[Retired] The LCD Thread

[CrabJuice]

I think I know what to do now after reading this thread for a couple of days. Nevertheless I feel the urge to join the fray. Firstly I'd like to take my hat off to you guys for sticking with it. And its been a pleasure tracing your posts both here and there, xtknight.

Trying to make a very long story short: I'm looking for some display that will limit problems with headache and eyepain that I experience with some displays. I've come to the conclusion that the only way to get around this is to try various monitors until I find something that I can use. Nevertheless, I want to discuss what to look for in a panel to deduce the nature of the problem and if it could be remedied by configuration. Currently I use a 19" Trinitron CRT. Mind that this is not optimal. I've used LCDs that are much better than this CRT. I've also used LCDs that are alot worse.

Purpose of this post is to find new angles and perhaps make you refute some of my own current ideas.

Possible issues, remedies for newer types of panels:

* Color dithering of 6-bit panels causes some type of flickering. Reason I believe this is that I did very well with an old 17" which probably didnt have dithering. Could this HiFRC be better? Does monitors have the option to turn off FRC? Would it be possible to come up with a color scheme for my desktop that minimize dithering artifacts?

* RTC issues when scrolling text, flipping pages alot. Possibility to turn off on some monitors?

* "Good contrast at low brightness." (xtknight quote?). Anyway it sounds reasonable. But how to test a monitor for this? Or know it from specifications? I have also been reading that people who lower contrast and brightness settings causes image problems and monitor audible noise action.

* Color shift. Should rule out MVA/PVA and IPS.. or is IPS better? I've used both types of monitors but never worked with them for extended time periods. True 8-bit might be better.

* MVA/PVA marketed as 'office' monitors. I know that MVA models used to have lower brightness but these days it seems like almost all monitors have same brightness specs. Contrast isnt that much better these days either.

* Dynamic Contrast. Pulsating/flickering backlight? I havent seen it in action yet but alot of reading in forums indicate that this could be an issue. Possiblity to turn off? Will turning it off remedy the contrast/brightness setting issues?

* Dotpitch. Higher better for eyes but text smaller making it harder to distinguish. Perhaps using large fonts on high dotpitch would be the best. That is an operating system question though. XP does it so-so. Vista might do it better.


Oh yeah. I dont play games at all. I watch scores of movies and TV-series but I'm fine with most displays for this. I think the sourcematerial is a much bigger problem than monitors, actually. All DVDs arent made equal. Its the massive amount of text-work that needs to be adressed first and foremost.

 

[redlinez33]

CrabJuice how much you looking to spend though???


IPS tend to be very bright, so they are a little more HARSH on the eyes. My eyes love SPVA panels from dell, but the colorshifting annoyed me (though didnt effect eye strain). SPVA panels typically can get pretty low on brightness while keeping high contrast.

If $400 isnt to much, look at the BENQ G2400 TN panel.

 

[loki5667]

Well I've been doing a lot of reading and searching for deals on a 22" lcd

Any pro's con's between the LG W2252TQ-TF (269 @ BB) and the L226WTQ-BF (279 shipped)

 

[muppet22]

i got the ds-263n several weeks ago, and played around with it for a week and a half. mine did not have the polarizer and this was very annoying because i watch a fair amount of movies and tv on my computer. off-angle it made black look like white..even looking straight on it was noticeable in the bottom corners. the 275t+ i used had much better viewing angles than the ds-263n.

for gaming, this monitor was pretty good. it still did not compare to my 19" TN (906bw) though..it appeared to either have some ghosting compared to the 906bw..of course it only showed up in a fast paced fps (counter-strike source) - when i move my mouse fast to look somewhere, it "took longer" to see it on the ds-263n. if you play fps competitively, i would recommend against getting a non-TN, although this one is pretty good it is not meant for serious gamers.

i've had the benq g2400w for almost 2 weeks now, and i am very impressed with how fast it is. additionally, the viewing angles are pretty good compared to other tn's i've seen. i wouldn't go so far as to say it looks better off angle than the ds-263n (w/o polarizer), but they have their problems off-angle and are subjectively comparable imo.

watching movies on the ds-263n, the poor contrast and high black levels was very very annoying - especially right after using a 275t+ for a month, which was absolutely beautiful (although extremely laggy).


xtknight - i recommend putting the doublesight and planar below the other TNs in the hardcore gaming section. while the ds is a good monitor for games, it is not great and certainly is not for a "hardcore" gamer. at least not first person shooters. for any other type of game (like rts) it is perfectly fine though. the g2400w should definitely be higher up on the list..and i dont know if the planar belongs on that list due to its higher input delay.

 

[Epix]

Sounds like all you really needed with the 263N was the polarizer.

To everyone who got a DS-263N with a polarizer, where did you order from?

 

[mmnno]

Originally posted by: muppet22
i got the ds-263n several weeks ago, and played around with it for a week and a half. mine did not have the polarizer and this was very annoying because i watch a fair amount of movies and tv on my computer. off-angle it made black look like white..even looking straight on it was noticeable in the bottom corners. the 275t+ i used had much better viewing angles than the ds-263n.

for gaming, this monitor was pretty good. it still did not compare to my 19" TN (906bw) though..it appeared to either have some ghosting compared to the 906bw..of course it only showed up in a fast paced fps (counter-strike source) - when i move my mouse fast to look somewhere, it "took longer" to see it on the ds-263n. if you play fps competitively, i would recommend against getting a non-TN, although this one is pretty good it is not meant for serious gamers.

i've had the benq g2400w for almost 2 weeks now, and i am very impressed with how fast it is. additionally, the viewing angles are pretty good compared to other tn's i've seen. i wouldn't go so far as to say it looks better off angle than the ds-263n (w/o polarizer), but they have their problems off-angle and are subjectively comparable imo.

watching movies on the ds-263n, the poor contrast and high black levels was very very annoying - especially right after using a 275t+ for a month, which was absolutely beautiful (although extremely laggy).


xtknight - i recommend putting the doublesight and planar below the other TNs in the hardcore gaming section. while the ds is a good monitor for games, it is not great and certainly is not for a "hardcore" gamer. at least not first person shooters. for any other type of game (like rts) it is perfectly fine though. the g2400w should definitely be higher up on the list..and i dont know if the planar belongs on that list due to its higher input delay.

The Planar and the Doublesight are the exact same model (except nobody has reported getting a Planar with the polarizer), and both have the exact same input lag: about 3.3ms. That's not much worse than the G2400W's 1.9ms, and both panels have an advertised 5ms response time. Given the unexceptional performance of 24" TN 5ms panels, it probably isn't noticeably better than the 5ms IPS.

[Edit: behardware has the NEC 26" advertised as 6ms, which means DS is fudging/lying because they use the same panel. However, looking at the response time tests of the NEC and the Samsung 245B (same panel as the G2400W...I think) the results are basically identical. Freaky.]

Originally posted by: Epix
Sounds like all you really needed with the 263N was the polarizer.

To everyone who got a DS-263N with a polarizer, where did you order from?

Amazon.

 

[SZGY]

Hey folks,

I bought a 2408WFP a couple of days ago, yet something's been bugging me. I have to say this monitor does not have a true 8-bit panel as mentioned in the topic start page. It's definitely 6-bit as I can clearly see the temporal dithering as I move my finger close to the screen and following with my eyes.

This makes me wonder... Has Dell jumped onto the panel lottery bandwagon or the information that was originally posted was false? Or is it possible that Dell is shipping screens with lower quality panels to Central/Eastern Europe? I really have no clue.

Nevertheless, I feel a little bit screwed over right now...

 

[Diogenes2]

According to this article:

http://www.tftcentral.co.uk/articles/6bit_8bit.htm

Some PVA panels are 6-bit .. They are trying to compete with the faster response time of 6-bit TN panels ..

Samsung are the most talked about culprit here,

Does the 2408WFP have a Samsung panel ?

The article also says that contrary to popular belief, there are some 8-bit TN panels out there ..

 

[SZGY]

Originally posted by: Diogenes2
According to this article:

http://www.tftcentral.co.uk/articles/6bit_8bit.htm

Some PVA panels are 6-bit .. They are trying to compete with the faster response time of 6-bit TN panels ..

Samsung are the most talked about culprit here,

Does the 2408WFP have a Samsung panel ?

The article also says that contrary to popular belief, there are some 8-bit TN panels out there ..

It supposed to have a Samsung panel (according to the first page in this topic). As for competing with speed, what I really don't understand that this is one of the most sluggish LCDs out there. Something tells me they used this 6-bit panel because it was cheaper...

 

[muppet22]

Originally posted by: Epix
Sounds like all you really needed with the 263N was the polarizer.

To everyone who got a DS-263N with a polarizer, where did you order from?

no, besides the not having a polarizer it too slow for competitive first-person shooters. and i don't like the contrast and black levels either..but tn doesn't offer much more on those issues

 

[muppet22]

Originally posted by: mmnno

Originally posted by: muppet22
i got the ds-263n several weeks ago, and played around with it for a week and a half. mine did not have the polarizer and this was very annoying because i watch a fair amount of movies and tv on my computer. off-angle it made black look like white..even looking straight on it was noticeable in the bottom corners. the 275t+ i used had much better viewing angles than the ds-263n.

for gaming, this monitor was pretty good. it still did not compare to my 19" TN (906bw) though..it appeared to either have some ghosting compared to the 906bw..of course it only showed up in a fast paced fps (counter-strike source) - when i move my mouse fast to look somewhere, it "took longer" to see it on the ds-263n. if you play fps competitively, i would recommend against getting a non-TN, although this one is pretty good it is not meant for serious gamers.

i've had the benq g2400w for almost 2 weeks now, and i am very impressed with how fast it is. additionally, the viewing angles are pretty good compared to other tn's i've seen. i wouldn't go so far as to say it looks better off angle than the ds-263n (w/o polarizer), but they have their problems off-angle and are subjectively comparable imo.

watching movies on the ds-263n, the poor contrast and high black levels was very very annoying - especially right after using a 275t+ for a month, which was absolutely beautiful (although extremely laggy).


xtknight - i recommend putting the doublesight and planar below the other TNs in the hardcore gaming section. while the ds is a good monitor for games, it is not great and certainly is not for a "hardcore" gamer. at least not first person shooters. for any other type of game (like rts) it is perfectly fine though. the g2400w should definitely be higher up on the list..and i dont know if the planar belongs on that list due to its higher input delay.

The Planar and the Doublesight are the exact same model (except nobody has reported getting a Planar with the polarizer), and both have the exact same input lag: about 3.3ms. That's not much worse than the G2400W's 1.9ms, and both panels have an advertised 5ms response time. Given the unexceptional performance of 24" TN 5ms panels, it probably isn't noticeably better than the 5ms IPS.

[Edit: behardware has the NEC 26" advertised as 6ms, which means DS is fudging/lying because they use the same panel. However, looking at the response time tests of the NEC and the Samsung 245B (same panel as the G2400W...I think) the results are basically identical. Freaky.]

from what people have posted on hardforum, the planar is a little slower than the doublesight (1 frame compared to less than a frame). 1 frame is about 16ms - i'm not sure where you got 3.3ms.

it seems the g2400w does indeed have exceptional performance for a '24" TN 5ms panel', both on digitalversus and tests done by 10e. also, i have used both and can say for sure that the g2400w is faster.

and for the NEC 26", although it uses the same panel as the planar and ds, it is tested as having 2 frames of lag by hardforum people (like toastyx). xtknight can probably confirm this as well.

Originally posted by: mmnno

Originally posted by: Epix
Sounds like all you really needed with the 263N was the polarizer.

To everyone who got a DS-263N with a polarizer, where did you order from?

Amazon.

it seems that anywhere with a "new" supply of the product has the polarizer. i got my ds just before the cutoff where people started getting polarizers. i think you'd be safe to say you'll get a polarizer most places except newegg.

 

[muppet22]

oh and i forgot to mention - of the 3 monitors i've used over the past few months (275t+, ds-263n, g2400w), none of them had BLB or dead/stuck pixels.

although when i originally turned on the g2400w, it appeared to have a patch of dead pixels and 2 dead in other places..but since then they seem to have disappeared. so it was probably just dust.

anyway, i can disappointed in the lack of great multipurpose lcds..i'd willingly shell out up to $1500 for an lcd that had the contrast and black levels of the 275T+, but the response time and input lag of the g2400w. unfortunately i am stuck with the g2400w for now.

 

[mmnno]

Originally posted by: muppet22
from what people have posted on hardforum, the planar is a little slower than the doublesight (1 frame compared to less than a frame). 1 frame is about 16ms - i'm not sure where you got 3.3ms.

it seems the g2400w does indeed have exceptional performance for a '24" TN 5ms panel', both on digitalversus and tests done by 10e. also, i have used both and can say for sure that the g2400w is faster.

and for the NEC 26", although it uses the same panel as the planar and ds, it is tested as having 2 frames of lag by hardforum people (like toastyx). xtknight can probably confirm this as well.


it seems that anywhere with a "new" supply of the product has the polarizer. i got my ds just before the cutoff where people started getting polarizers. i think you'd be safe to say you'll get a polarizer most places except newegg.

With regards to the NEC, I was talking about response time, not input lag, since your total lag is reactivity+input lag.

I didn't go looking for the planar thread, but this is toastyx's input lag test: http://hardforum.com/showpost....032194456&postcount=70 2/10 of a frame, or 3.3ms. I got the G2400W's input lag from digitalversus, of course.

Here's behardware's evaluation of the 245B's response time, same panel as the G2400W: http://www.behardware.com/arti...-tn-vs-24-pva-mva.html
Both monitors apparently lack RTC. Put that image side by side with the NEC's results and there is basically no difference. That's what I mean by unexceptional performance; with RTC, TN panels can do better for response time (though they tend to sacrifice IQ).

The lag of the BenQ is of course exceptionally low, but that's not what I was referring to.

 

[10e]

Actually the BenQ G2400W has an AUO TN Panel, while the Samsung 245BW and Samsung 2493HM have a Samsung panel. The BenQ is standard 72% NTSC gamut, and the Samsungs are slightly extended to 82%. I do believe that the G2400W has a slightly newer panel.

With some 2ms panels that are TN you have to watch out for input lag that is introduced by the employment of overdrive, as what overdrive will do is look at frame 1, buffer it, look at frame 2, buffer that, and then apply higher voltage for big pixels swings in order to "settle" back into the right color. Depending on the speed of the buffer this extra image storage can cause input lag. Usually not too bad, but that's part of the reason that most VA panels are a bit higher in the input lag dep't than most IPS and TN displays.

Regards,

10e

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: SZGY
Hey folks,

I bought a 2408WFP a couple of days ago, yet something's been bugging me. I have to say this monitor does not have a true 8-bit panel as mentioned in the topic start page. It's definitely 6-bit as I can clearly see the temporal dithering as I move my finger close to the screen and following with my eyes.

This makes me wonder... Has Dell jumped onto the panel lottery bandwagon or the information that was originally posted was false? Or is it possible that Dell is shipping screens with lower quality panels to Central/Eastern Europe? I really have no clue.

Nevertheless, I feel a little bit screwed over right now...

VA panels are assumed to be 8-bit unless bad FRC is noticed (VP930b or 970P). Otherwise it's usually so subtle that it's not even worth the mention or uncertainty when many of the other "8-bit" panels may also dither.

Is this FRC actually distracting, or did you just happen to notice it? I would be very surprised if that were the case, but I can tell you with my VP930b it actually was a little distracting. When I tried the VX2435wm I noticed very subtle FRC, but again, not enough that I'd revoke the 8-bit rating and introduce confusion. Certainly not as much as the VP930b. I assume the other bigger panels have the better dithering algorithms as well.

Keep in mind I say the color mode will be listed "as accurately as possible" and I never made guarantees to the info there. The bit depth is never publicly listed so those are mainly based on trends and what generally works best for people. I hope that the FRC is not distracting enough for you to make this an unworthwhile purchase. I certainly did not find the FRC to be the main annoying thing with the VX2435wm. Actually I never noticed it in real use, at all. I'm not sure if the case is different with the 2408.

(Although I knew of FRC on the VX2435wm, I have not heard of it on the 2408 (or 2407s) in particular. I have heard about it on smaller Dell VA/IPS panels like the 2007FP and 2007WFP.)

Dell cheaps out on a lot of components and it's seemed this way for awhile. It's not because of speed as far as I can tell. But the only other display I'd be reasonably sure about being 8-bit anymore is the LCD2490. It's just that people freak out when they get told an LCD isn't 8-bit, and they think it's some kind of garbage.

 

[10e]

The Dell's panel is the same as the Samsung 245T which is most definitely an 8-bit panel, but the Dell is reputed to be very hard to calibrate and has a fairly dull sRGB preset.

Is it possible that the monitor has a marginal power supply? I've seen this cause "pulsing" in the screen that could appear similar to temporal dithering.

You may also try and move the DVI cable away from any potential RFI/EMI sources like speakers, wall plugs, power supplies, etc...

I know that another user on Hardforums reviewed it, and he didn't mention anything about this, and he would have.

Good luck,

10e

Originally posted by: SZGY
Hey folks,

I bought a 2408WFP a couple of days ago, yet something's been bugging me. I have to say this monitor does not have a true 8-bit panel as mentioned in the topic start page. It's definitely 6-bit as I can clearly see the temporal dithering as I move my finger close to the screen and following with my eyes.

This makes me wonder... Has Dell jumped onto the panel lottery bandwagon or the information that was originally posted was false? Or is it possible that Dell is shipping screens with lower quality panels to Central/Eastern Europe? I really have no clue.

Nevertheless, I feel a little bit screwed over right now...

 

[mmnno]

Originally posted by: 10e
Actually the BenQ G2400W has an AUO TN Panel, while the Samsung 245BW and Samsung 2493HM have a Samsung panel. The BenQ is standard 72% NTSC gamut, and the Samsungs are slightly extended to 82%. I do believe that the G2400W has a slightly newer panel.

With some 2ms panels that are TN you have to watch out for input lag that is introduced by the employment of overdrive, as what overdrive will do is look at frame 1, buffer it, look at frame 2, buffer that, and then apply higher voltage for big pixels swings in order to "settle" back into the right color. Depending on the speed of the buffer this extra image storage can cause input lag. Usually not too bad, but that's part of the reason that most VA panels are a bit higher in the input lag dep't than most IPS and TN displays.

Regards,

10e

Well, I wasn't referring to the 245BW but to the 245B, which is a sRGB panel. But you're right, the BenQ does seem to use the newer AUO panel. Still, the performance is mostly identical.

I'm not a fan of RTC anyway since I only play FPS with the absolute minimum level of competitiveness. It also seems to create tiny weird effects with moving images, so I'd rather have a normal panel with ghosting I can't discern anyway. There are some monitors that don't have lag problems with overdrive, but those models can have the weird effects I was talking about so I wouldn't consider the technology a high priority for TNs.

 

[SZGY]

Originally posted by: xtknight

VA panels are assumed to be 8-bit unless bad FRC is noticed (VP930b or 970P). Otherwise it's usually so subtle that it's not even worth the mention or uncertainty when many of the other "8-bit" panels may also dither.

Is this FRC actually distracting, or did you just happen to notice it? I would be very surprised if that were the case, but I can tell you with my VP930b it actually was a little distracting. When I tried the VX2435wm I noticed very subtle FRC, but again, not enough that I'd revoke the 8-bit rating and introduce confusion. Certainly not as much as the VP930b. I assume the other bigger panels have the better dithering algorithms as well.

Even though I sometimes notice it and it's somewhat (very little) distracting, I can live with it, fortunately. I think these DLP-like rainbow artifacts I'm sometimes seeing are a side-effect of dithering. What bugs me though that this is not an "E" model and I expected true 8-bit without any kind of dithering. But yeah, there's no such thing as a perfect monitor, I know...

 

[SZGY]

Originally posted by: 10e
The Dell's panel is the same as the Samsung 245T which is most definitely an 8-bit panel, but the Dell is reputed to be very hard to calibrate and has a fairly dull sRGB preset.

Is it possible that the monitor has a marginal power supply? I've seen this cause "pulsing" in the screen that could appear similar to temporal dithering.

You may also try and move the DVI cable away from any potential RFI/EMI sources like speakers, wall plugs, power supplies, etc...

I know that another user on Hardforums reviewed it, and he didn't mention anything about this, and he would have.

Good luck,

10e

Nah, it's definitely not the power supply, or interference. I can clearly see the dither pattern, no doubt about it.

 

[loki5667]

Originally posted by: loki5667
Well I've been doing a lot of reading and searching for deals on a 22" lcd

Any pro's con's between the LG W2252TQ-TF (269 @ BB) and the L226WTQ-BF (279 shipped)

bump

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: SZGY

Originally posted by: xtknight

VA panels are assumed to be 8-bit unless bad FRC is noticed (VP930b or 970P). Otherwise it's usually so subtle that it's not even worth the mention or uncertainty when many of the other "8-bit" panels may also dither.

Is this FRC actually distracting, or did you just happen to notice it? I would be very surprised if that were the case, but I can tell you with my VP930b it actually was a little distracting. When I tried the VX2435wm I noticed very subtle FRC, but again, not enough that I'd revoke the 8-bit rating and introduce confusion. Certainly not as much as the VP930b. I assume the other bigger panels have the better dithering algorithms as well.

Even though I sometimes notice it and it's somewhat (very little) distracting, I can live with it, fortunately. I think these DLP-like rainbow artifacts I'm sometimes seeing are a side-effect of dithering. What bugs me though that this is not an "E" model and I expected true 8-bit without any kind of dithering. But yeah, there's no such thing as a perfect monitor, I know...

Yeah, well I hope you don't feel screwed by me or anything. But I really do not know whether a monitor is true 8-bit or not.

I feel screwed because my LCD26 has input lag.

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: qwester

Originally posted by: xtknight

Originally posted by: qwester
I'm looking at the Benq G2400W for a mix of office work and multimedia (movie watching). No gaming. Price is attractive for a 24"er that has quite a bit of positive feedback.
Is there any particular reason why it's not included among the recommendations in the office work section, but is included for multimedia?! Any drawbacks the benq has for office work?
Thanx for the help.

The viewing angles might be a little annoying for office work, I suppose. But not any more so than for multimedia, so I guess I could add it.

One final question before I finalize my decision on the G2400W.
For my use, do you think it's worth taking a gamble on the Soyo DYLM24D6? (for a VA that's within my budget)

I've noticed from user experiences that the reliability and quality of the Soyo is quite questionable, but the ones who end up with a good one are pretty happy with them. The Soyo is tempting as a VA vs. a TN and at ~$100 less, but I am afraid of the headache it might cause me.

If the gains of a VA over a TN are minimal for my uses, I'd rather take the less risky way, and the G2400W is just within my budget ($400) anyway.

I have used TN and IPS panels, but never VAs, so I cannot really judge for myself

Thanx for the help

I suppose you could give it a shot. Just be aware you might need to deal with troubles down the road.

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: CrabJuice
I think I know what to do now after reading this thread for a couple of days. Nevertheless I feel the urge to join the fray. Firstly I'd like to take my hat off to you guys for sticking with it. And its been a pleasure tracing your posts both here and there, xtknight.

Trying to make a very long story short: I'm looking for some display that will limit problems with headache and eyepain that I experience with some displays. I've come to the conclusion that the only way to get around this is to try various monitors until I find something that I can use. Nevertheless, I want to discuss what to look for in a panel to deduce the nature of the problem and if it could be remedied by configuration. Currently I use a 19" Trinitron CRT. Mind that this is not optimal. I've used LCDs that are much better than this CRT. I've also used LCDs that are alot worse.

Purpose of this post is to find new angles and perhaps make you refute some of my own current ideas.

Possible issues, remedies for newer types of panels:

* Color dithering of 6-bit panels causes some type of flickering. Reason I believe this is that I did very well with an old 17" which probably didnt have dithering. Could this HiFRC be better? Does monitors have the option to turn off FRC? Would it be possible to come up with a color scheme for my desktop that minimize dithering artifacts?

Dithering on desktop monitors is done at the monitor level, and it is not possible to diasble this.

Your 17" probably had dithering (spatial, checkerboard), but not FRC (temporal, time-based, flickering). Either way, I doubt this is the cause of your eye strain.

* RTC issues when scrolling text, flipping pages alot. Possibility to turn off on some monitors?

Some monitors do offer the ability to disable OVERDRIVE or RTA, yes. Particularly some Samsungs and the high-end NEC 90 series.

* "Good contrast at low brightness." (xtknight quote?). Anyway it sounds reasonable. But how to test a monitor for this? Or know it from specifications? I have also been reading that people who lower contrast and brightness settings causes image problems and monitor audible noise action.

Usually monitors with high contrast have good contrast at low brightness anyway, so that's bit redundant to just saying high contrast. You know it because of tests done by review sites, and panel type (VA=highest contrast, new gen TNs are good, S-IPS are avg, H-IPS are good).

* Color shift. Should rule out MVA/PVA and IPS.. or is IPS better? I've used both types of monitors but never worked with them for extended time periods. True 8-bit might be better.

Huh?

Well IPS is the best of them all when it comes to this. MVA experiences probably the most problems with horizontal-plane, annoying gray shift. TNs are just shifty all over, but aren't quite as sensitively shifty as VAs and therefore not quite as annoying for a lot of people. Color shift is not related to 8-bit in any way. It's just that VA/IPS types are more often 8-bit.

* MVA/PVA marketed as 'office' monitors. I know that MVA models used to have lower brightness but these days it seems like almost all monitors have same brightness specs. Contrast isnt that much better these days either.

Actually this may change, as I've heard many times that TNs are easier on the eyes for most people. So really right now I think TNs are good office monitors. They deliver punchy colors and aren't excessively bright, and the newer ones deliver great contrast.

* Dynamic Contrast. Pulsating/flickering backlight? I havent seen it in action yet but alot of reading in forums indicate that this could be an issue. Possiblity to turn off? Will turning it off remedy the contrast/brightness setting issues?

Almost all monitors give you the ability to turn this off, if it is even an option in the first place. I'm not sure which issues you're talking about.

* Dotpitch. Higher better for eyes but text smaller making it harder to distinguish. Perhaps using large fonts on high dotpitch would be the best. That is an operating system question though. XP does it so-so. Vista might do it better.

A higher dot pitch delivers bigger text, but a higher DPI (smaller dot pitch) delivers smaller text. It's usually just best to get an LCD with bigger text because XP/Vista's DPI scaling is generally agreed to be crap.

Oh yeah. I dont play games at all. I watch scores of movies and TV-series but I'm fine with most displays for this. I think the sourcematerial is a much bigger problem than monitors, actually. All DVDs arent made equal. Its the massive amount of text-work that needs to be adressed first and foremost.

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: loki5667
Well I've been doing a lot of reading and searching for deals on a 22" lcd

Any pro's con's between the LG W2252TQ-TF (269 @ BB) and the L226WTQ-BF (279 shipped)

Sorry, I know next to nothing about the W2252TQ. Consider the L227WT though for not much more $ than you're talking about. Or, the ASUS VW222U for a standard gamut.

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: muppet22
i got the ds-263n several weeks ago, and played around with it for a week and a half. mine did not have the polarizer and this was very annoying because i watch a fair amount of movies and tv on my computer. off-angle it made black look like white..even looking straight on it was noticeable in the bottom corners. the 275t+ i used had much better viewing angles than the ds-263n.

for gaming, this monitor was pretty good. it still did not compare to my 19" TN (906bw) though..it appeared to either have some ghosting compared to the 906bw..of course it only showed up in a fast paced fps (counter-strike source) - when i move my mouse fast to look somewhere, it "took longer" to see it on the ds-263n. if you play fps competitively, i would recommend against getting a non-TN, although this one is pretty good it is not meant for serious gamers.

i've had the benq g2400w for almost 2 weeks now, and i am very impressed with how fast it is. additionally, the viewing angles are pretty good compared to other tn's i've seen. i wouldn't go so far as to say it looks better off angle than the ds-263n (w/o polarizer), but they have their problems off-angle and are subjectively comparable imo.

watching movies on the ds-263n, the poor contrast and high black levels was very very annoying - especially right after using a 275t+ for a month, which was absolutely beautiful (although extremely laggy).


xtknight - i recommend putting the doublesight and planar below the other TNs in the hardcore gaming section. while the ds is a good monitor for games, it is not great and certainly is not for a "hardcore" gamer. at least not first person shooters. for any other type of game (like rts) it is perfectly fine though. the g2400w should definitely be higher up on the list..and i dont know if the planar belongs on that list due to its higher input delay.

I find that very odd, muppet22. The DS-263N has only 16 ms of lag at most and quite a good response time. It might be something else that you're noticing (size?)

The NEC definitely has three (or four) frames of lag, at times. It's always slower than my NEC 20WMGX2 which is often in itself two frames. And the lag is noticeable.

You found the G2400W a lot better than the DS for gaming overall? That's surprising, to me.