I Am Afraid of LCD's I Think I Want a 80 lb CRT

[blatherbeard]

My 17 " crt died so i picked up a 19" lcd and i absoloutely loved it(dcl/lcd 19" 75 refresh but only 1280x1024 rez and a decent response time but not the best) and i absoloutly loved it. I could adjust the brightness pretty well and got Wow running well on it. Then my buddy was getting rid of his 21" crt since he got a new monitor. My wife was going to take it but it wouldnt fit on her desk so i tried it and now im even happier. I had forgotten how much better a high refresh rate(100+) and 1600x1200 looked. and now that the screen is big enough i can read the damn text at that high a rez.

crt wins out again, until it dies and i have to get an lcd. lol

 

[dfloyd]

Well I am glad many prefer what they prefer. I just personally cant understand it.

After owning and using for many years the following, I just cant fathom why people think CRTs are so much better. Maybe some of the highest end of the highest end are better, but on average I dont think CRTs currently touch LCDs in overall quality.

Mitsubishi Diamond Pro 900u
NEC FE950
Samsung 955DF
And many others, these are just the most recent before i moved to LCD.

Now I have not compared LCDs to the higher end 22"+ CRTs, but my point was never that LCDs are better in every way than a CRT can be. But on average LCDs are now better than CRTs.

And again I never stated OLED was a LCD technology, I stated it was a flat panel tech coming out soon. The argument about LCD scaling is still amazing to me as I just cannot see this huge quality loss when I scale on my LCD, unless I go to some crazy low number like 800 x 600, which I never do.

On the side by side comparison, this was not done in a store, this was done at my home with friends present. Friends who loved my current NEC FE950 until they saw it side by side with my new 2005 FPW, Rev. 3. Everyone agreed the LCD looked far better in gaming, in color vibrancy, in depth. It literally made the FE950 look dull and lifeless when compared in gaming and video.

 

[JRW]

Im suprised you're using the 2005FPW as an example (of all LCDs) being it has poor black levels , in my side by side comparison my CRT was making my 2001FP look very bad with basically everything except for text. Color vibrancy on a CRT hasnt been an issue since Nvidia came up with the Digital Vibrance feature which allows you to adjust overall color saturation.

You also fail to mention the obvious motion blur differance between your CRT & LCD ..Please dont tell me you didnt notice any ghosting / blurring ..its painfully obvious when doing CRT / LCD side by sides with gaming. A solid 60FPS on a CRT looks way more fluid than *any* LCD ive seen.

 

[dfloyd]

Notice I said the 2005 FPW Rev. 3 I had. It did not have poor black levels, nor did it have the backlighting issues that some earlier ones had apparently shown. In fact I could not find a fault with it.

And digital vibrance doesnt even come in the same league of true color vibrancy that I see on my LCD when compared to my CRT. I am being serious, its not even close. Obvious motion blur difference? I swear I see not one drop of motion blur or ghosting. I dont see any at all and no 60fps on a CRT does not look more fluid than on my LCD, it just looks more dull and lifeless. The color is not even in the same league in comparison and Nvidias tweaks do not fix that.

Please sit your CRT up beside the LCD, its a huge revelation (Not going over to a friends house and trying to remember the difference). I honestly never expected my LCD to even compare to my CRT. I got it because I need to move my monitor alot and the LCD would be alot easier to move. Talk about being blown away, and I was, and that is why I am arguing so strongly against those talking like LCDs have all these problems.... They dont, they may have in the past, but they are getting past most all of the initial problems .

 

[selfbuilt]

Interesting thread - simply summarized, stick with whatever you like best.

Personally, I switched to a great LCD (Samsung 191T) three years ago from the best aperture grill CRT monitor I ever owned (Viewsonic PS790), after realizing that my cheap notebook was looking better that the 5yr old PS790. Don't get me wrong - great CRT monitor, but no amount of tweaking, vibrancy, etc, could ever get it to match a LCD in a side-by-side comparison.

I am still using that same LCD today - in all its 25ms response time glory. Sure, ghosting is very visible in games - but you get used to it so as to barely notice it in time (not that I would have believed that at first - playing the Borg levels in Elite Force 2 when I first bought the LCD were nauseating with all the ghosting on the deck plating, etc.).

The key to happy LCD life is adjusting your settings - I run the monitor at about 25-30% brightness for every day use, at 50% contrast, with customized reduced individual R-G-B gamma settings to match the lighting conditions in the room (about .8 - 0.95, depending). The "default" settings were hell on the eyes - just adjust down until you get it right. Most of the "eye-strain" bashing of LCDs is likely due to having the brightness turned up too high.

That being said, I'm hardly anti-CRT - main problem with LCDs is running them at non-native resolution still looks terrible (even on the new ones). I just bought a refurb 20" CRT for my mom, given that her eyesight isn't as good as it was, and she can run this beast nicely at lower resolutions. Live and let live ...

 

[Rangoric]

Problem I have with LCDs is the Native Resolution. Typically that I will not bother getting an LCD if it doesn't support 16x12 or close enough for me not to care.

And once I narrow down the resolution to good ones, I tend to either have the price go up, or the LCD to be crap.

16x12 reso is the reason I picked the CRT I have now.

 

[Dethfrumbelo]

Pretty much all the CRT users here have professional-grade diamondtron/aperture grill/<.24 dp/superbright monitors, so these are certainly not your average CRTs. I agree that even midrange CRTs these days are pretty awful, but that's not what we're dealing with.

Ok, let's say I'm imagining the problems I'm having with LCDs. The fact still remains that you can't acceptably scale resolutions and are either forced to constantly upgrade your video card or get stuck at a craptastic 1280x1024. When LCDs look acceptable going below their native res I'd look into them more seriously, because the bulk of a CRT can be problematic.

Why are there so many LCD Nazis running around. People still like their CRTs, what's the problem?

 

[dfloyd]

Sorry not being a LCD Nazi, I just thought the OP was asking for opinions and if he should go with the 80lb monster or not. For the life of me I cant comprehend why anyone would, LCDs may not look as good scaled, but I swear I cant see how they look bad. Just got through playing some Oblivion and in fact 1280 x 720 looks pretty dang good on my 1680 x 1050 native screen. If I could see it looking bad like people claim I am sure I would agree, but the saying goes seeing is believing and what I see does not look a hundreth as bad as people are implying, and I swear my FE950 looks much worse because the colors look lifeless and dull. (At least compared to either of the two 20.1" LCDs)

 

[CP5670]

As I mentioned earlier, a lot of it depends on your lighting conditions/preferences and what your CRT is like (there are lots of bad CRTs out there, and even lots of bad samples of otherwise high end CRTs). In a dark room, CRTs look much better and LCDs look much worse than in a brightly lit room. I have also found that CRTs with superbright or an equivalent feature look far better than other CRTs in games. Also, the internal focus controls on CRTs usually need to be adjusted for them to look their sharpest. I think if all these conditions are met, there is not much of a contest purely in terms of image quality.

I haven't seen a 2005, but I was pretty unimpressed with the 2405 one guy had where I used to work (too bright, high black levels, screen door effect, ghosting and 60hz). The only LCDs that look good to me are the ones with the glossy coatings, and only in the daytime since the actual black level sucks on most of them. (although I haven't yet seen the new NEC 20" one, which seems to be an exception)

 

[thepd7]

I like both but since I game semi-seriously I need a good CRT. The 19" I have right now is crap. Now, I have heard of lots of people buying good CRT's used at computer shops but I for the life of me can't find one in DFW (I think Fry's killed them all?). If you live in DFW and know of somewhere I can find a great used CRT, I would appreciate a PM.

And I have no idea how people can say LCD's are close to high-end CRT's. Wake up, LCD's are great, but if they are so close why don't you see them at CPL events (cyberathelete professional league, the gaming NFL)? Even people having to lug them around use them rather than LCD's.

That being said, I own 2 LCD's and they work great and take up less space (and text is sharper) but they don't cut it for gaming.

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: Rangoric
Problem I have with LCDs is the Native Resolution. Typically that I will not bother getting an LCD if it doesn't support 16x12 or close enough for me not to care.

And once I narrow down the resolution to good ones, I tend to either have the price go up, or the LCD to be crap.

16x12 reso is the reason I picked the CRT I have now.

Perhaps by the time Vista is here they will fix that with a DPI adjustment that works well for every app. They can't leave all LCD users hanging like that. Not to mention SED, OLED, plasma, DLP, the list goes on. I'm sure tons of users want a resolution scaling that looks perfect on their monitors.

 

[Rhezuss]

I just made the move to the LCD side, though at first I was very unsure, after lots of tweaking and adjustments, I can tell you that I love my LCD. I only have it for 2 days now and I'm actually starting to "get used" to this technology (higher contrats/brightness and black level).

Although the viewing angle on my model (VX922) is not the best, slightly move up, down, left or right and you already see a difference, I really love the crisp and sharp image coming out of this panel.

You should see Oblivion on this LCD.

 

[CP5670]

I like how the original poster always disappears in these types of threads.

 

[JRW]

Originally posted by: dfloyd
Notice I said the 2005 FPW Rev. 3 I had. It did not have poor black levels, nor did it have the backlighting issues that some earlier ones had apparently shown. In fact I could not find a fault with it.

And digital vibrance doesnt even come in the same league of true color vibrancy that I see on my LCD when compared to my CRT. I am being serious, its not even close. Obvious motion blur difference? I swear I see not one drop of motion blur or ghosting. I dont see any at all and no 60fps on a CRT does not look more fluid than on my LCD, it just looks more dull and lifeless. The color is not even in the same league in comparison and Nvidias tweaks do not fix that.

Please sit your CRT up beside the LCD, its a huge revelation (Not going over to a friends house and trying to remember the difference). I honestly never expected my LCD to even compare to my CRT. I got it because I need to move my monitor alot and the LCD would be alot easier to move. Talk about being blown away, and I was, and that is why I am arguing so strongly against those talking like LCDs have all these problems.... They dont, they may have in the past, but they are getting past most all of the initial problems .

Been there done that with the side by side comparisons, Maybe its just my FW900 but the colors & contrast are excellent on it, and it doesnt matter what Rev a 2005FPW is ,its still using a low contrast ratio IPS panel which means average at best black levels,try playing a game at night with the lights out such as Doom 3 / FEAR etc. and you'll see what I mean, LCDs that use SPVA panels (such as the 2405FPW) have decent blacks but even then still cant compare to a properly calibrated CRT.

I agree LCDs are improving with better black levels & faster response times but the 2005FPW isnt one of these. From your comments it sounds like something was wrong with your CRT

 

[xtknight]

LCDs that dynamically adjust the backlight should perform much better in dark games, such as the NEC 20WMGX2. I agree most TFTs leave a bit to be desired in darker games. The NEC gives you fast response time, high contrast, dynamic backlight (if you want it), almost Lambertian (CRT-like) viewing angle, and great colors so if you're dissatisfied with others that may be the one monitor that will satisfy you. It does demand a lot of cash though.

 

[aboothman]

Well, many people base their opinions of LCDs on cheap, crappy, poorly adjusted panels.

Just make sure to see a REAL LCD before you decide they are all crap....

 

[blatherbeard]

Originally posted by: dfloyd
I personally dont think its subjective at all.
.

This is the real statement i had a problem with. Doesnt this discussion MAKE the subject subjective? Just the fact that we have opinions on both sides make it a subjective arguement, end of story.

 

[Perdera]

I saw two of those 24" widescreen (22.5" viewable, 93 lbs!) Sony monitors in the local Craigslist last Thursday. Ran over to some guys house and picked one up for $250. It's awesome. $800 24" LCD's can kiss mah tuckus.

 

[JRW]

Originally posted by: xtknight
LCDs that dynamically adjust the backlight should perform much better in dark games, such as the NEC 20WMGX2. I agree most TFTs leave a bit to be desired in darker games. The NEC gives you fast response time, high contrast, dynamic backlight (if you want it), almost Lambertian (CRT-like) viewing angle, and great colors so if you're dissatisfied with others that may be the one monitor that will satisfy you. It does demand a lot of cash though.

Yea this looks like a promising LCD ,If only it wasnt so small... im also skeptical about its auto black level adjustments ,If its anything like the Samsung LCD HDTVs ive seen all it does is cause 'black crush' effects ...meaning black levels get dark but lose all subtle shadow detail in the process.