Which 120Hz?

[guy93]

Alright so I am looking to purchase a 120Hz LCD monitor, but I am having trouble as to which one is recommended to get, as all of these are great!

http://ncix.com/products/?sku=55988&...nufacture=ASUS

http://ncix.com/products/?sku=49306&...nufacture=Acer

http://ncix.com/products/?sku=56593&...nufacture=BenQ

Suggestions?

 

[Nintendesert]

I built one system with the ASUS monitor and I built myself one with the Alienware since it was on sale down to 350 range. I like them both and could never go back to 60hz monitors again.

 

[darkswordsman17]

I believe there might be some new ones that are supposed to be out soon, so I'd maybe wait on them.

You might look at Hardforum's Display forum, they are a pretty good source of info and feedback. Also here's a couple of blogs that might help:
http://www.pcmonitors.org/
http://3dvision-blog.com/

I will say that you should probably stay away from the BenQ for now, it seems to have some significant backlight bleed issues.

 

[Karstein]

I built one system with the ASUS monitor and I built myself one with the Alienware since it was on sale down to 350 range. I like them both and could never go back to 60hz monitors again.

Absolutely. I have a Samsung 2233rz and couldn't dream of my next gaming monitor not being 120Hz.

 

[TheDrake]

you know all this talk of people who have gotten 120hz monitors saying they would never go back to 60hz is funny to me. I had the Alienware 120hz and was happy as all to get rid of it and go back to a IPS 60hz. I play plenty games including an occasional FPS and would much rather have an IPS 60hz panel over a TN 120Hz. Am I just the exception here?

 

[nanaki333]

i've got the asus one and like. my opinion is biased since that's the only one i own though. beautiful picture and i never had a problem with it.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

I went from a 2ms ViewSonic to a 3ms gtg 120Hz ViewSonice for high speed gaming and it helped alot with input lag and frame-rate smoothness. I haven't compared this to an IPS panel but my LCD TV is an IPS panel and I don't notice much difference from our TN panel in the living room.

EDIT: you are probably not going to like this but I would go for the Acer on a personal Preference. Its up to you though. They all are basically the same.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

you know all this talk of people who have gotten 120hz monitors saying they would never go back to 60hz is funny to me. I had the Alienware 120hz and was happy as all to get rid of it and go back to a IPS 60hz. I play plenty games including an occasional FPS and would much rather have an IPS 60hz panel over a TN 120Hz. Am I just the exception here?

And I'm sure somewhere there is a guy refusing to use a ssd because his 2 80gb raptors in raid "PWN".

I personally enjoy games at really high fps and when I get tired of that I switch over to 3D and do that. When I need a pretty picture I'll go fire up the plasma and watch some blu rays on it. When I need a fast responsive monitor to kick some ass on BC2 online multiplayer I'm using my 120hz.

 

[Petey!]

The Asus or the BenQ.

I've heard talk that with recent firmware updates, the BenQ is now one of, if not the, best. The Alienware is really good aswell, but it's so expensive and doesn't go on sale much.

 

[artvscommerce]

The Acer certainly isn't the best, but i'm quite happy with it and you can get it refurbished for under $200 @ cheetahdeals.com

 

[Grooveriding]

you know all this talk of people who have gotten 120hz monitors saying they would never go back to 60hz is funny to me. I had the Alienware 120hz and was happy as all to get rid of it and go back to a IPS 60hz. I play plenty games including an occasional FPS and would much rather have an IPS 60hz panel over a TN 120Hz. Am I just the exception here?

There are probably a lot of users who have never used an IPS panel and may have had nothing but TN LCDs. Also some users may just not care about colour and image quality over the higher refresh rate of a 120hz TN.

 

[Dkcode]

I have the ASUS VG236HE and it is fantastic if you don't mind the glossy surface.

I think its probably the pick of the 120Hz monitors out at the moment.

I also tried the BenQ XL2410T and I did not like it. Colours no where near as good or clean as the ASUS.

The other alternative is the LG W2363D which is also supposed to have excellent image quality.

 

[Worthington]

I have the Asus and am pretty happy with it (my previous monitor was a IPS NEC 20WMGX2). It's got all the regular TN issues (bad angles, etc) but since it's just a PC monitor i'm pretty much always right in front of it anyways.

I bought one of the Eye-One coloromiters though and calibrated it as it was pretty terrible right out of the box. Once I did that though it looks solid, and gaming on it is a world of difference.

 

[Dkcode]

I have the Asus and am pretty happy with it (my previous monitor was a IPS NEC 20WMGX2). It's got all the regular TN issues (bad angles, etc) but since it's just a PC monitor i'm pretty much always right in front of it anyways.

I bought one of the Eye-One coloromiters though and calibrated it as it was pretty terrible right out of the box. Once I did that though it looks solid, and gaming on it is a world of difference.

Which preset mode do you use with it dude?

e.g. Standard, Theatre, Gaming etc.

 

[Worthington]

I'm not in front of it right now but I'm almost positive I'm using Gaming preset and then adjusted the image settings for that one.

 

[apoppin]

i have three of the ASUS displays for 3D Vision Surround. They are a great match because they can be extremely bright - and are very bright right out of the box - which is necessary for 3D Vision as it is dark compared to 2D.

i have a 30" 2560x1600 LCD also and you will never really never miss the accuracy of color and image quality in gaming by using a TN panel (or panels). There are no issues for me with viewing angles for 3D Vision on all 3 panels for 3D Vision Surround as you sit directly in front of the displays while gaming.

Aerial views of Panau are spectacular in 5760x1080 in 3D Vision.

 

[Ben90]

you know all this talk of people who have gotten 120hz monitors saying they would never go back to 60hz is funny to me. I had the Alienware 120hz and was happy as all to get rid of it and go back to a IPS 60hz. I play plenty games including an occasional FPS and would much rather have an IPS 60hz panel over a TN 120Hz. Am I just the exception here?

You are not the only exception. Plenty of people cannot really notice 120hz and there is no debating that IPS monitors look better.

I think the general consensus on this forum is that if you play FPS games, generally you will be better off spending the premium on a 120hz monitor than an IPS. There are always exceptions, so everyone will have to decide for themselves.

Also, some games cannot simply be ran consistently around 120fps. Crysis (even on minimum settings with a 5ghz 2600k) has some problems here, and Fallout 3 simply maxes out at 60fps.

 

[Karstein]

That's my situation; I bought mine to use for Quake Live, Counter Strike, etc.

Also - there will always be those who say 'but you can't notice over x fps' - I can definitely tell up to about 80-85, after which anything else is just for stability's sake. The fact I get 120fps constantly in Quake Live means I never have any doubts in the back of my mind because it's comfortably over this mark.

 

[guy93]

Thanks for the input guys! Does anybody know about the glossy screen on the asus monitor?

 

[NYHoustonman]

I recently bought the Asus VG236 (without 3D kit, as I'm an AMD user at the moment), coming from a 2209WA. At first I was a bit put off by the way the desktop looks on a TN panel, but I've gotten used to that and frankly don't notice the color shifts at all in games or movies. What I do notice, of course, is the more consistently crisp image (and better black levels). Great monitor.

The glossy surface can be tough during the day. I have to keep the blinds in my room closed completely. Given a dark enough room I'd go for glossy every time as images look more natural (none of the 'shimmering' you get with anti-glare).

 

[guy93]

Yeah when I play games or do anything, I have my blinds behind me closed and have pillow blocking my blinds so no light gets in at all hahaha.

It's now down to ASUS or BenQ

 

[postmortemIA]

I spending gaming about 20% of time that I use PC, so I would not trade IQ for response time.

TNs are bad, but you can get used to it.

 

[guy93]

Alright looking for the monitor with the best response time, since I am gaming most the time as I'm a competitive gamer. People have told me go with the BenQ since it has some "program" or something in there which makes it better, I wouldn't know haha.

 

[Petey!]

BenQ definitely has the best response time out of them.

There's a big thread about it from it's pre-release up until present, and you can see that a lot of the complaints it had when it first came out got rectified.

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1548394&page=13

 

[bunnyfubbles]

if you're into competitive games, particularly shooters, the BenQ XL2410T is easily the best monitor I have ever used, including CRTs.

CRTs still have better motion clarity, but the FPS and User Game-1 and User Game-2 profiles allow much better vision in low light areas, of course this advantage comes at the cost of overall image quality. Such an advantage is arguably as great as the monitor's 0 input lag or 120Hz refresh rate, for example games like Left 4 Dead I hardly ever need to use my flashlight even in the darkest areas.

Other that that the sRGB mode is decent for desktop use (at least for a TN) and if you're willing to mess with configuration you can get the Standard mode to look just about as good as you could expect from a TN, but these are just about unbearably dark for any game that is has a lot of dark areas.

The biggest weakness of the monitor, at least IMO, is that they don't make switching between monitor profiles all too easy, but its not a deal breaker.