Yes, looking at LCD. Are there any other connections I should look for?
Anything other than response time, contrast, pixels that are pretty
important to compare?
Im about to buy one right now and I keep seeing post after post about
the same thing here and at various sites.
Frankly Im getting confused and sick of the while thing now. I was all
hyped up and got rid of my current system and was all frantic about
ordering my new system a few days ago but now -----with PCI express
transitioning and LCD confusion --- Ive frankly held off and even
canceled one order right after I ordered. Ive even entertained the
idea of just using my wimpy backup system which Im using now for a
month or two to wait for PCI express boards and cards to come down and
maybe selling my 6800 and waiting for 19" LCDs to get even cheaper or
new panels to come out that might have better response AND good color
AND cheaper prices.
One thing about DVI - look at a few. Frankly I just got a LCD now w/o
DVI and it looks fine. Many guides claim theres only a marginal
difference at best right now. I finally did see one article at
Anandtech, maybe everyones all hot and bothered about it because of
that and the theoretical benefits of DVI. Anandtech even says a while
back DVI was poorly implemented and it looked worse on some LCDs . But
then he then goes on to dismiss a Samsung that doesnt have DVI in a
recent test of LCDs saying he knows its going to do poorly in some
objective tests they are going to run because it doesnt have DVI. Now
that sounds very severe - like you HAVE to have one. However I dont
think I see lots of actual tests where people claim the DVI-less
monitors were universally inferior because of the lack of DVI.
Heres some quotes from posts at various sites :
My own Samsung 191T (9800 Pro) shows almost no difference between the
DVI and VGA inputs, at least at the native 1280x1024 resolution.
....my friend just got a 19" LCD w/ only a vga and it looks just as
good as my dvi maybe its because im not comparing vga to dvi back to
back but i think monitors with just vga show vga a little better than
monitors that have both a vga and dvi?
Anandtech explaining DVI
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.html?i=1577
The gist of it is , you have a digital signal that gets converted to
analog then back to digital again for LCDs. Why do that? It doesnt
make sense. Just keep it digital, its cleaner that way.
But I dont see any definitive tests on all the monitors out there that
shows a big difference only attritubable to DVI . Some sure claim they
see one but the variables are all different - different monitors,
video cards etc.
However the Samsung in Anandtechs articles does fare poorly in the
tests. Is it the DVI or other aspects of the monitor?
He also has a bit - a guide to looking for a good monitor. The
problem is as everyone keeps pointing out the response time figures ,
contrast ratios and even other figures cant be taken at face value. In
fact if you do search several sites including Toms Hardware etc all
say the figures shouldnt be relied on as the only guide to picking a
monitor.
Here Anandtech talks about response times and contrast ratios:
Everyone's preferences on response time are different. If you play a
lot of games and feel that the few ms difference between a 6-bit LCD
and an 8-bit LCD are worthwhile, then it's a worthy investment. Most
people can't tell the difference - and that's not just most people who
aren't gamers, but most people in general have to be shown the
differences between two displays that differ by single digit transient
response times.
Unfortunately, relying on manufacturer Contrast Ratios too heavily
during a purchase will probably lead you astray. To correct that, we
will run a standardized test in our lab that tests contrast ratios of
all of our LCDs in controlled situations.
BenQ's FP931 is based on a TN 6-bit LCD panel. While it is advertised
as a 16.2M color display, each pixel can only display 262,000 hues;
the other 16M hues are "simulated" using dithering techniques.
-----------------------------------------
Basically manufacturers specs are gross indicators at best. Some LCDs
with lower claimed response times fare worse than others with avg
response times. One of the ways to get lower reponse times is to have
6 bit panels that dont get as accurate colors and have less viewing
angles - like the BenQ which I was just about to get. In fact Im
abandoning my focus on low response times - since you seem to have to
sacrifice other areas and many 25 ms rated panels get decent consumer
feedback even on games and some even on reviews by hardware sites.
The only two cheaper ones I know of are the Acer 19" which claims 16ms
and BenQ 16ms - 931 and thats the one Anandtech says is 6 bit etc.
Acer and Benq I recall are related to so I wonder if they are using
similar panels though the specs differ a bit. So you have all this
spec murkiness , the review sites also dont test many of the models
and you get a picture of lots of hard comprimises and shortcomings
in various areas of LCDs no matter what you choose and yet most people
really dont seem to be able to tell. Though everyones obsessed with
specs - get a DVI, low response times , contrast ratios - actual tests
show all sorts of compromises with all the models and yet almost 90%
of the consumer reviews RAVE about almost every model even for games
and color accuracy etc. So even with all the defects it seems good
enough for most people. I think as long as you dont get a DOG that
really ghosts like crazy - a decent 25 ms with more accurate colors
maybe the better choice than trying to get a low response LCD at a
reasonable price. Some tests do talk about some newer screens that
have a bit of a better compromise all around - but they tend to cost
way more than the current lows prices are hitting for 19" - $300-400.
Theres no way Im spending 600-700 on a screen that maybe outdated
in a few years with maybe some newer technology - LCD or something
else. Supposedly LG-Philips is going to push thin CRTs this year
about 6-7" thick who knows what new LCD type panels will come out too.
Right now Im leaning more again towards the probably older 25 ms
panels used in a lot of the $300-400 19" which claims better contrast
and viewing angles , 8 bit color - which also gets rave reviews by
consumers even for gaming etc Though how reliable that is - who knows.
You can read them at Newegg and Amazon.
Im looking at the AG-NEOVO F19 I think its called though I think its
overpriced at $385. After finding out it was only 25 ms I kind of
dismissed it but now Im warming up to it again. I might wait until it
goes down to $345 or so at least. A lot of these models are using
panels probably that have been out for a while so the prices are
falling from the gross range of $500-700 to 300-400 . They are OK but
with people obsessed about response times etc new panels may be on
their way to the generics but I dont want any of the ones like BenQ is
using which use 6 bit color to improve reponse times.
