Hello! I've been well out of the game for a good year or two now, and am slowly catching up with new hardware, technology, etc. I'm slowly getting my head around a new build, however don't know what monitor to go for. Last I knew 24" was all the rage however they don't seem very popular now? Also, there are LED monitors. I'll have a budget for a monitor of around £260, and my main use for it is games, then the usual internet, media garb. The new build will be based around CustomPC's most recent gaming build (i5, 560 TI, Asus P67, Corsair 4GB, etc). Any help is, as always, much appreciated. Sam.
Dell u2311h Enough said really lol IPS panel, rather than TN so looks a gazillion times better. And many other nice features which I'm sure someone will enlighten you with soon lol
LED monitors are good...in laptops where power saving and things are of upmost importance. In desktops not really a need for power saving when you have a gaming rig. You'd be much better off getting an IPS panel monitor like the u2311h or the hp zr24w (something like that anyway ) To answer your actual question, an LED monitor is fine for games, but quality wise the IPS wins hands down. Also, most LED monitors (and TN panels in general) have a glossy screen which basically tries to fool you into thinking the colours look really vibrant. When in actual fact they don't, side by side an IPS panel monitor will easily show how vibrant colours should be.
Excellent screen, well worth the money, you won't be disappointed And if you think I explained it well, just wait until you see one of GoodBytes posts on the same subject. I'm like a blithering idiot compared to him
No no No NOOoo.. LED Monitors are these: Every thin panel for computers, today, widely available on the market, are LCD panels. You have 4 types of LCD panels (well more, but I am not going to consider screens from phones, watches, calculators, etc...), You have TN, MVA, IPS, and PVA. TN panels that will provide you with the worst imagine results, between all mentioned above. TN panels are fast, and low input lag, but at the costs of not supporting a true color processor to assure accurate color reproduction, and the LCD liquid itself is very low end, and poor back light spreading technology,. hence why you can't have vivid colors. If you try to, you get over saturated colors, not vivid. Some manufacture compensate for these problems by using a glossy display. In addition TN panels, have a short view angle, and can only be seen in landscape mode. If you put the screen in portrait mode, text will be hard to read, and colors will sift. TN panels big advantage is low power consumption, and very inexpensive, ideal for laptops (laptop TN displays are already expensive due to the thin format). TN panel shows back light bleeding al the time and affects colors. You might not see it without looking closely, but it's there. TN panels, are aimed at the low end market.. for people that seek for 1 thing and 1 thing only.. cheapest price. So cheap stand, non-adjustable stands even, are used. Mixed with cheap build quality. Now, MVA panels, are a slight step up over TN, they have a wider view angle, and can have color processor, but colors, despite better is only marginally better. MVA isn't very popular, because for the same price, or almost, you can get a MUCH better technology, called IPS. The up side is stunning blacks. IPS panels offer 178 degree view angle in ALL DIRECTION. So, no mater how you put yourself in the room (other than behind the screen, of course) or in-front of the desk, you get the same great image. It's high grade LCD liquid assure stunning vivid colors, without saturation tricks, and usually, they features a high-end color processor. In addition, due to the panel and liquid structure, no mater how you rotate the screen, the image will be the same crisp, sharp image with no color shift. IPS panels has virtually 0 back light bleeding on white and on colors. A slim back light bleeding is visible on 4 corners of the screen on pure black color. They are fast panels, they are slightly slower than TN and have a higher input lag due to the color processor principally. But, this is not visible. ~99% of people who has a IPS panel on this forum will assure you, it wont' affect your gaming, unless you are this hardcore, humming bird speed reflection and vision, FPS player. Other than that, you won't notice a thing, even on fast action, shaky cam, movies. IPS panels are aimed at a higher market, so build quality is high to really high, and suually feature a non-glossy screen (except Apple displays), and fully adjustable stand (except Apple displays). IPS panels are preferred by armatures, professionals on a tight budget, or people who simply love colors. PVA panels, are like IPS panels, they are very alike. They are however, even slower (so it could potentially affect your FPS games... depending on the monitor), but provides stunning blacks (0 back light bleeding on blacks). But, PVA panels are also more expensive than IPS. PVA are preferred by professionals who require excellent color reproductions. So, you have up and downs. The best balance of everything are IPS panels. Especially if you jump from a TN panel, that minute back light bleeding that will be visible on a full screen black image (not if you have content, like a wide screen video), an excellent upgrade choice. What is "LED Monitor/Display" that some manufacture, especially Apple, is? Good question, what they mean, is that the back light of the LCD (as LCD doesn't illuminate light), is using LED's instead of a CFL lamp. Marketing team love using the term "LED", as it says in the name: "Futuristic, Star Trek like, wave of the future". But in reality it's crap. While CFL doesn't necessary mean good, usually on high-end monitor a high-grade CFL lamp is use to provide great to excellent whites. LED back light, well I should say: WHITE LED back light, doesn't provide nice whites, as true white is not yet achievable out of small white LED's which monitor uses. What you should look for, if you seek for the best of whites, is however, RGB LED. This is read, green and blue LED, put very close together, and scattered everywhere behind the screen, to provide uniform back light, AND a true white color. Some monitor even offer the possibility to tweak the RGB lights intensity to get the preferred white color. RGB LED are mostly reserved of absolute high end monitors. The Dell U series uses LG panels. You can get the same models that Dell has, from LG, but pay a much higher price tag, for simply the name. I would go get the Dell one. (same applies for select HP monitors) The Dell U series uses an IPS panel, and a high grade CFL lamp for stunning whites. The Dell U2311H is an entry level IPS panel. It's 6-bit color per channel, and uses an effect (like TN panels) called A-FRC, which means take 2 colors that it can produce, close to the color it needs to produce, and switch between them to achieve the missing colors, so that it can do all 8-bit colors per channel or (16.7 million colors). The Dell U2410 is a higher end IPS panel, it's panel is true 8-bit panel, and uses A-FRC to achieve a look like of 10-bit color panel, for an even higher stunning visual output (warning may cause seizure by the awesome colors). The U2410 is a using a 16:10 wide screen format, which is ideal for work. As it provides you with the benefits of a tradition 4:6 aspect ratio (non-wide screen) but wide. So the resolution is 1920x1200. The U2311H is a 16:9 aspect ratio, so it's 1920x1080 resolution. If you multitask a lot, or work with programs with lots of tool bars, or want to save the space lost buy the ribbon bar that is used by many programs, including of course, Office 2007/2008, and possibly Win8 even on folder, based on leaked pictures (but no guaranty, as nothings says it stick as it's just leaked of a early development stage), 16:10 is very beneficial. And the cool stuff, is that there is no downside to 16:10. as 1080p content perfectly fits in 1200p without any scaling as the width (1920 pixels) is the same. The Dell U2711, and U3011, are using true 10-bit panel, of course they are more expensive and much higher resolution So in conclusion. For desktop monitors for stunning image compared to TN panels, all by being cost effective and be very good in gaming and fast action movies, go with IPS panels. If it says LED back light (and not CLEARLY stating RGB LED back light on the spec sheet), avoid unless you enjoy blu'ish whites instead of a nice white. The Dell U2410, U2711, and U3011 (NOT the U2311H), comes with 2 pre-calibrated color profiles: sRGB and Adobe RGB, for a quick setup. Turn on the monitor, set the monitor color profiles for store shelf setting (Standard as it's called), to Adobe RGB or sRGB, and voila! Of course, it must be noted, that the above should be seen as a bonus feature and not a decision making one, why? Because in reality the calibration is something you should do every month, to make up the wear and tear of the monitor and lamp, that is if you need pin-point color accuracy. But for you and I, I believe it's a good place to start. The U2311H has very nice color out of the box to start with. My recommendation for a monitor, is the Dell U2410, because of the 16:10 aspect ratio, which I believe, for me, very beneficial. with no downside other than a higher price tag. AND has a variety of inputs. You can plug virtually anything. It has VGA, 2x DVI, Display Port (which is replacing DVI), HDMI and even component and composite. If you have analogue TV, using an old VCR, you can have TV on the monitor (use VCR as a TV-Tuner, and plug it on composite port). It also has Picture-in Picture and Side by Side Picture in Picture. However, if you really can't afford the U2410, the U2311H would be my second choice. Note: Based on TFT Central, Dell is expected to replace this Q3 the Dell U series. They will all be LED black light, all be 16:10, and if it follows the new laptop build quality, including on the Dell high end models the Latitude series, then it will be crap quality. So, you don't have much time before it gets replaced with disappointing models.
Listen to Goodbytes he is a monitor genius. On that subject is there any new monitor tech in the pipeline? The one point id make about monitors is buy the best you can afford because the tech doesnt change as fast as say gpus or cpus. And they are the part of your PC you spend 99% of your time looking at.
Indeed. What's up in the monitor world: > OLED.. but that was on this list since ages... the technology is still not ready for high resolution, big size monitors, at an affordable price.. let alone fix problems such as a lack of brightness. > Super PLS LCD screen form Samsung... which is a IPS panel for small mobile devices, which brings it closer to desktop IPS panels as it seams (brighter, wider view angle, as apparently IPS mobile panels aren't as wide screen as desktop IPS panels) > E-Ink improvements panels. Nothing really impacting desktop monitors. I think if OLED is not ready soon for (which I highly doubt it... and usually 1st gen stuff is never really good, heck even IPS panels 1st gen was super far compared to what it is now), and might cost a few fortune) we will simply get what I like call XHD displays. Basically, same size, higher resolution, and perhaps, do the jump from 92 DPI up to 120 DPI. If you want to have a quick look at this, set your DPI setting in Windows 7 to 125 or 150%, and you'll see how things are much smoother, and easier to read 9of course bigger, but the much higher resolution of the screen solves that)
In case the message wasn't received with perfect clarity... Buy the Dell U2311H ... attach to PC ... visual Cheesecake Oh and right this will give you the problem of what to spend the left of 60 quid on...
CCL Online are currently out of stock and that Aria deal has a special free delivery option...damn, I think I am going to have to get one now, before the new model comes out...
Blimey, cheers for that. I'd love to afford the U2410, but the PC build is more important! Cheer's everyone. <3 Bit-Tech.
More like, you have been liberated from the curse of TN badness. Now, you took a step backward to the beautiful colors we used to have from a good CRT monitor.
And what is wrong with the LG monitors I bought? The dell u2311 is old tech compared to the LG ips231p-bn which uses a newer panel. Did I mention the LG is over £50 cheaper? My review of the LG, which is a fantastic monitor for the price! Clicky Cheers, Simon.
