HDTV or monitor

Dangerous

Sorry if this has been answered a million times before, but a quick search didn't turn up anything. I'm looking for a HD display for under $300 to play xbox 360 on. We have a 50" rear projection tv in the basement but I want something smaller for my room.

For that price 22" sounds like a decent size. I was just wondering if I should really get a HDTV or would I be fine playing it on a monitor? I already have the VGA cable for my 360 so that's not a problem. 22" widescreen monitors for the most part are a hell of a lot cheaper around here than HDTVs of the same size. Is there a reason for that, and would there be a big difference in image quality? I don't plan to use it for watching tv. Just playing 360 and maybe watching a few movies. Any advice would be great.

darkenedwing

for what you want a monitor would be much better, and you dont need a VGA cable either because some monitors come with component imputs (for that HD gaming goodness )
And for $300 the quality of the monitor would be much better than an HDTV. the sceen would probably be 1050p on a 22" monitor, while the screen on a $300 HDTV would be 720p, probably.
thats like... 300 more p's :P

protozoider

There are some 1080p HDMI monitors out there under $300. There's a decent 21" Acer at $199 1080p. It's not the greatest monitor but it's really low price, has a good picture, and a 5ms response. There are other better brands below 300 but you're still looking at over $400 for the majority of HD monitors. If you have a 360 with component cable, that's going to be a little harder to find a montor for under 300, but they are out there. I would recommend getting an HD capable monitor over using the VGA.

Photon

Keep in mind that those monitors protozoider mentioned only support 1080p as an input, the native resolution will be lower and the image will be downscaled, this may still look pretty good depending on the quality of the scaler, but you arent really getting 1080p.

MrMonroe

A TV is a computer monitor with a TV tuner installed, meaning that it can filter one single channel signal from a cable wire or an antenna. The specifications are all run on the same scale, so if you have two items with exactly similar specifications but one is labeled "TV" and the other is labeled "Monitor," all it means is that one can pick up television and the other can't without a separate tuner.

Also, IIRC, 22" does some funny things about resolution, where it's the same number of pixels as a 20" screen. Essentially it's exactly the same as a 20" when you sit an extra foot away. If you have good eyes, this is a good thing. If you have bad eyes, it is a bad thing. If someone else can elaborate on this past my memory that would be good.

darkenedwing

Photon wrote: »

Keep in mind that those monitors protozoider mentioned only support 1080p as an input, the native resolution will be lower and the image will be downscaled, this may still look pretty good depending on the quality of the scaler, but you arent really getting 1080p.

This.
The standard for 22" monitors is 1650x1050(1050p) I believe, and at 24" its 1920x1200 (1200p). "1080p" is a 16:9 resolution, while a lot of monitors use 16:10.

Photon

darkenedwing wrote: »

Photon wrote: »

Keep in mind that those monitors protozoider mentioned only support 1080p as an input, the native resolution will be lower and the image will be downscaled, this may still look pretty good depending on the quality of the scaler, but you arent really getting 1080p.

This.
The standard for 22" monitors is 1650x1050(1050p) I believe, and at 24" its 1920x1200 (1200p). "1080p" is a 16:9 resolution, while a lot of monitors use 16:10.

1680x1050, but yep. Alot of cheap monitors will just stretch the 16:9 image vertically, which personally i hate, whereas others will give the option to preserve the aspect ratio while scaling, meaning you will get small black bars at the top and bottom but the image is in proportion. Its important to check out the scaling modes the monitor supports depending of which of these you would prefer (or if it bothers you at all).

Saying that i was perfectly happy playing my 360 on my 22" samsung, (this was a 1080p image, downscaled and stretched to fit the screen so the aspect was dodgy) till i started working at HP and got staff discount on my 24" beast :winky:

Desriel

I had much the same debate for myself, I decided to go for the monitor as not only would I have a kick-ass gaming monitor I'd have a kick-ass PC monitor for my PC, and widescreen, so I could enjoy more Hulu goodness and better screen sizes in Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Visual Studio etc.

I would definitely look for a monitor with multiple inputs, though, to get the most of it. I picked up an LG 22" and I have one DVI input for the PC and the other for the 360, which lets me switch between both with the push of a button rather than having to switch the cable. For audio I just run it through the SPDIF in on my sound card (which screws up the sound when I try to play a movie DVD for some reason, dolby encoding maybe? but otherwise its ok)

Since the controllers are wireless it doesn't really matter where the box is, it's nifty to pause, push the source button, and go to Gamefaqs =(

Dangerous

Thanks for the advice, guys. I was also thinking about using the monitor for my PC as well and selling off my old one.

For inputs, is there a noticeable difference between VGA, HDMI and component on most 22 inch monitors? I use my old 17 inch HP monitor with VGA input and it looks quite good even though it only supports up to 1280x1024 resolution.

expendable

Photon wrote: »

darkenedwing wrote: »

Photon wrote: »

Keep in mind that those monitors protozoider mentioned only support 1080p as an input, the native resolution will be lower and the image will be downscaled, this may still look pretty good depending on the quality of the scaler, but you arent really getting 1080p.

This.
The standard for 22" monitors is 1650x1050(1050p) I believe, and at 24" its 1920x1200 (1200p). "1080p" is a 16:9 resolution, while a lot of monitors use 16:10.

1680x1050, but yep. Alot of cheap monitors will just stretch the 16:9 image vertically, which personally i hate, whereas others will give the option to preserve the aspect ratio while scaling, meaning you will get small black bars at the top and bottom but the image is in proportion. Its important to check out the scaling modes the monitor supports depending of which of these you would prefer (or if it bothers you at all).

Saying that i was perfectly happy playing my 360 on my 22" samsung, (this was a 1080p image, downscaled and stretched to fit the screen so the aspect was dodgy) till i started working at HP and got staff discount on my 24" beast :winky:

Isn't there something in the new dashboard update about 16:10 support?

Photon

expendable wrote: »

Isn't there something in the new dashboard update about 16:10 support?

That's awesome i didn't realise that ... presumably it adds black bars? I would have killed for that on my old monitor.

Jelloblimp

Photon wrote: »

Keep in mind that those monitors protozoider mentioned only support 1080p as an input, the native resolution will be lower and the image will be downscaled, this may still look pretty good depending on the quality of the scaler, but you arent really getting 1080p.

Does this always apply? I have been looking at this one: Fujitsu-Siemens AMILO Display L 3220T, pdf-file
.Says "Pixels 1920x1080" and "Pixels expanded: 1280x768", which I don't really get.(And why have piddly 1,5W speakers on it o_O ).


Yes the dashboard update on the 19Th adds 16:10 support (along with being able to save disc images on the harddrive among other features).

archonwarp

Jelloblimp wrote: »

Photon wrote: »

Keep in mind that those monitors protozoider mentioned only support 1080p as an input, the native resolution will be lower and the image will be downscaled, this may still look pretty good depending on the quality of the scaler, but you arent really getting 1080p.

Does this always apply? I have been looking at this one: Fujitsu-Siemens AMILO Display L 3220T, pdf-file
.Says "Pixels 1920x1080" and "Pixels expanded: 1280x768", which I don't really get.(And why have piddly 1,5W speakers on it o_O ).


Yes the dashboard update on the 19Th adds 16:10 support (along with being able to save disc images on the harddrive among other features).

I think what that means is that it has 1920x1080 pixels, but that it doesn't do 1:1 pixel mapping, and will instead throw a 1280x768 image up there. I could be wrong though.

Elementalor

Don't the panels they put in TV's have better viewing angles? Especially vertical. I think that's the main differentiation. But if you're going to sit in front of the monitor when you play, then getting a monitor is a good deal. I'd go for a 24" with at least 1080p res.