I found the following two sites pretty helpful:

This is a lot of information on monitors and the different kinds. It also probably has answers to some of your questions.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/display/lcd-guide.html


This thread was nice, for it recommends monitors for different applications, and they would remove monitors that were part of the Lottery (as in, companies would release good monitor model, then would release a poor version of that model so some people might get the "good" version, while others got stuck with the "poor".

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=31&threadid=2049206&enterthread=


I ended up choosing the BenQ FP241WZ and am enjoying it. It cost 700 dollars Canadian, but, I believe it was worth spending the money on a decent monitor. When I earn more money (maybe next year), I will buy a second for dual heh

edit: Both of these links I believe were linked in the LCD monitor thread posted in G&T. Should try to find it, was pretty helpful.

Gotcha Force

KVW wrote: »

Im picking up a monitor in the next week as my old CRT is just not cutting it these days. Few questions on LCDs.

Contrast Ratio - How high is high enough? I will be doing gaming on this, but only older stuff, the occasional new game like Starcraft 2 whenever it comes out and maybe some WoW if the expansion is any good. Other than that, I do the occasional photoshop stuff, no major graphic designer or anything here though. I dont watch movies, but do watch anime and the occasional other downloaded video like game trailers or whatever.

Whats an acceptable contrast ratio? Cheap monitors can range from 700:1 to 1000:1. Ive seen some that are like $30-50 more and have 2000 or 3000:1 ratios, which seem a lot higher. Is there much difference between a monitor with 800:1 and 700:1 or 1000:1?


MS - Whats a good ms? Should 5ms be sufficient for the most part? Ghosting is a problem from what I understand with higher ms rates. I assume 8+ms is just a waste of time looking at. Should I focus only on monitors with 2ms?

Brand - Ive read Acer is not the greatest brand name for LCDs. Should I stick to Samsung brand LCDs? What about LG or Benq?

Dont pay attention to contrast ratios, response times, or really ANY specs for the monitor. The only way to tell if an LCD is good is by the type of panel inside of it.

TN-film - garbage, this comes in 19-20-21-22-24-27" all of them are bad. These monitors are the cheapest by far for a reason.
S-IPS - great, best for colors/graphic design
S(or other letters)-PVA - great, little better for games

Really just research stuff on hardforums and thats about all you need.

Fibretip

I know nothing about lcd monitors... but mine is a 12ms model, and i have never experienced "ghosting" as it's described online. I play all my games at 1280*1024 on max settings, so the load is pretty much as high as possible... and it's always been just peachy.