is it worth upgrading monitors?

C

codral

New Member
hi guys, currently in the market for a new monitor (sorta).. had a squizz at msy.com.au and have picked a few monitors i like the looks of (LG w2242T-bg, asus Vw220T, viewsonic vx2255wmb)..

I cant decide whether buying a new monitor will bring noticeable difference though.. I currently have a Soniq 19" i bought about 2 years ago, http://www.soniqav.com/Qvision.php?mdm=c7c2394210b1f68e5ce364555621a4ee&group=LCD Display

Soniq is a cheap chinese brand, but i think they use lg screens

Looking at the specs they actually don't seem that bad

Is it worth udpating to a new monitor? this is old and cheap but will i notice much difference in response, quality, brightness etc or is it likely differences will be small

Also, this monitor has a close to standard aspect ratio if i got one thats longer sideways and shorter height ways, will it distort and stretch my games etc, or do they just allow for more stuff on the screen

Those monitors lifted below are in the lower end of my price bracket, i dont mind spending a bit more,

mainly use pc for games
 
Hi,

I'd point out that a 19" standard is much larger than a 19" widescreen, a 19" widescreen is more like a 17" standard. Well I guess your playing fast games, maybe it'd be a bit better, if you were just using for windows it wouldn't make a sausage of difference. I personally wouldn't, a screens a screen.

Regards,
 
Worse than that, even. I recently went from a 19" 4:3 monitor to a 24" 16:10 widescreen and my screen image is a little shorter. I would suggest 24" at a minimum for you.
 
The newer monitors you have listed all have lower response times than the Soniq you have currently. You will notice a difference between the 8ms response and the LG/Asus monitor's 5ms or especially the Viewsonic's 3ms response time. They all have a greater resolution and brightness/contrast ratio than your current monitor as well. You will definitely notice the difference.

As for image distortion... That depends on your settings and whether or not the games you play even support the widescreen resoloutions. Most modern games will, but many older games will only use the 4:3 or 5:4 aspect ratios. The monitor or the graphics drivers can enforce keeping that aspect ratio in these instances, but you will then have empty space (pillar boxes) on either side of the image.
 
fmw said:
Worse than that, even. I recently went from a 19" 4:3 monitor to a 24" 16:10 widescreen and my screen image is a little shorter. I would suggest 24" at a minimum for you.
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:confused: What max vertical resolution did you have on that 19" that you can't get on the 24"? 1280x960 (or the 5:4 ratio at 1024) is much smaller than the 1920x1200 or greater resolutions I have seen on 24" monitors.

Or are you referring to physical size, not resolution?
 
ahh ok, the one i have now is pretty blurry, if i turn quickly stuff blurs like crazy.. i like games but i'm not a hardcore gamer obsessed with em, that said this one does blur a bit much..

The current one i have is 19" but is square, that's a bit of a worry if some games don't support it, nothing will annoy me more than playing games and not having full screen.. windows will fit it though, right?

24" is pretty damn big too isn't it? My current monitor only works properly at one resolution, the others look really blurry.. will this mean the 24" will need a huge resolution to look good, because this will hurt game performance quite a bit

also 4:3 is the safest bet for ratio?
 
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codral said:
ahh ok, the one i have now is pretty blurry, if i turn quickly stuff blurs like crazy.. i like games but i'm not a hardcore gamer obsessed with em, that said this one does blur a bit much..
Click to expand...

This is due to the lower refresh rate on your current monitor. Also, while they advertise 8ms, I suspect that is not the black-white-black response time. Any of the newer monitors suggested will be much better in this regard.


The current one i have is 19" but is square, that's a bit of a worry if some games don't support it, nothing will annoy me more than playing games and not having full screen.. windows will fit it though, right?
Click to expand...

Windows will work fine with it. Yes, some games won't support it natively. Most new ones will.


24" is pretty damn big too isn't it? My current monitor only works properly at one resolution, the others look really blurry.. will this mean the 24" will need a huge resolution to look good, because this will hurt game performance quite a bit

also 4:3 is the safest bet for ratio?
Click to expand...

It is quite big. On any LCD only the native resolution will look the best. Anything smaller will look blurry because it is being scaled up. This is normal. Yes, the native resolution on a 24" monitor may hurt game performance, but you can lower the resolution. Yes, it will not look as crisp as native, but the only other fix is to upgrade your video card (and possibly CPU/RAM).

A 4:3 ratio will be the natural ratio of most older games, but you can run them fine on a widescreen display.
 
ahh ok, thanks for the breakdown mate, i've chosen a benq w2400hd 24" which i'm headed to grab today, my pc is pretty good but still struggles a bit on some bits of games ( i like to play things on max graphics) so might haave to look at upgrading my cpu down the track

Thanks for the breakdown =)
 
codral said:
ahh ok, thanks for the breakdown mate, i've chosen a benq w2400hd 24" which i'm headed to grab today, my pc is pretty good but still struggles a bit on some bits of games ( i like to play things on max graphics) so might haave to look at upgrading my cpu down the track

Thanks for the breakdown =)
Click to expand...

No problem codral! :):good:

Let us know what you think of the new monitor. By the way, do you currently use DVI cables to connect your monitor to your graphics card? I didn't see DVI inputs on the specs you linked to earlier, only VGA. That could also add to the blurriness you have reported.
 
Zatharus said:
:confused: What max vertical resolution did you have on that 19" that you can't get on the 24"? 1280x960 (or the 5:4 ratio at 1024) is much smaller than the 1920x1200 or greater resolutions I have seen on 24" monitors.

Or are you referring to physical size, not resolution?
Click to expand...

It isn't a question of resolution. It is a question of physical size. All I'm saying is that to get the physical height of a 19" 4:3 monitor in widescreen, you need a 24" widescreen at least. Screen size is measured on the bias, not the width.
 
fmw said:
It isn't a question of resolution. It is a question of physical size. All I'm saying is that to get the physical height of a 19" 4:3 monitor in widescreen, you need a 24" widescreen at least. Screen size is measured on the bias, not the width.
Click to expand...

OK. Thank you for the clarification. I did not see how physical size mattered in this case as the resolution was more of a concern.
 
Zatharus said:
No problem codral! :):good:

Let us know what you think of the new monitor. By the way, do you currently use DVI cables to connect your monitor to your graphics card? I didn't see DVI inputs on the specs you linked to earlier, only VGA. That could also add to the blurriness you have reported.
Click to expand...

Yeh i was actually using VGA, didn't even know DVI existed lol, have changed now though

screen is alot less blurry in games, and is pretty huge which is cool, very happy with it, cheers for help guys
 
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