Need Advise Buying a New Monitor

[paraiso36]

Good Day,

I finally decided to replace my 15 years old 15" CRT monitor (yes,it is really a shame for a hardcore gamer like me).So I began searching for my new monitor with a limit of 300 dollars. And I got tempted by an LCD monitor, technology which I didnt know well. For no more than 300 dollars I have two AOC LCDs models and one Viewsonic, the VE175. So I began my research about LCDs monitors and sadly I realized that all LCDs within my money limit had 25 ms of latency which was not good for playing games. So, my problem was resolved..I would buy a CRT monitor. Today my PC shop offered me an ACER AL1715B 17" LCD monitor for 299 bucks and my doubts appeared again because this monitor has 12 ms of latency. So here are my questions,

1.- Is it 12ms of latency good enough to play any game?

2.- I have read that LCD monitors have an optimum resolution, usually the highest, due to architecture facts. Although I have a top line vga card, can I play games with a res of 800x600 or 1024x760 with an LCD monitor?.I know there is an image problem changing the optimum res..but how important is this problem?

3.- I know LCD monitors have less viewable angle than CRT monitors. This Acer has 150º view angle. How bad is this? Can I play with someone sitting beside me?

Considering all the doubts above, and remarking that I need the monitor to play, I have 3 options:

1.- Refurbisheb 1999, Ibm P260, DVI 21" CRT monitor for 150 dollars.

2.- A new Viewsonic model Ef or Gf 19" CRT monitor for 226 bucks.

3.- The LCD 17" Acer AL1715B mentioned above for 299 bucks.

Which one do you recommend me?. Can you answer me the LCD questions?.Let me also say that the question about resolution is really important to me...Thanks a lot...

 

[Chuck_Hsiao]

1. I personally feel that 12 ms should be good enough; I'm not a hardcore gamer though. I do know that 25 ms is definitely noticeable, even when using regular applications, as opposed to video-intensive stuff like games and DVDs. The best way though is to go down to the shop and see if you could run some stuff on it, and see if you notice any ghosting.
2. You can play under pretty much any resolution as long as it's less than the LCD's max resolution. Things may look somewhat fuzzy, but that's usually more along the lines of text, which tends to be one or two pixels thick (and hence, making the pixel interpolation much more noticeable). I wouldn't expect it to be a problem with images, which tend to be larger, and thus obscure the edges anyway -- not to mention, motion also tends to blur the edges. I never notice the fact that Starcraft is really at 640 x 480 resolution on my LCD monitor.

As a side note, I'd recommend using a DVI-compatible monitor (if your video card supports DVI), since the picture quality is better that way. Just make sure the monitor comes with one so you're not left paying for an extra cable.

3. This really depends on the particular monitor. Stated LCD view angles tend to be exaggerated since they give the angle at which the contrast is 10:1, but we can notice the difference starting at around 100:1. Whether or not someone sitting beside you can see it well is open to debate, and how well they want to see it.

It should be fairly easy actually to find LCD monitors for less than $300. I've generally found the prices to be around $180 for a 15-inch, $220 for a 17-inch, and $300 for a 19-inch, but those are for my company's monitors, which are not "name brand". I would expect that other companies that we compete with would have similar prices.

Chuck Hsiao
Amptron

 

[paraiso36]

Really thanks for your answer...Talking about resolution you left me at peace....About angle sorry but I didnt understand what you explained due to my limited knowledge about LCDs monitors..And about latency, hope 12ms will be ok..
I agree with you about dvi connector. My VGA card is a 6800 Nvidia 256 DDr3 GT with two DVI conectors..Sadly enough the Acer model I described has only analog connector as I have read. Here in my counry LCD monitors are only adquired by order so, it is no possible to check the monitor before buying it. However I have read an excellent review about this Acer model searching in google.
Finally, among my 3 options...what is your choose?....thanks...

 

[Chuck_Hsiao]

Well CRT monitors are viewable from any angle. LCD monitors though are best viewed head-on, but get a lot worse when viewed from other angles. In generally it's not too bad; someone looking over your shoulder should see pretty much the same thing you do. Someone sitting next to you...well, it depends on how close next to you. So it really depends on how close they are. If they're just looking on, then it should be fine. If you want their opinion on colors while you're working on a picture or something, it may not be. With a 150 degree viewing angle, they should be able to see you fragging people fine. However, generally speaking, the lower the response time, the lower the viewing angle, so you may have to make some tradeoffs in this area. And because of the way viewing angle and response time are reported, they give a rough idea of how good a monitor is, but not a particularly accurate one.

Using a regular VGA instead of DVI probably won't make that much of a difference -- just that if you're looking for clean, crisp pictures, DVI is a better bet because you don't lose signal integrity the way you do with a digital-to-analog then analog-to-digital connection that the regular VGA provides. Ahh well.

My company sells monitors only in the United States, so I have no idea what's good in other countries. You may want to wait for some serious gamers to show up and say what they consider to be good LCD stats for gaming, because I'm not really sure what the standard is. My main area of knowledge for LCD monitors is dead pixel policies, so anything else, well, I'm not a hardcore gamer so I don't really follow up on the latest advancements.

Hehe because I work for a competitor company, it's sort of awkward for me to give advice on which of those you should choose. You could always wait a few months though, because by then, LCDs will probably cost a lot less, and the specs will improve. Not to mention, a lot more LCDs will by then support the DVI interface. All of my company's 19-inch monitors already support DVI; only 2 of our 17-inch monitors support DVI, however. Most likely, there'll be a few more LCD options for you down the road.

Chuck Hsiao
Amptron