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movax
Aug 30, 2008

smug forum rear end in a top hat posted:

He mistyped, the U2311H is 1920x1080 :)

Yeah, I messed up, sorry!

Basically, we're approaching the point where upper-midrange cards do just fine at 1920x1080/1920x1200, and the ultra high-end cards are for people at 2560x1600, or doing Eyefinity/multi-monitor/3D gaming. (Some say this is because consoles have stagnated progress for the past 4 years, so PC folks are doing new things with their extra horsepower, like 3D and multi-monitors).

In the past, midrange cards would do just fine for folks with 22" 1680x1050 monitors (or their 4:3 LCDs that came with Dells/HPs/whatever) whilst people with "holy poo poo 1920x1200 24"" would go for the high-end. My old 8800GTS did great at 1680x1050, but going higher started to make it suffer. Now the midrange gives no fucks about 1920x1200, and everyone really seems to be benchmarking at 2560x1600 these days. I like HardOCP's videocard reviews because they specifically tell you what settings they could use whilst still keeping the game playable.

Personally, the game I really want to be able to enjoy this year is Mass Effect 3. I have 0 doubt that my 460 will be able to run it at 1920x1200, but I will definitely have to sacrifice eye candy (AA and AF) if I want to run it at native res of 2560x1600. I bought my 460 before I bought my U3011 :downs:

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movax
Aug 30, 2008

fyallm posted:

So if I go with the u2311h, and run in 1920x1080, is it worth it to grab the 560ti?

I would say that card would handle 99% of the titles released from 1980 to the end of this year. (with the end of year titles perhaps necessitating slight overclocking or performance tweaking. Worst case, no eye candy).

E: vv I'm not factoring in pricing though, that's your prerogative. The 460 will do fine too, but you'll definitely have to overclock it a bit, but it's essentially obsolete.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

brainwrinkle posted:

Nope, measuring my graphics memory usage with EVGA Precision shows it going up about 20 megabytes after opening a Youtube window or 30 megabytes for Hulu. There's no real need for 2 GB video memory at 1920x1080.

1GB is the sane amount for 1920x1080/1920x1200. If you have 2GB, you might be able to turn on SUPER MEGA TEXTURES mode or something, and that's about it. (IIRC, copious amounts of VRAM help out with AF as well, but at some point your GPU itself will limit that as well).

movax
Aug 30, 2008

fyallm posted:

So I know I said I was going with the U2311H but I really want 1920*1200 . What are you guys views on the HP Compaq LA2405wg 24" Widescreen LCD Monitor - 1920 x 1200, 1000:1 Native, 5ms, 60Hz, Tilt, Swivel, VGA, DVI?

Haven't heard of that one before. At that price point, it's certainly not an IPS panel, which isn't a big deal if you're not big into photography or something, and just want a decent all around monitor. I would still say that the Dell is a better choice because of their amazing warranty and Premium Panel guarantee.

e: vv DrDork wasn't lazy and did more research, it is TN, I'd stay away from it.

Star Wars Sex Parrot, is there a graphics card megathread, or is it rolled into the sticky system parts thread?

movax fucked around with this message at 23:02 on Mar 10, 2011

movax
Aug 30, 2008

DrDork posted:

If you go and look at one of the MacBookPro screens (which are IPS), or poo poo, even the iPad, and then compare that to the wall of TN monitors at BestBuy or where ever, you should get a decent idea of what I'm talking about.

Macbook Pros don't have IPS screens (yes, it's absolutely retarded that a $2000 laptop has a loving TN panel), but iPad/iPhone do.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Tab8715 posted:

Uh, what? I'm pretty sure you're 100% incorrect, I tried googling a bit but I repair plenty of macs for a year or two and the screens are much better than opposed laptops.

They are definitely not IPS; colors shift when you move vertically and the viewing angles aren't the best. Most threads I've found say "maybe we'll get IPS this refresh! :eng101:" followed by "nope, not IPS :eng99:"

They are better than most other TN-based laptops though, I don't know if it's a function of coating, the glass, or something else, but they're still TN in the end.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

DrDork posted:

Ugh. Yeah. Too early in the morning for me. I mean the iMac, not the MacBookPro. They sit right next to each other on the tables, close enough drat it!

So :gay:! But yeah, iMac (post-2009 I think?), iPad and 4G iPhones/iPods (I think) all sport IPS displays. Maybe next refresh for the MBPs :(

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Nonpython posted:

Speaking of this, what laptop does get a visit from the IPS fairy?

HP's DreamColor(?, DreamDisplay maybe) are IPS-sporting. They are also HP's, unfortunately.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

kuddles posted:

Yeah, this is part of the Asus product line that tries to go the route of Apple in being super stylized for the hell of it, being as light and skinny as possible, and not having a lot of input options. Still, Asus's screen quality is usually pretty decent considering their price, as is their return policy on dead pixels, so I'm mostly curious if there's something we can recommend other than just any old TN panel when someone on a strict budget comes in here asking and can't wait until another random U2311H sale.

I'm pretty comfortable recommending Asus or Sammy, with the latter having pretty solid PVA panels, just not the greatest pricing. If anyone has a specific model in mind to recommend, let's discuss it here and then add it to the OP.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Bret Hart posted:

For those of you who have 27" and above, how do you browse the web? Especially forums. I have to look at the right and left side of my wallpaper constantly and there are only a few out there that don't bother me to death. I wish I could maximize my browser all the way but that poo poo is just way too wide to look at threads way to the left.

Right now I have a Firefox window maximized on a 2209WA sideways (1050x1680), with U3011 just kinda open as my general desktop area (various programs running).

Doing win key + right on the window on my U3011 makes it pretty viewable too, results in a 1280x1600 browser window, still pretty bitchin.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

probably drunk posted:

I just got a 2407wfp A04, the non HC version for $200. Was this a good deal?

A 24" monitor for $200 ain't bad. A 24" 1920x1200 display for $200 is better. A Dell UltraSharp 24" 1920x1200 display for $200 is awesome.

If you got a S-IPS screen in there then even better yet.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Rirse posted:

Thinking about getting a second monitor for watching videos and leaving IRC running on. My ATI Radeon 4870 512mb graphic card has two slots for performing this, but would I have to upgrade the card if I play on playing a game in one window while videos play on the other? Currently have a 500 watt PSU, 4 GB of ram, and 3 GHZ dual core. My current monitor is a 21' inch that runs on 1920 x 1080 and probably will get another monitor in that same resolution or slightly less.

The card won't suffer, but Windows can do some interesting things when it comes to multiple monitors, video playback and full-screening. Some games shift around your windows and such when they go fullscreen. As for video playback, it depends on the output mixer...VMR7, VMR9, Overlay, EVR, Haali's, etc. One of those should be able to maintain a fullscreen video while you play a game.

Probably suffer a minor loss in performance from the GPU, but you will of course take a CPU hit, assuming it's H.264 video.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Red87 posted:

Postin' from the U2711. My god is it beautiful. Not quite up to the standard of the Apple Cinema Display but the height adjustment and multitude of inputs edged it out, even though I preferred the gloss. My single GTX 560 is struggling a bit at 2560x1440, so I was considering throwing a second in. It'd still be cheaper than a single 580 would have been.
What titles? Dropping AA and AF down helps a lot. My 1GB 460 is still surviving at that resolution with most newer titles set to 2x AA or so.

NOISIA posted:

This seems like the best place to ask: I have my computer and game consoles connected via an HDMI switch which is then connected to my monitor with a HTMI -> DVI-A adapter. It's a bit of a mess, but the monitor I'm using right now doesn't support multiple inputs, and I happened to have an HDMI switch lying around.

My problem is that, when I switch the display from the computer to a console, it temporarily resets the resolution to 800x600. Is there anything I can do to prevent that?
Your Windows resolution gets reset to 800x600? I will safely guess there is some EDID or similar fuckery going on when that switch switches input sources.

Also, did you typo DVI-A or did you mean DVI-A? Because that could be an issue too, as that means there is D/A transcoding occuring.

Aphal posted:

Edit2: That gamma is all fine and dandy until I run any game in fullscreen, and they overrule my gamma settings. Putting the in-game gamma setting in some games all the way to the lowest possible is still not enough to get the gamma on this thing as low as it is on the desktop, so some games are just washed out and there's nothing to do about it.
Your problem looks like classic black levels gone wrong somewhere, like 0-255 vs. 16-255. Any setting like that on your display/GPU control panel? (Black Level: PC/TV, you want PC).

VerySolidSnake posted:

It seems that the Dell monitors are the most popular in here, but what about a sub-Dell monitor? I'm not going to be very picky since it will be used primarily for coding and testing websites. So when we jump down another price bracket, what kinds of monitors do you recommend for 23-24"? I noticed the Acer's and Samsungs are almost 50% lower in price.
Acer, Samsung, Asus are all pretty solid. I'd get something that will be easy to RMA if needed, so maybe buy from a brick and mortar store, or find an e-tailer with a good dead pixel/panel exchange program.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

smug forum rear end in a top hat posted:

The controls on my U2311h are suddenly very unresponsive and the unit takes a long time to power on from standby mode :sigh:

e: I turned it off, then on, and got five minutes of static (pic). I unplugged it, and plugged it back in, and the static is gone, but the controls still don't work. Pressing any of them either doesn't work, or displays a lock icon on the screen (about 50% on each).

Looks like it's hosed. Call Dell and get an advance RMA, it will be overnight or 2-day at most. Put dead monitor in box, take to FedEx location, done.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

DinosaurHouseParty posted:

What is the difference between MVA vs IPS? From the stats is appears the MVA panel refreshes at a higher frequency.

1st post posted:

IPS/S-IPS/eIPS/H-IPS - (variant) In-Plane Switching.
These displays offer the best color reproduction LCDs have to offer. IPS is the granddaddy tech, most "IPS" panels these days are Super-IPS or some proprietary brew of it (eIPS, AS-IPS, P-IPS, etc). The viewing angles are amazing compared to TN; you could actually have people beside you see what's on the screen without it being washed out. Naturally, the catch is that response time can suck (and it really did on the early models), and it's pricier that TN-based panels. Response times have improved in recent models. Dead pixels are black for this tech.

"High-end" monitors are almost always some IPS variant, and graphics designers/gurus love these monitors because color is important to their work. Enthusiasts and programmers like these for viewing angles and rich color.

MVA/PVA/VA - Vertical Alignment Technology (multi-domain or patterned)
This is the compromise technology. These are basically in the middle of TN and IPS. They have good viewing angles (slightly under IPS), very good blacks (better than IPS and TN), slow pixel response (sometimes slower than IPS; this is mitigated with "overdrive"/"magic speed" tech, depending on brand). PVAs will offer the best black-depth; sony Bravia models utilize PVA panels. However, you may note the name of this technology, VERTICAL alignment. Tilting a *VA-based monitor into portrait mode, depending on panel, could be a terrible idea. (Anectodal: My P-MVA Gateway looked like rear end in portrait mode, but was just fine in landscape.)

So basically, MVA is perfect for mid-range monitors with good colors, but without the terrible viewing angles like TN. That Asus wouldn't be a bad idea for the all around user who does a little of everything, and who doesn't have a livelihood/serious hobby riding on hyper-accurate color reproduction.

Eagerly awaiting any goon reports of these two Asus monitors.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Aredna posted:

Shamelessly stolen from Hardforum.com, but this is the best summary I've seen on the different types of LCDs:

Congratulations, you posted essentially the same content as the first post of this very thread.

Fingers McGee posted:

I pulled the trigger on the ZR24W. Ordered from B&H for 399 shipped. Since its close to me ground shipping will still get it here in a few days. So a good deal overall and put it in a good area between my other options.
Not a bad price at all, and B&H has pretty good customer service, so you should be covered if it shows up with a terrible amount of dead pixels or murdered from shipping.

Ledneh posted:

I'm thinking about going out and replacing my Samsung T220HD with something a bit larger. Take a look at 120hz screens, and LED LCDs. I imagine I'm going to spend a lot of money, though, so I want to know it's worth it.

How do you folks feel about the T220HD I have now? Worth upgrading to one of the monitors mentioned in the OP (or newer versions)? P

retty much all I do is gaming and (very) light programming and other typing.

I think your T220HD is fine what what you are doing, certainly. Based on your description of intended usage though, I don't think the UltraSharps are what you want; you could perhaps look at Sammy or Asus offerings in the 24" range. You'll get PVA or MVA panels, and both of those makers implement their own special sauce to improve response times, so you should little to no effect on your gaming.

120Hz is trickier; do you have a GPU setup that's going to push above 60FPS at high resolutions in most titles?

movax
Aug 30, 2008

spasticColon posted:

I think my 3 year old BenQ G2400WD might be making GBS threads the bed because it goes into standby randomly and and I have to power cycle it for it to come back and its making a humming or buzzing sound off and on. Is it hosed?

Edit: And if its hosed, what's a good affordable replacement? I would use the monitor for mostly gaming and internet on a GTX 460 1GB video card.

Sounds like failing capacitor(s) to me, do you have a local hackerspace/electronic geek hangout/friend? It would be a very cheap fix.

If not, look for Samsung or Acer offerings in the 24" range. U2410 and ZR24w are nice, but I don't think they are suited for your use case.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

spasticColon posted:

So what's the deal with my monitor? I reinstalled the video card drivers because I had my system on my HDTV via HDMI and that seemed to solve the monitor getting stuck in standby issue but it still hums and the screen still flickers when I turn down the brightness from maximum. And if I turn on Dynamic Contrast the monitor really hums and even buzzes. I know little on how LCD monitors work so what is going on here?

Edit: And where are the 120Hz LCD monitors on Newegg?

It's your backlight inverter; poorly designed/near-failing backlight power supplies are over-stressed when forced to dim; I used to have a Motorola Razr whose screen killed itself in a month because I ran it at minimum brightness. Some switching supply somewhere is probably under a lot of stress bucking voltage to dim your screen, whereas max brightness is much easier to tolerate.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

metachronos posted:

Well I think my current monitor is gonna bite it soon so I'm looking at the u2211. The 23" is $50 more, what should I do?

I'd get the 23", personally.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Master Stur posted:

How easy is it to replace the power adapter on a BX2331? I'm positive mine has gone bad, but Samsung support has no option to register/service request this monitor without calling them. It should be a simple switch and replace, but for some reason mine is glued in with epoxy :argh:

By 'power adapter' do you mean the power supply inside the monitor? If you're planning on buying a replacement board, just rip that sucker out of there (after disconnecting all the wires/connectors going to it) and put in the new one. Use heat to help fight the epoxy (hair dryer, heat gun, etc).

movax
Aug 30, 2008

SpaceDrake posted:

Completely excellent, thank you gentlemen. I'll probably just run out and see if my local reasonably-priced computer/AV shop has a converter plug available since I'm a babby who doesn't like waiting for shipping :v: That's one attractive price on Monoprice, though.


I figured it'd be as such, I'd only want to have the NES running alongside the PC for example, so that's no problem. Now I just need to find a AC adapter with a plug that'll actually fit into my old Ninty :ohdear:

Anyway, thanks gents, this helps tremendously.

For your RCA jack question, it probably boils down to no room/a PITA on the PCB to put two RCA jacks on there and their associated circuitry/filters.

But yes, PIP on a U3011 is pretty :awesome:

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Captain Walker posted:

I want to hook up an Xbox 360 into a monitor via HDMI input and put it in my room so I don't have to go down to the den to play games. Is this a feasible plan, and if so what would I need to do to Make It Work?

Very feasible, buy a monitor that supports scaling, and has HDMI and/or DVI inputs. (You can always get a converter).

I'm not familiar enough with the 360 to know if you can split off audio over Toslink when using HDMI though.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Kilometers Davis posted:

You're probably right. They have at least 20 monitors there but I doubt they have many high end models.

I'm starting to think I should go for the U2410 instead of the 27. I'm running a single GTA 460 and I doubt it's worth turning settings down to run games natively. Besides 1080p is pretty much the standard now it's not like I would be really missing out if I didn't go higher than it.

Would a U2410 be a pretty massive upgrade over my current monitor (FHD2400)? It's hard pulling the trigger on a monitor with the same size + resolution even though I know it will be higher quality.

GTX460 runs all current titles for me on my U3011 at native resolution. For the more recent ones though, I can only max out AA at 2, if on at all. It's a trade off I'm willing to make though.

The U2410 will have a matte anti-glare screen (if the FHD2400 is anything like Gateway's first generation FPD2485, it will be glossy in comparison) and it will deliver superior color quality being IPS versus I believe S-PVA.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Vizrt posted:

I'm putting together a new computer this week when the parts arrive, so I figured I would get an LCD to replace my CRT. I've been shopping around and reading up today on various LCDs. Right now I'm trying to decide on which one of the Dell monitors to purchase. I had all but decided on the U2311H when I noticed that the U2211H is currently on sale for $229.

Aside from the screen size, are the U2211H and U2311H comparably identical? I looked at the specs for both, and they seem to be the same. I'm not familiar with LCD monitors, so I want to make sure there's not something I'm overlooking.

Check the OP to be sure, but I think they have the same inputs, so yes, the only difference should be screen size. It's just that the U2211H usually isn't a very good bang for the buck.

e: ^^ simulpost :hfive:

movax fucked around with this message at 14:41 on Apr 12, 2011

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Kilometers Davis posted:

I just got my U2410 in. I'm not totally sold on it. The response time makes even browsing feel off and the anti-glare is very distracting from the image itself. Has anyone else felt this way and gotten used to it? I'm coming from a glossy FHD2400 so it's pretty much a totally different monitor.

e: I played a bit of Crysis 2 and it's extremely hard for me to aim. I hope I get used to this so I don't have to eat a restocking fee.

Hmm, really? I have a U3011 (probably even worse for input lag) and I do just fine Crysis 2 (or any shooter for that matter). You'll probably get used to that.

I can't help you on the whole going glossy to anti-glare thing though, all my monitors have always been AG, from my first CRT to my current Dells. You'll just have to get used to it, I think...

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Bensa posted:

Looking for a monitor for a laboratory setup in the 23-24" range:
- Wide viewing angle (both axis)
- High contrast
- Non-glossy (frame and screen)
- Color reproduction not important (B&W images)
- USB hub a plus but not necessary

IPS would seem like a bit of a waste but TN has horrible viewing angles, but if someone knows a specific model that fits the bill...
We're only looking at B&W footage, but we need high contrast and good viewing angles so we don't miss anything. We can't filter the images to increase contrast since then we don't know if we're actually getting a good signal (repeatability).

Not medical imaging, right?

Sounds like PVA/MVA could be up your alley; you're definitely right in TN being useless for your application. UltraSharps are in, obviously, but my brain is currently blanking on pulling up non-glossy PVA/MVA monitors...check Asus/Samsung/Gateway offerings, per chance?

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Coredump posted:

Thanks for the reply. For instance I found a led lcd 120hz tv on newegg and I went to Visio's website and not even the tech specs specify. It list Computer Support: 1920x1080, 1360x768, 800x600, 640x480 via VGA/HDMI and Signal Compatibility: Supports 1080P (FHDTV), 1080I(HDTV), 720P(HDTV), 480P(EDTV), 480I(SDTV) but no mention of refresh or frames per second for computer support, and just 120hz refresh for the tv period, which could mean its just inserting extra frames or black frames instead of doing 120 discrete frames of input.

I don't care about 3d stuff at all, but I would like to have a monitor capable of displaying more than 60 frames per second that's not a TN panel. A lcd tv seem like a good compromise. I'm open to other suggestions that might these requirements.

120Hz TVs interpolate input to achieve 120Hz and the result looks artificial and terrible. (The former part of the sentence is truth, the latter is my opinion).

Whereas on a PC, your videocard will happily output 120FPS (if it can) to a display, and games would look glorious. I loved running my old FW900 CRT at 100Hz, games played like a dream on that thing.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

DrDork posted:

While undoubtedly a fantastic monitor, the FW900's days have past. These days they're stupid expensive ($800+ for one in good condition once you factor in shipping), come with no/very limited warranty, will require extensive tweaking/converging on a regular basis, are gigantic (and 92 pounds!), etc. They're just not a good option unless you have a very specific need, and/or just can't give up a CRT because you hate progress/LCDs/whatever.

I definitely am/was a CRT die-hard (as evidenced by the little :smug: comments about CRTs in the OP), and own 3 FW900s. However, after unfortunate nicks on the AG coating, and spending hours tweaking the drat thing (focus pots + WinDAS hookup, etc), I couldn't take it anymore and finally migrated to a U3011.

Black levels, response time, scaling, etc all suffered, but in the long run it was worth the trade off of having razor sharp text across the whole screen (you cannot do this on a CRT) and still having the capability to play games. (No warm-up period was helpful too, I used to run a blank black screensaver on my FW900 so that when I walked away, it'd still stay on and heated in case I came back in a bit).

Besides, all 280 lbs. of those loving things are in the closet should I ever decide to go back to them. I got super lucky back in 2007; I read about the FW900, decided to look on Craigslist, and found 3 in less than a week for less than $100 total.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

El_Matarife posted:

Okay I assume this is a decent enough place to talk projectors. If not, ignore me.

I've gotta order a new projector for our conference room, in an upside down ceiling mount. Unfortunately, an increasing amount of my companies higher ups want to use their Macs with it so I need DisplayPort. I can't find a single projector with DisplayPort on Projector Central or Newegg or even by Googling "Projector displayport", do they exist? I'm pretty sure I need 1024 or 1280 wide at a minimum, and I don't really care if I end up 16:9 or 16:10.

Get a business-class Dell projector than run a DVI and VGA cable down to the table. Use afore-mentioned Mini-DP<->DVI and/or Mini-DP<->VGA adapters to interface with projector.

The most difficult part will likely be getting the muckity-mucks to remember to bring the adapters lest they just start jamming things into their Mac like cavemen going "WHY IT NO FIT BUNGA WUNGA :downs:"

movax
Aug 30, 2008

whiteshark12 posted:

Can someone explain what the key differences are besides screen size and IPS vs TN panel? Seeing as it's 1.5" bigger bus same resolution won't the pixels be bigger? I'd also be plugging my Xbox 360 into this as well, hence them both having HDMI ports.

Come on man, read the OP and parse the section about panel types. I think it's pretty clear...

quote:

Is anyone actually running 2560x1600? What card do you have? Can you actually run games at considerable settings?

Yes, GTX 460 1GB overclocked, I can run at "High" with AA and AF turned low. This card is the bare minimum to play at that resolution (a midrange card).

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Manac0r posted:

I m on the phone to a dell rep as we speak pulling the trigger on a U3011. I m assuming TRI 580's can power this display and have the correct cables/connections?

E: Is it true the U3011 doesn't come with a double DVI-D cable? Will I need to purchase this separately?

3 580s will be more than enough. My U3011 came with a dual-link DVI cable, DisplayPort cable and VGA cable, so you should be covered there.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

As mentioned in the OP, a tangible benefit of having a 1920x1200 screen is being able to relatively easily work on HDTV frames 1:1 and still have some room for one or two menubars/toolbars and poo poo.

Other than that though, dropping to x1080 screens should lower cost for us, which will be nice.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Decius posted:

The "IPS-glitter" is far more pronounced than on my old Dell, but it also not in a way that would bother me.

That's more a function of the anti-glare coating Dell applies to their UltraSharps. Good that you can live with it though, glad you're excited!

iamthexander posted:

I'm looking at getting a new 27" monitor, but don't want (or need) to drop $900 on a Dell UltraSharp.

How bad off am I getting a LCD Backlit, 1920x1080, 2ms, ASUS VK278Q for around $350? I mean it is less than half the price of the UltraSharp, but if the image quality will be terrible I can settle for a higher-quality 24".
That is a TN-panel, so if you are OK with its characteristics (mentioned in the OP), you could go for it. Viewing angles won't be the best, nor the color reproduction, but it will be more than enough for coding, browsing, etc.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

GreatGreen posted:

How are black levels on modern LCD monitors nowadays? I'm still using a drat CRT monitor (the best CRT ever made incidentally, but still a great big dinosaur of a CRT) and literally the only reason I'm still using it over any LCD I know of is because with CRT monitors, there is basically zero lag and/or ghosting in any way and they have infinite contrast ratios and deep dark inky blacks even in an otherwise pitch black room and I'm kind of a stickler for that kind of thing.

So do they make LCD monitors with no backlight bleed yet?

As OP says (FW900 supremacy :smug:) PVA based panels are probably the only ones that will come close to a proper CRT in terms of black levels. You'll have to decide if the tradeoff for text fidelity / smaller size / etc. is worth it for worse black levels.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

paint dry posted:

I'm thinking about a new monitor for my birthday. Could I get a consensus on whether 24" is too big when you're sitting right in front of it? If not, what's the best 24" LCD around right now? You know, 120Hz, deep blacks, all that poo poo. I'm not very good at this.

Edit: right now I have a 21.5" (I think) Benq monitor from two and a half years back. I still like it, but it can only go up to 60Hz and it's killing my eyes when I'm not playing a game. I don't know why it's only starting to bother me now.

What is "right in front"? 6" away from screen? (do you have a really shallow desk?).

I think 24" will be fine, unless you sit so close to your monitor that you have to move your head. I sit about 2 ft. from my 30" and it's just about right.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

Mitsune posted:

I know there's a lot of info in the OP, but this should be up there too. I'm going to copy/paste this whenever friends asks about TN panels from Newegg and the Ultrasharp series from Dell.

Thanks for the general run-down. ;)

Added to post #3!

movax
Aug 30, 2008

archangelwar posted:

I need to get a new monitor and the 24" range seems to be perfect for me. Is there any reason why I would not like the HP zr24w?

If you plan on hooking up things other than a computer to it, it is not the monitor for you (no scaler). There's also some FW bug that's detailed in the OP that a goon talked to HP about.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

MadMax posted:

I guess I have three main questions regarding this. My graphics card is a radeon 6870, currently not over clocked at all and I can play Crysis 2 at maxed settings no problem; will I need to upgrade my gpu for either/one/both of the above-outlined ideas?

I think you will; 2560x1600 is murder on graphics card. If you're willing to give up AA or AF, you might slip by with a single card containing the highest-end GPU. I have this feeling I'm going to end up going SLI to play Battlefield 3 and Mass Effect 3 with all eye candy when they come out. (I have the U3011).

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Second, can people with either of the two setups in terms of size/resolution I am considering speak to the practical/workflow advantages of either? I'm leaning towards the tri 24" just because it will be a lower additional cash outlay to swallow but if having that much additional unbroken screen real estate makes a huge difference I could convince myself to get a U3011 or similar.

I run one U3011 plus 2 2209WAs, one of them in portrait. While the 30" is obnoxiously high-res (I realized the other day that 1/2 of my U3011 = the resolution of that 2209WA in portrait mode), I do still enjoy having the multiple monitors. The 30" is my "workspace" i.e. current task of interest is on there (Visual Studio, etc.), the portrait monitor always has Firefox open in it (or comics), the landscape 2209WA has Outlook and IRC.

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Lastly, am I completely missing some other option or is one (or both) of my ideas completely addlebrained for my workload.
I think just getting a 30" monitor and still using your existing displays would do you fine. Tilt the Samsung into portrait as your web browsing monitor, use the Viewsonic as a scratchpad display.

movax
Aug 30, 2008

End of Life Guy posted:

Well, my 7 year old BenQ 4:3 monitor just poo poo the bed.

Looks like I'll be upgrading to a 16:9. I read the OP, and it seems a little harsh on TN monitors. Do I really need an IPS? They seem way more expensive, and I'm sure my old monitor was a TN and it did just fine.

You don't need an IPS monitor, as long as you understand that with a TN, you'll take some hits to color reproduction and viewing angles. If your usage is mostly staring at it head on playing video games and surfing the internet, TN is probably fine.

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Here's my video card. It was the sweet spot card to get from the pc thread 2 years ago. Can it handle 1920 x 1080 ? I know it says "max resolution 2560 x 1600' on the specs, but i mean, reliably, consistently, push 1920x1080 for another few years?

I'm not up-to-date on my AMD cards, but I can tell you that the max resolution spec is just maximum resolution it could output to a display. It looks like your card is from 2008 though, which means that yes, it will probably suffer performance wise for upcoming games. You should look at getting a new videocard and look at benchmarks that tell you what settings you can run with at 1920x1080.

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movax
Aug 30, 2008

frailimbnursry posted:

What have the sales been like for the U2410? Right now it's selling for $120 off at $479.00. I'm not in any rush to get a monitor this instant but I wanted to know what the best sale price has been for it historically so I know what to be on the lookout for.

I'm not sure, but maybe some kind of price suggestions are in order for the OP by the Dell monitors. Can people post (or PM me, since I have that now) prices they've seen it at / bought it at so I can post the range up?

Also probably drunk, you are a glorious bastard, twin 30"s for $75 ea., I need to go to the garage sales you go to, apparently. Well done!

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