What Srceen Recommendations for IL2/gaming

[Blackdog_kt]

I can second the Dell for good image quality.
I have had the 2209WA for a year or two, it's 22" and runs at 1680x1050 (it's a 16:10 aspect ratio).

They have released a follow up series with 23" monitors that also feature displayport connectors (mine only has DVI and analog).

The good thing about these Dells is that they give you IPS panel performance at lower prices. They use an e-IPS panel type which has most of the advantages of the IPS design but at a lower price.

The only problem with IPS is that the bigger ones tend to get pricier. However, for 22"-24" sizes i think the benefits of no color distortion and true 180 degree viewing angles justifies the slight price difference.

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

The only problem with IPS is that the bigger ones tend to get pricier. However, for 22"-24" sizes i think the benefits of no color distortion and true 180 degree viewing angles justifies the slight price difference.

I do not even want to think about what kind of hardware you will need to run SOW on a 24" LCD's native resolution with everything maxed. Sounds like a good way to blow $3-4K.

[Chivas]

I'm no expert, but I was under the impression that the expensive IPS panels were not the great for gaming because of their high response times and input lag.

[TeeJay82]

well i warmly recommend 16:10 1920X1200.

[Bearcat]

[Igo kyu]

Originally Posted by Bearcat

That's a lovely image. However it's missing 1366 x 768, which is a current laptop size, does anyone have any idea what they call that? It's also missing EGA, which was something like 640 x 350, that was a long time ago, the pixels in EGA weren't square, it was a screen the same shape as VGA, just with bigger pixels vertically, that was about 1990 that showed up for a short time. Thinking about it, CGA wasn't (always) smaller than VGA either, the pixels were just huge (and the colours very grotty).

[He111]

Samsung have a 24" - 2ms - LED - narrow bezel - low power monitor.

BX 2450, I think?

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[Blackdog_kt]

Originally Posted by speculum jockey

I do not even want to think about what kind of hardware you will need to run SOW on a 24" LCD's native resolution with everything maxed. Sounds like a good way to blow $3-4K.

Well, resolutions are pretty much fixed nowadays. This is a different debate by the way, but people always fall for the advertisement stickers and don't realize that the bigger the screen, the higher the resolution you need to maintain acceptable pixer-per-inch values. Right now we might have the 1920x1080 resolution being the standard and it does take some hardware to make it work right, but the truth is that such high resolutions look awful on anything bigger than 27" if you sit close to it.

Your point is right and that's why i opted for a screen with a lower resolution, since i will be having to run everything at the monitor's native res i wanted something that's good enough but not high enough to warrant a graphics card upgrade with every new game. It's also a 16:10 monitor which gives me a bit more vertical space that will come in handy when scanning upwards for boogies (i don't mind the horizontal black bars when watching movies at all).

Originally Posted by Chivas

I'm no expert, but I was under the impression that the expensive IPS panels were not the great for gaming because of their high response times and input lag.

Actually, i was worried about this before buying mine, but it ended up being far from the truth (luckily for me that is, as i had the monitor shipped from the UK).

Generally speaking, the way TFT LCD specs are defined and measured is a joke and highly misleading to the buyer.

The 2ms response times you see quoted on the horrible image quality TN panels are black to white response times. That means they are the measurements taken under optimal conditions, as black to white (a full rotation of the liquid crystal) is the fastest transition possible. Grey to grey response times are what matters most (ie, adjusting of colours in a gradual way by moving the crystals from one in-between position to the next), but they are also the hardest ones to achieve and manufacturers rarely put them on specs because it doesn't look good having a "8ms" stamp on the box.

Input lag is a totally different thing as well. This has to do with how much time it takes for the image to be "fed" to the LCD matrix and not how fast the matrix can show a changing image (which is response time). Ironically enough, monitors with high input lag are usually monitors that incorporate some kind of "anti-blurring" technique: if their response times are slow, they keep 1-2 frames in a buffer and running an algorithm on them they can sort of "pre-align" their crystals between the currently displayed frame and the next 2 frames in order to ensure fluid switching of frames. The effect this has is that it messes with color fidelity, plus you are seeing 2 frames into the past. That's why it's called input lag. When you're playing IL2 with such a monitor, you are actually seeing 2 frames behind other players. Contrary to network lag the game world is still moving, but what you see is 2 frames old. Not too good for competitive/combat games as you can see.

I'm happy to say that my IPS has minimal input lag. Easiest way to measure it is have a clock/timer running full screen on two monitors, a CRT (CRTs have no input lag whatsoever) and a TFT. Take photos every 10 seconds or so, divide the total runtime with the discrepancy between the two timers and you can find out what your input lag is.

To make my monitor blur i have to specifically try to force the issue: i take my trackclip pro in my hand and move it frantically left and right across the TrackIR camera, ok, then it blurs a bit if i keep this up for 4-5 seconds. However, this is a non-issue as the speed required to do this would leave me with a dislocated neck if i was normally wearing the trackclip on my headphones, ie i will never need to or even be able to request that fast a change in rendering from my monitor, so it's ok.

Seriously, IPS panels are getting cheaper (certain sub-types that is) and they are very much worth it. It's the closest thing available to CRT image quality and it has TRUE 180 degree viewing angles with absolutely no blurring/color shifting at all. The e-IPS panels are the low cost ones, look for one of those. If you are interested in 120Hz refresh rates to use nVidia's 3d goggles, you'll have to wait for the x-IPS panels.