New PC Monitor Advice? [2020]

[BRiT]

New year, new problem with old monitor... and no, it's not cat related.

I'm looking to eventually replace my ancient LCD from 2005, the 24" Dell 2405FPW monitor that does 1920x1200. The monitor still functions but the power button does not. Currently it's stuck on, but I think the next power outage will have it never be able to turn on again. Might even need to sign out a monitor from work to be able to work remotely.

I am entertaining monitor sizes in range of 24" to 32". Currently the video card is an Nvidia GTX 1070 but I do not desire to buy into the GSync ecco-system so that's not a driver.

What should I be looking for? Some rather sloppy browsing through Amazon was showing monitors from $500 to $1300. Why do they cost as much as a 55" to 65" HDR 4K LCD TVs from TCL? I haven't seen any 4K HDR TVs at the 32" size.

What panel tech for monitors are preferred in this day? Is HDR even feasible on PC yet?

If you had to shop for your own PC display setup, what would you go with?

Thank you.

 

[Malo]

If I was going to buy a new monitor this year to last me another 5-10 years, I would be getting a 34"+ Ultrawide high DPI monitor with a good Freesync implementation (preferably already g-sync compatible). I currently have a 34" ultrawide and love the format.

 

[AlphaWolf]

Acer ET322QK

32", 4k hdr, supports freesync, under $400. Seems to get decent reviews.

I have no experience with it myself. It is only 60hz if that matters to you.

 

[Davros]

/Brit obviously did not see my post explaining his next monitor should be a crt
In all seriousness, I'm with Malo a big fan of the 21:9 ultrawide format

 

[Davros]

Nvidia has developed new technology that enables 360Hz refresh rates on PC displays, achieving unprecedented responsiveness that’s perfectly suited to esports, where any advances in terms of refresh speeds can translate to improved performance during play. Nvidia’s new G-sync tech that delivers the 360Hz refresh speeds will be coming to market first through a partnership with Asus, via the Asus ROG Swift 360 monitor that’s debuting at this week’s annual CES show in Las Vegas. It works in combination with Nvidia’s RTX line of GPUs, and will provide refresh rates that translate to less than 3 milliseconds of input latency, all available on a 24.5-inch, fully 1080p HD gaming panel. The Asus ROG Swift 360 monitor will be coming out sometime “later this year,” and pricing isn’t yet available but you can bet it’ll be more than your average gaming monitor, given its advanced performance features and esports target market.

 

[orangpelupa]

Nvidia has developed new technology that enables 360Hz refresh rates on PC displays, achieving unprecedented responsiveness that’s perfectly suited to esports, where any advances in terms of refresh speeds can translate to improved performance during play. Nvidia’s new G-sync tech that delivers the 360Hz refresh speeds will be coming to market first through a partnership with Asus, via the Asus ROG Swift 360 monitor that’s debuting at this week’s annual CES show in Las Vegas. It works in combination with Nvidia’s RTX line of GPUs, and will provide refresh rates that translate to less than 3 milliseconds of input latency, all available on a 24.5-inch, fully 1080p HD gaming panel. The Asus ROG Swift 360 monitor will be coming out sometime “later this year,” and pricing isn’t yet available but you can bet it’ll be more than your average gaming monitor, given its advanced performance features and esports target market.

oh my, i wonder if its true 360hz or there's some trickery or weird behavior. hmm.

 

[BRiT]

I can't even imagine the price on that thing, gonna be at least $1K and even then it's still only 1080p SDR. Such fail.

 

[Malo]

I can't even imagine the price on that thing, gonna be at least $1K and even then it's still only 1080p SDR. Such fail.

Fairly specialized purpose though, not something 99% of gamers need to care about. It's not like they'll be producing a large quantity of them for sale in BestBuy or anything.

 

[orangpelupa]

Fairly specialized purpose though, not something 99% of gamers need to care about. It's not like they'll be producing a large quantity of them for sale in BestBuy or anything.

probably only esport players and 1337 gamers that gonna bought that

 

[tuna]

I can't even imagine the price on that thing, gonna be at least $1K and even then it's still only 1080p SDR. Such fail.

Why is it a fail?

 

[orangpelupa]

Why is it a fail?

a fail for brit, a boon for other (surely rendering 1080p at 360Hz will be rather heavy)

 

[Davros]

Why is it a fail?

gonna be at least $1K and even then it's still only 1080p SDR

 

[Cyan]

Acer ET322QK

32", 4k hdr, supports freesync, under $400. Seems to get decent reviews.

I have no experience with it myself. It is only 60hz if that matters to you.

I can't speak for @BRiT but it could well matter. 1080p is palatable, and looks very good. I've been playing at 1080p on my 4k monitor with a GTX 1080 (4k 60 is very common with this card but I was just testing the resolution to see how different it was) before getting a 240Hz 1080p curved monitor and the difference is night and day.

60Hz is okay but since you are on PC and you have a 1070, you can go much further, your eyes will be grateful and appreciative of the smooth framerate. A teacher I had, a computer science engineer recommended me to get a high refresh rate monitor and I am always grateful to him.

He told me: "You are myopic. Don't worry about 4k and stupid things like that. Get a 120Hz and above monitor and you will see the experience you get and how grateful you will be you took that decision".

 

[Cyan]

Nvidia has developed new technology that enables 360Hz refresh rates on PC displays, achieving unprecedented responsiveness that’s perfectly suited to esports, where any advances in terms of refresh speeds can translate to improved performance during play. Nvidia’s new G-sync tech that delivers the 360Hz refresh speeds will be coming to market first through a partnership with Asus, via the Asus ROG Swift 360 monitor that’s debuting at this week’s annual CES show in Las Vegas. It works in combination with Nvidia’s RTX line of GPUs, and will provide refresh rates that translate to less than 3 milliseconds of input latency, all available on a 24.5-inch, fully 1080p HD gaming panel. The Asus ROG Swift 360 monitor will be coming out sometime “later this year,” and pricing isn’t yet available but you can bet it’ll be more than your average gaming monitor, given its advanced performance features and esports target market.

there should be a difference for those who can play at those amazing framerates.

I noticed this 4 years ago, when I played Battlefield 4 on my girlfriend's brother-in-law PC at 144Hz. He had a 750Ti at the time and well, on my Xbox One the game felt smooth in general 'cos of the 60 fps framerate.

But when I went back playing it on my Xbox One after playing the PC version, the game felt a bit sloppy for me, like some frames were missing, although I couldn't explain why. I felt the console was inferior, and particles less dense too. :/

 

[Davros]

Whats 1080 like on a 4k monitor
one of the first things you learn about lcd's is they have a native resolution
and you should always run at that (unlike crt's)

 

[Cyan]

Whats 1080 like on a 4k monitor
one of the first things you learn about lcd's is they have a native resolution
and you should always run at that (unlike crt's)

it doesn't look bad. A bit softer than 4k of course, but the graphics quality come from the settings. My 28" 4k monitor is perhaps a bit small for 4k, but while the extra crispness is there it's not a night and day difference like going from 30 fps to 60 fps, or 60 fps to 144fps and above.

I've been playing Marvel vs Capcom Infinite (gamepass PC) at 4k and dropping the resolution to 1080p doesn't change things that much. My best friend has been also playing that game in person with me using his Xbox One S on the monitor, and that was a whole different story. The game looked murky, soft and ugly compared to the PC version -most easily noticeable in the stage with the goldenstairs on the background-.

Another Xbox One game that looked surprisingly bad on my monitor is GTA V. My best friend, being a console gamer, proudly showed it to me -I'm not into GTA at all- and there were some cool things, but while they say that it is 1080p native 30 fps, it looked bad in my eyes. The fine detail when he stole a car, wasn't there, I could barely discern the words on stores, cars, etc.

Continuing with the PC, Bloodstained looks a bit softer too compared to native 4k, but easy on the eyes anyways.

PES 2019 and 2020 benefit from 1440p or 4k though. Especially when it comes to the detail on the shirts -player's name and number-, the ball, etc, but with high settings the difference is not night and day at 1080p and I can happily play it.

NBA 2k19 looks okay at 1080p. Softer, but not bad.

Now with a 240Hz 1080p monitor is not that I'm going to care. The 4k monitor has its uses as a secondary screen, for some work where the most screen and pixels you can cover is a boon and to extend the screen. Other than that, I am going to use the 1080p monitor the most.

 

[green.pixel]

Higher resolution is only better when the limits of the lower resolution have been reached.
Higher fps is always better.

It is so regrettable that game graphics complexity is tied to selling consumer TV and monitor tech standards to the masses.

The extra hardware power in each gen should be used for more complexity so that standard resolution games can become indiscernible from standard resolution movies in certain types of games that allow it (mostly first, third person and beltscroll/sideview action perspective). Only when we have achieved this should we move to more powerful hardware and higher resolutions.

It would be great to see say PS5 gen game developed with 480p or 720p in mind.

 

[AlphaWolf]

It would be great to see say PS5 gen game developed with 480p or 720p in mind.

Careful where you say that.

While I agree that there are limits to what more pixels can do, I also find there are limits to what a higher frequency will add. And it's not the same for everyone and varies by game type. I don't see much benefit for me above 60hz for the games I play.

 

[Cyan]

Higher resolution is only better when the limits of the lower resolution have been reached.
Higher fps is always better.

It is so regrettable that game graphics complexity is tied to selling consumer TV and monitor tech standards to the masses.

The extra hardware power in each gen should be used for more complexity so that standard resolution games can become indiscernible from standard resolution movies in certain types of games that allow it (mostly first, third person and beltscroll/sideview action perspective). Only when we have achieved this should we move to more powerful hardware and higher resolutions.

It would be great to see say PS5 gen game developed with 480p or 720p in mind.

maybe I wouldnt' go as low as 720p but with the rumoured power of the PS5, if all games ran at 1080p, 200+ fps games would be very possible. But 4k marketing and stuff is going to limit those games to 60 fps in the best case scenario.

Meanwhile, in the PC land.., you have 240Hz monitors -and a 360Hz monitor pretty soon too-. I recently purchased the Samsung CGR5 240Hz monitor given the reviews:

https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/samsung-27-crg5-240hz-gaming-monitor

My phone is low quality. this is how the curved 1080p 240Hz 27" VA panel monitor -left- looks side to side with my 4k 28" 60Hz TN monitor. Both Samsung models.

 

[green.pixel]

Careful where you say that.

While I agree that there are limits to what more pixels can do, I also find there are limits to what a higher frequency will add. And it's not the same for everyone and varies by game type. I don't see much benefit for me above 60hz for the games I play.

Yeah, that's why I wrote for certain types of games it would be the most suited for. For strategy and text-heavier games higher resolutions would certainly be a better choice.

The big mistake, however, is to force all developers to design for XXXX p's minimum, regardless of the kind of game they are making, and to use millions in marketing to convince people that the jump in resolution would result in a corresponding jump in image quality. Console mfcs AFAIK don't even allow you to output an image with 1:1 pixel mapping to get a crystal-clear image with the black borders.