I have put off buying a new screen for a while, but the time has come.

Do you guys have any suggestions? Any good comparison sites? What about all the specs, what should I look for and avoid?

You didn't mention a budget, but I assume you don't want to go as big as the Apple 30-inch.

I don't think you need look any further than the Dell Ultrasharp 2407WFP a highly rated 24" that is a jaw dropping steal at $799. It has an incredibly fast response time of 6ms which is good for us gamers. Compare that to the popular HP 2335 which has a 16ms response time and costs substantially more. It comes with a 3-year guarantee to boot.

Anyone using this monitor?

newegg.com is a great site for getting a good deal on one. They also have LOTS of reviews from people and ratings for the products from those reviews. Mike helped me select parts for a new system from there and the reviews and ratings make it nice.

Junkie

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Radiation: , I think thats where I think I will end up (response time seems to be around 8... 2ms I haven't seen that!)



That Dell looks SWEET! My first urge was to go to best buy, get a 19" for 250 and be happy. But my sense of it is that you guys know better!

So, what do you guys use? Any dual monitors, any really big monitors? (26 or bigger)

My situation is:
- This will be 1/2 half of a dual monitor setup... (use interim with 17 crt)
- About $500 give or take unless some ideas from would change my plan.

Not trying to jump this thread but is the lower the ms time actually mean faster response time. Lol I am confused.

as a canadian shopper, i highly recommend tigerdirect.ca or canadacomputers.com. i have ordered many products from both and had no troubles what-so-ever! i ordered my viewsonic vx2025wm for under 400$cad from tigerdirect and it works great! http://www.canadacomputers.com/index.php?d...&cid=MT.258... it ranks fairly high in reviews when compared to other models in it's price range! i did quite a bit of reading on monitors of this size and it boiled down to this one and dells 207wfp http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/product...mp;sku=320-4688... both great monitors in that price category!



if your not looking for something that big i would recommend atleast going 19''. make sure it's under 12ms response time to avoid ghosting in games, and over 500:1 contrast ratio. the higher the contrast ratio the deeper the black levels will be, hence better picture.



and i would've recommended newegg as well because they have everything you could ever want for computers, but they don't ship to canada!



g/l sh and don't shop the net till your eyes bug out like i did

It is all a bit confusing. The response time is the time it takes a pixel to change from black to white to black again. Now, if you have a low contrast monitor, the range isn't as big from black to white and, thus, the response time will appear to be faster. The problem in evaluating a monitor on this one bit of information is clearly not sufficient. You really have to compare the contrast ratio at the same time. Does it show pure white and pure black, or are the blacks muddied?

Most of our games take place in low contrast light, and we like to hide and engage from darkened areas. To discern detail, we need crisp blacks that aren't muddied by a low contrast monitor, but we sure want to see anything that moves as fast as we possibly can!

One thing is for sure, this new generation of LCDs are showing great promise as they offer amazing response times and stunning contrast.

To answer your question, SH, both Cross and I use the 23" Apple HD Cinema displays which are starting to show their age as they offer a 14ms response time but have a beautiful 700:1 contrast range.

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Wow better prices than I thought for 19-20"

OK so the keys are:

Response time - under 8 is good but only with high contrast ratio
Contrast Ratio - Higher the better 500 or more to 1
Native res - higher the better
Brightness - Higher than 300 cd / m2

Try and maximize all those?
What about the 16:10 aspect ratio? UO doesn't support<?> but worth it?

Here's a great source for information on monitors ... if you have to patience to wade through it all: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/dis.../lcd-guide.html

I have the Dell 20" wide screem... http://www.pureoverclock.com/article637-2.html It works great for me, lots of neat features with a swivel and rotate function (what every girl needs...LOL) Looks nice, does not take up to much room and has lots of external inputs that are easily accessible. Wow I was just reading up on all the little features that I didn't know it had...WOW



I have the sound bar with it. Works like a charm:)

uo doesn't support it, however most new games do, and trust me it looks awesome!

mine has a native resolution of 1680x1050 which isn't an option in cod. i use 1280x1024 though and it still looks great. the thing i like about the wide screen is the ability to have a few different windows open side by side so you can view both rather than switch between the 2. lots of desktop area! for me it was worth it, and i'm glad to have it now!

Sounds like price isn't much of a concern. However, you really should take a look at the Hanns G HW191D widescreen 19".



http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?...N82E16824254005



It really is a stunning monitor and for your price range you can get 2 or 3 of them.



I have 4 of them and was surprised at how good the picture is. Only downside is it comes shipped with the brightness at 100%. I knocked mine down to around 50 and all is good.



No dead pixels on any of them. Running them for 4-5 months now



-Pain



ps. I didn't check if it's ok to post urls. Many apologies if I'm bad.

WOW, I am quite surprised at how much the price is down for these monitors, I was expecting to have to dig deep, but thats not the case.

I just got back from a recon trip to the local Future Shop (Canadian Best Buy) and stumbled onto the ole Samsung Syncmaster 931bf square 19" with a 2000:1 contrast and 2 ms response... for $300 can. Only thing is this theatre wide decision.

This ain't so bad... thanks for the input guys it helped! Gonna stop by that place Corey suggested (one in waterloo) and check it out...

Then, by tomorrow night hopefully you all will be either 10% bigger, or same hieght and 30% fatter, either way easier to shoot!

Cool!
John

I switched to widescreen months ago and now when I play at work (I hope my boss doesn't read this) on my square screen it just isn't the same. Thinking about taking my 4th to work. Widescreen really is the way to go. For me anyway.



-Pain

There is a lot of hype about LCD response time. Let me try to clear up a few things:

1) For gaming, the most important thing is refresh rate, not response time. Almost all LCDs run at a 60 hz refresh rate. That means that the image frame changes every 16.7ms. As long as the LCD can show an image frame and then get it off the screen in time for the next image, there will be no ghosting effect or afterglow effect. This measurement is called gray to gray response time. Anything less than 16ms is good enough.

Actually very low response times of 2ms and lower will make the screen appear to flicker at the 60 hz rate. If you've ever seen a CRT (big tube type displays) at 60 hz, you know what I am talking about.

2) Some LCDs are claimed to run at 75 Hz. Almost all are really running at 60 hz and throwing every fifth frame away. Talk about false advertising. Someday we will have 85 to 120 hz refresh rates for LCDs and that will mean a real improvement in gaming performance.

3) Native resolution is also an overlooked item of LCD performance. This is the LCD's actual number of horizontal and vertical pixels. A 1280 x 1024 native resolution LCD is better than a 1680 x 1050 LCD if you are playing at 1280 x 1024. This is because the video card has to take additional time to convert the image and there will be round off errors (artifacts) generated in the final result. This effect can be minimized if the LCD native resolution is a multiple of your gaming resolution.

4) Wide screens (16 x 10 or 16 x 9) are very nice and can allow you to see more of the game view than a player running in normal width (4 x 3) screen. But also realize that everything is a little smaller in wide screen mode and that it will put additional processing demands on the video card to keep up.

By the way, I run two wide screen LCD monitors: Samsung 243T and Dell 2405FPW. Both are 24 inch, 1920 x 1200 native resolution monitors. My dream monitor would be a 30" widescreen with a native resolution of 1920 x 1200 (not higher) and a true refresh rate of 85 Hz. Nothing like that is yet available.

Good luck with your decision,

Old Man Mike

Just plugged in a new 19" Samsung... thanks for your posts, made it an enjoyable purchase rather than a crap shoot! I went with the Samsung because $50 DVI digital cable was included (apparently this is not always the case), and the specs on the model couldn't be matched at the same price!
Specs out at...

2000:1 contrast
1284x1024 native
2ms response


http://www.samsung.com/Products/Monitor/LC...S19MEDSFXAA.asp

The difference is remarkable! Great picture, thanks again!

suweeet! That will make for picking out the tight sheep even easier. Baaaaaaaaa.

Dave your a sick man!