Help in Choosing a 19"+ LCD Monitor

[Azazel]

So I've been looking around on the web for the best Gaming-Oriented LCD monitor I can find for my AU$400-ish price point.

The local place with the best prices (by far) naturally only carries several ranges, and I've tried to cross-check them with websites like Tom's Hardware but of course, roughly a billion monitors are released a year and Tom's and other websites can only review so many.

Another drawback I face is the fact that I really don't know what the fuck I'm looking for, besides a low refresh time. I'm simply not hugely knowledgable about hardware.

So, it's to f13 that I turn. I'll provide the link to the store's webpage, and despite their pages saying "web price only" I know I can walk into this place and get an item for the web price without a problem, and therefore no shipping cost and they're also very good about returns for faulty stock and the like, so I'll 90% likely be buying it from them.

I'm not expecting anyone to do research for me or anything like that, but if a couple of people could scan their list and maybe point ouit anything that's exceptionally good within my price range, or by the same token if there are any absolute lemons people recognise I'd love to have those warned about as well.

My budget is $400ish. If I can get something great for $350, then that's awesome. At a stretch I might be able to go to $450, but I'm not in the market for a high-end screen. (remember, these are Australian dollars!)

And of course, a huge thanks to anyone who can be bothered to reply!

http://www.centrecom.com.au/catalog/default.php?page=1&ccsid=1c03db63ae64f975eb1daa95315ff4d7&cPath=93_25

[Azazel]

Damn, now I'm considering this one
http://reviews.cnet.com/ViewSonic_VX2025wm/4505-3174_7-31747549-2.html?tag=nav
despite the price tag being $530 which is a fair bit more than I want to shell out. Did I mention I don't have a clue?

[dusematic]

Well, this probably won't influence you, but I recently got the Samsung 204B and I really like it.  (http://www.buy.com/prod/Samsung_SyncMaster_204B_Black_LCD_Monitor_20_1_LCD_Active_Matrix_TFT_0/q/loc/101/202293374.html)  It's really been well received at Ars Technica, if you dig around their A/V forum youi'll see that virtually everyone loves it. 

For the money it's going to be hard to beat this monitor.  It looks schnazzy, is very adjustable, and has a cool blue LED power button.  The only caveat is that I've HEARD that it may not be ideal for an artist who needs exacting standards of color reproduction.  However, it's nothing I've noticed and has received somewhat of a reputation on tech sites as being spot on for games.  No ghosting. 

[dusematic]

Jesus dude.  530 dollars?  I mean, it's a good monitor but if you're sane you'll buy the 204B.

[Trippy]

His link is in Australian dollars.

[Nevermore]

Well, this probably won't influence you, but I recently got the Samsung 204B and I really like it.  (http://www.buy.com/prod/Samsung_SyncMaster_204B_Black_LCD_Monitor_20_1_LCD_Active_Matrix_TFT_0/q/loc/101/202293374.html)  It's really been well received at Ars Technica, if you dig around their A/V forum youi'll see that virtually everyone loves it. 

For the money it's going to be hard to beat this monitor.  It looks schnazzy, is very adjustable, and has a cool blue LED power button.  The only caveat is that I've HEARD that it may not be ideal for an artist who needs exacting standards of color reproduction.  However, it's nothing I've noticed and has received somewhat of a reputation on tech sites as being spot on for games.  No ghosting. 

I'll second this.  Last year I bought a Samsung LCD TV and was extremely happy with it so when I recently needed a new LCD monitor, I bought the 204B.  Samsung LCDs have great viewing angles and the best blacks I've seen in an LCD.

[geldonyetich]

I bought this one a couple months ago: A Viewsonic VA1912wb. (Pricegrabber link.)

My goal was a widescreen, so I can get in on some of this action.   The VA1912wb I recieved works awesome - zero dead pixels and acceptible update rate.  It even has built in speakers (that I'm not using because I've a subwoofer setup instead).

My only gripe with it has been that running games at 1440x900 resolution apparently takes a lot more video pixel grinding power than running a 1024x800, which now has me eyeing upgrading my video card which, in turn, requires upgrading from an AGP system.

Widescreen gaming is advantagous on the few titles that support it, but not mindblowing.  I dream of the day when stereographic becomes mainstream.

[Furiously]

That's what about $400 american?

I'd look at a Dell widescreen

[geldonyetich]

That's what about $400 american?

The VA1912wb?  Much better price than that.  I got mine at about $250, looks like the pricegrabber link has them available for even lower now.

[rattran]

I've got both a Samsung 930b, and a 205bw. Both excellent monitors for gaming. The widescreen is nice, but not everything supports it (yet) and it's pricey. The 19" has good blacks, decent response (the 940b is on the site you linked at about AUD 400, slightly better everything than the 930b)

[Azazel]

That's what about $400 american?

I'd look at a Dell widescreen

Thanks for the feedback guys!

The problem with Dells is that they're just not that readily available here. The other problem with directly converting finds from $AU to $US is that we simply pay more over here, for pretty much everything. (Like they do in Europe). So a direct price translation really only works when we're buying something over the web from the US and shipping won't be too exhorbitant.

The thing with the place in that link is that they're pretty much just the cheapest place out there. Their regular prices on some of those monitors (ie: the Viewsonic VA1912) are close to $100 cheaper than another big chain which has them on sale. So whatever I can get from them is pretty much guaranteed to be a great deal, price-wise. They're a big fan of huge turnover, but it seems to work for them and I've been buying from them for years now.

[Lt.Dan]

Not sure where you live in Oz, but in Melbourne there are a plethora of 'yum-cha*' IT shops - check out the green-guide in The Age (newspaper)

They're pretty competitive if you don't mind going for a no-name brand or second tier brand.

* Those little hole-in-the-was shops on the city fringe that sell everything under the sun.  Just check the stuff you buy is actually new.

[hal]

You mention Tom's. Have you tryed Anandtech? Not just there reviews but scope out there video forums. You'll find lots of options of lots of part numbers. Mind you I've been in the market for about a year and haven't bought. But i don't need one. I'd just like to free up the space and my CRT isn't going to last forever.

[Bunk]

I bought this a couple months ago:

Viewsonic VX2025WM 20IN LCD Monitor BLACK/SILVER Widescreen 1680X1050 8MS 800:1 VGA DVI W/ Cable

It's available at $389 Cdn right now.

I love it personally. Not the highest end out there, but it works great for me. Only issue it has is a little bit of light bleeding on the corners of the screen when the screen is all black. Considering I can only see it when its booting on a black screen, or if I were to play Doom 3, it really doesn't bother me.

[Kenrick]

Well my budget is a wee bit smaller than some of the others in this thread, but my Acer AL1916WAbd arrived today.  If you're looking for quality 19" lcd widescreen goodness under $200, you can't go wrong with it!  But man it is taking me some time to get used to the wideness. 

[Sky]

But man it is taking me some time to get used to the wideness.

That's what she said.

[Azazel]

So as a followup  to this thread, I ended up getting very distracted by far more useless bits of shiney crap to spend my cash on and didn't get myself an LCD at all. Also partly because of concerns about running games in non-native resolutions and knowing my machine is getting on a little and can't handle stuff like BF2 in 1280x1084.

So anyway, I bought my wife this for Christmas, based on the recommendations in this thread:
http://www.samsung.com/au/products/monitors/tft/dual/940b.asp

and when checking out the Samsung page, I saw this:

http://www.samsung.com/au/products/monitors/tft/largeformat/320p.asp

How does that look, as far as gaming goes? I ask here, because you guys know far more than I do about this stuff. Remember, the prices are in AU$, etc.

[hal]

Az the killer, particularly with LCD monitors is make g*d d*mn sure your vid card will support your new monitors resolution.

[hal]

Thats what is killing it for me. the monitors I want require a new vid card, which requires a new motherboard. Witch requires new ram. Witch requires a second income witch i am way to lazy to do.

[Azazel]

Az the killer, particularly with LCD monitors is make g*d d*mn sure your vid card will support your new monitors resolution.

hm. I'm going to sound like a newb here, but how can I do that?

I know it's an Radeon 9600 ATI AGP with 256mb RAM, has a digital output, and was pretty decent when I bought it, but I'm not 100% sure how to check the other specs.

Just changed my desktop to 1360x768 with no problems, which appears to be almost the same as the 1366x768 for that 32" on the Samsung site (and fuck, my icons will be huge.. )

Is there more to it?

[Sky]

My 9800pro 256MB struggles with newer games, but it fine for older stuff, at 1280x720. So for gaming, you might be hurting a bit. You can get better AGP cards on the cheap, though.

I'm scared of hal's pc witch. I'll get you and your little dog Mobo, too!

[NiX]

Thinking about upgrading from my 17" LCD to a 20.1" LCD. Anyone know if my 6600 GT OC (BFG) will support most widescreen res's without a problem?

[Azazel]

I'll be building a new PC within a couple of months of getting the monitor, so my main concerns are really
"will it work ok in the meantime?" and "is it a good enough monitor for gaming?"

I'm mostly only playing WoW and San Andreas at the moment, FWIW.

[Engels]

I would save up, get the rig first, then see what monitor you can get for it. You may want to spend some extra on a widescreen, for instance.

[Azazel]

Um, the monitor I'm looking at getting is a 32" widescreen. It appears to be teh awesome but I know f13.people will know better than I, and I "need" a new monitor about as much as the new rig, (ie I could go another year or even two probably without upgrading) though I'm waiting on Vista before buying the machine, because there's no way I'm buying two OSes.

[Engels]

Sorry, didn't catch that. Anyway, I am hearing good things about Samsung all around. Funny, it used to be considered the yugo of electronics, on up there with Emerson. Back in the 80s that is.

I can sorta see why you want the new monitor before the rig, with Vista coming out, but I think that most rigs will be fine with Vista, but what's probably more of an issue is DX10, and the cards that can run it. Right now, the nvidia 8000 series claims to run dx10, but its hard to tell till games with dx10 start to show up in earnest.

[Azazel]

Oh, I'm sure my current computer would be fine with Vista, it's just that I want to buy a new pc with high-powered shiney, and move the others each one step to the left. Maybe I should start a new topic to see if the new monitor I'm looking at is any good for gaming?

[Sky]

It's hard for me to say. The lcd tv? It looks ok, but it's a bit low resolution for the size, imo. The reason I can get away with 1280x720 is the hugeness, it allows text to be pretty clear from my sofa across the room. A 32" might be tough to read from across the room but too low res for up-close viewing.

[Azazel]

That's one of my main concerns, actually. The resolution. I thought it looked a little low (my desktop icons, for example are going to grow quite a bit) but then all the Samsung big-ass monitors on that page are the same reso, including the one that costs 4 grand, so I wasn't sure if this is a "normal" thing for big monitors.

Since the farthest away it'll be is the other side of this desk, that's only going to be about 2ft4"/70cm away from my head, I might have to "test" one in a store by sitting in front of it for awhile.

[Sky]

If you're talking desk pc, I'd go with a nice widescreen computer monitor, but then you'd be hard pressed to drive that native res. If you're thinking tv, start thinking bigger tv and wireless keyboard+mouse :)

See if the store will hook up a pc to the display.