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LCD Round-up
TheKillerBee writes "The TechReport has posted a nice comparison of several different LCDs. A plethora of benches are present to help you decide how to spend that Christmas bonus check!" The screen update times still aren't fast enough for gamers, but they still are ever so delicious.
Don't you mean that Christmas Severence Check? Or even more likely that Christmas Unemployment Check?
I believe the author was talking about ghosting caused by slow LCD updates, which is still an issue. Sure, you may not be able to see the flicker you get with CRTs, but you can see after-images when you've got a lot of motion going on.
Do these retailers take Ralphs(California Grocery Chain) Gift certificates.
Thats what I get for a Chistmas bonus!
moo.
Just to set the record straight, many people, myself included, have found that update times less than 30 ms are plenty good for even the fastest games (UT2003 springs to mind). My 15" KDS is excellent for gaming -- I can't imagine ever going back to a CRT.
No, he's just a management goon who's getting the profit bonuses from laying off 50% of his staff. Very dislike superheroes, except for the spandex of course...
I'm a real estate whore... I'm currently running 2 19" monitors at 1600x1200 (3200x1200) and I'm seriously considering getting a third. I've looked at LCD's every once in a while and I've never been pleased with what I've found, I can get a very decent 19" for under $200, Viewsonic PF790's are what I'm using now. Lower cost, higher res, I could even get three of these and be right in the middle of the pack pricewise. Apart from the Apple Cinema HD (which I wouldn't mind getting four of) I can't think of an LCD that cuts it.
sig.
The display control panel may say 60 Hz, but that's not how fast the LCD updates. LCD updates are dependent on how fast the diode can turn on and off, usually called response time. It's generally in the range of 30 or 40 ms (about 25-30 Hz), though they are getting faster - I think I've seen some as fast as 20 ms (50 Hz) recently.
They probably couldn't afford the test monitors...
"And like that
It's funny how a 1280x1024 LCD at $799 is considered opulent. It wasn't so long ago that an 800x600 15" CRT cost more than that.
Most places I've worked have sprung for Trinitron tubes back when they cost a premium. Why is it unreasonable to think they'll go LCD? Do you have any idea how much these things save in desk space? and frankly, they make users happy, which also helps the bottom line. The up-front cost is a small price to pay for the continuing dividends.
Kevin Fox
Sexy LCD 17" Monitors - Part I
Comparison of 17" LCDs: The Heavyweights Enter The Ring - Part II
Cheers
I think the biggest downside with CRT computer monitors is the fact that monitor manufacturers still haven't addressed the biggest downside of these monitors, namely the large depth of the monitor due to the way CRT's are manufactured.
:-(
I remember a few years ago Viewsonic addressed this with the A75s model, a 17" CRT monitor that had a physical depth substantially less than other 17" CRT monitors. I'm very disappointed that Viewsonic (let alone the CRT monitor industry) has not adapted the short-depth CRT concept to all their 17", 19" and 21" monitors.
CRT's fast response makes them excellent for viewing fast motion graphics (e.g., high-end games and DVD playback), but monitor manufacturers should be working on shortening the depth of the tube so the monitor can fit onto desks easier.
If you want to stare at text all day long, you'll need a CRT with a fast refresh rate to approach LCD's "no refresh" approach, so in that respect LCDs are far superior. But, if you want to play action games, you'll need an LCD with a fast update to approach a CRTs refresh rate. On the other hand, if you have too much desk space and need to put more watts through your UPS, CRTs are superior in that respect also. But, LCDs still don't have the brightness of a CRT.
In short, LCD and CRT tech are different and the value of each will depend on just what the user is looking for in a monitor.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
Because they believe that:
Ignorance is bliss, some people say.
In Soviet Russia, Jesus asks: "What Would You Do?"
here's a few reasons:
1. LCD's are smaller, have less of a depth to them.
2. LCD's are silent, CRT's have a horrible whine.
3. LCD's don't have that annoying screen refresh that gives people (me, anyway) an awful headache.
4. LCD's use less power. It ads up in the long run.
5. LCS's are brighter, at least in my experience.
YMMV, of course, but those're all the reasons I switched to LCD.
Triv
I have to say that my viewsonic va800 (17.4") is quite the awesome peice of eq. I'm a software eng by day and a gamer by night... As for the programming side of the coin, any monitor will do, bug screen space is king... that paired with crisp fonts makes the code flow. As for the game side, the lcd I have is very good for games. I have owned 2 other LCD flat panels that were just plain too slow (disposal of pixels) to play games on, but the va800 has it down. Scrolling, full motion, no bluring in the least. Don't get me wrong, not all viewsonics are great for games.. their 15 inch one was just terrible, and a friend of mine claims his 19 inch black viewsonic was too slow for him. Something about the va800 made me keep it for gaming where the others went back to the store. Just my 2 cents for the gamers.
;)
Oh and some of the other PRO's of LCD that make it totally worth it if you have the extra cash and have found one with a quick pixel disposal rate that you are comfortable playing games on:
1) one touch auto sync / setup. Match the res and contrast with a click of a button. No black boxes around your viewing area. BTW 17.4 means 17.4 VIEWABLE.. unlike in the CRT world.
2) no more areas of the screen that you just have to deal with distortion on... Cant count how many monitors are just slighly curved or crooked in the corners or discolored in a fashion that even a degaus coil won't fix.
3) LIGHT and small. This one is under rated. I had a 21 inch monitor at work that was soo big, I couldn't get it all the way in the corner section of the cube where the computer should go and still have a keyboard on the desk. What a joke.. I don't need a big set top TV thank you. LCD's pivot, twist.. all that... turn the screen show a friend. Move the screen to a new location, don't break your back.
4) low power consumtion... quit dimming the lights when you power on your RAY GUN.
5) multiple input and or tuners built in. Some of the lcds have multiple inputs (svideo, multiple analogs..), some even have tv and radio turners with PIP built in (I had a samsung that did that.. TITS!). I can have my ultra 60 and my game PC plugged into mine and hit the 'switch input' button and boom.. there's the other machine. And with all that space i saved for having an LCD, I can have 2 keyboard and mice! JOY!
Thats's about it. I like mine overall... it was 1600 bucks back in the day, now it's like 700 retail. I'm very happy with it... the moral is 'try em all' cause loads of them just do plain suck for disposal rates. I made the guy at the computer store play a DVD on all of them before I considered purchasing one
I use a sound spectrogram (voice print) display that I scroll in the same way. Synched to the vertical retrace using DirectX and viewed on a glass monitor at over 80 Hz, the scroll is rock solid and blur free. Try this scroll on ANY LCD (even the 20 ms response kind) and it looks like a blurred mess.
I got the same blurred mess when I bumped the glass monitor refresh to 120 Hz but only updated the scroll every other frame (60 Hz). I pointedly don't get a blurred mess when refreshing and updating at 60 Hz.
What this tells me is that a glass monitor gives a stroboscobic image (it flashes the image and goes dim in between refreshes), and for certain kinds of motion (i.e. a scroll or pan of the entire field), you can do amazing things with glass and get garbage with LCD. It also tells me that LCD will never be any good for motion, no matter how fast the response time, because it is not strobing the image.
In your typical game (or even a movie), only part of the scene is changing over a pretty much static background. On the other hand, if you want a game with a scrolling 2-D display, like a moving "treasure map", you are going to notice this difference. With the right image, the effect is quite striking -- you don't need a "Golden Ear" to hear the difference between a tube and transistor amp.
I suppose LCD will eventually take over, and there will be us few glass monitor holdouts, but the LCD will NEVER do motion well, but the masses of people will resign themselves to LCD's being good enough.
Kind of funny that two of the most highly regarded makes of LCD monitors are ignored.