Computer Monitor Recommendations for 2016

[yxkalle]

Why trillions of colours when we can have... billions?

[Ed Oscuro]

@ Domino: When the Viewsonic launches, I think that'll be just as good a choice, if not better. IPS / G-Sync of course.

[Exidna]

Not sure I would get a G-Sync monitor for MAME only. Most MAME games can be adjust to 60hz just fine.

However, by not going G-Sync whenever you plan to do any PC gaming that you can't do at at least locked 100hz, you'll regret it. Or when you try to emulate non-60hz systems (though the only significant one I can think of is DOS with 70hz games).

Except for the Irems and the Seibus. Forcing them to 60hz on these lower refresh rate games is annoying with the stuttering and the slight pause due to adding extra hz in the refersh rate.

Depends if you're re-clocking to 60 FPS or trying to run 55 FPS at 60Hz.
The former will be smooth, though 9% fast, the latter will stutter.

The best option if your display can't sync below 60Hz, aside from a G-Sync display, is to run at 2x the source refresh rate. (110Hz)
If you're using a CRT, you can do 110Hz with black frame insertion and the screen is effectively refreshing at 55Hz.

I would only buy a G-Sync monitor if you can't handle 2 frames of latency for V-Sync.
In all other respects, a multisync CRT monitor is better than a G-Sync display for 2D gaming.

V-Sync opens up a new can of worms and still doesn't give the smooth scrolling that I want.

V-Sync should be perfectly smooth unless you are running a game at a framerate which doesn't match the refresh rate.
Arcade games can be more problematic because they were more likely to run at non-standard rates, but if you're wanting to play home console games such as the SNES, where everything runs at 60.08Hz, re-clocking that to 60Hz will have an imperceptible effect on the game's speed while completely eliminating any stutter.

I think I'm going with the Dell G-Sync monitor since for one it looks like a normal desktop monitor and two it doesn't have the OMG gaming desktop look, which actually does drive me nuts. If this tech can give me butter smooth MAME experience I'm willing to pay the money for it. I used to pay $400+ for PCB boards and I can deal paying $600 for smoothness in MAME with higher screen rez plus benefit other games I have as well. .

Just be warned that it's a TN panel and the factory calibration is apparently not great.
I agree with you on the looks, but the XB271HU is the monitor to get right now if you can afford it, since it's an IPS panel - which is especially important if you're wanting to play vertical games in tate mode.

Viewing angles on the Dell.
Viewing angles on an Eizo IPS using a very similar panel as the XB271HU

Just remember that G-Sync gets you smooth gameplay with zero latency, but there will be motion blur.
A CRT monitor for emulation will give you smooth gameplay with virtually no motion blur, but there will be a couple of frames of latency.
A CRT hooked up directly to real hardware does all three: smooth gameplay, zero latency, and virtually no motion blur.

[Xyga]

virtually

This is important.

A lot of people who probably haven't seen an actual low resolution 15khz crt in a long time (maybe never) give an impression they believe everything in motion on crt's remains perfectly consistent while scrolling any direction and at any speed, hence the need for flat panels clocking at 100,000Hz, strobing faster than light, and responding anticipating the future.
Well no: crt's blur too, getting closer to those with flat panels doesn't mean achieving perfection.

Personally when it comes to flat panels, until those fancy bleeding edge technology monitors get down to more reasonable prices, I'll be perfectly fine still playing on a 60Hz display.
For syncing, well I sync to the monitor games that are down to around 57,5Hz, then leave the slower ones (Irem, Seibu, blah blah) managed by triple buffering (both in GM = no unsufferable queue, so the lag is lower than normal MAMEs. Or using RA too at times).

Still, if there's one thing I'll be happy to get rid of, it's to have to make that choice, but not at the current asking prices that would get me trucks of used crt's (literally).
I'm putting my 'flat cabinet' project on hold for a few years, that would be silly otherwise.

[Exidna]

virtually

This is important.

A lot of people who probably haven't seen an actual low resolution 15khz crt in a long time (maybe never) give an impression they believe everything in motion on crt's remains perfectly consistent while scrolling any direction and at any speed, hence the need for flat panels clocking at 100,000Hz, strobing faster than light, and responding anticipating the future.
Well no: crt's blur too, getting closer to those with flat panels doesn't mean achieving perfection.

Personally when it comes to flat panels, until those fancy bleeding edge technology monitors get down to more reasonable prices, I'll be perfectly fine still playing on a 60Hz display.
For syncing, well I sync to the monitor games that are down to around 57,5Hz, then leave the slower ones (Irem, Seibu, blah blah) managed by triple buffering (both in GM = no unsufferable queue, so the lag is lower than normal MAMEs. Or using RA too at times).

Still, if there's one thing I'll be happy to get rid of, it's to have to make that choice, but not at the current asking prices that would get me trucks of used crt's (literally).
I'm putting my 'flat cabinet' project on hold for a few years, that would be silly otherwise.

I use a PC CRT monitor for all my retro gaming, not a 15kHz CRT, which I guess handles that better due to being progressive? I typically run it at high resolutions since it produces a cleaner image.

Though motion handling is not perfect on a CRT, it is significantly better than any flicker-free display.
100,000Hz is unrealistic, but to realistically match a CRT's motion clarity with a flicker-free display, you would need something running at a minimum of 1000Hz, where the source framerate matches the refresh rate.
CRTs have a persistence of less than 1ms - often quite a bit below 1ms - so a flicker-free display needs to be updating at 1000Hz to match that.
A 60Hz flicker-free display has a persistence of 16.67ms which is why they have so much motion blur - and the panel's response time is added on top of that.

1000 FPS is unrealistic for most games, and impossible with emulation since the framerate is tied into the game speed - so we're pretty much stuck around 60 FPS.
If your framerate is fixed, the only way to reduce persistence is to introduce flicker - either by using black frame insertion on a display which can actually switch the pixels off (CRT/OLED) or by strobing the light source with an LCD display.

But there are some big problems with this.
With BFI, what typically happens is that the panel operates at a higher refresh rate and you get evenly spaced black frames inserted in the image.
Current OLED TVs run at 120Hz, so with a 60 FPS source, you can only insert one black frame. The best you can do is halve persistence, which gets us from 16.67ms down to 8.33ms. An improvement, but far behind a CRT.
Now BFI doesn't have to be done that way, it's just how BFI is typically done.

With LCD displays, even though the LCD crystals are slow to respond, you can switch the backlight on/off instantly. So it's not too difficult to achieve 1ms persistence by doing that.
The problem is that to achieve 1ms persistence at 60Hz, the backlight is being switched off for 94% of the frame's duration.
So your brightness is cut down to 6%. A 400cd/m2 backlight is now only 24cd/m2 which is very dim. For reference, a typical CRT would be about 100cd/m2.
There are other problems with this approach as well, but that has to be taken care of first before we can even start to think about the rest.

But here's the biggest problem: G-Sync requires that the display is flicker-free to operate, because G-Sync was not built for emulators, it was built for modern 3D games where the framerate is highly variable.
If you combined variable refresh rates with backlight strobing, you would end up with two big problems:

1. The display's brightness would change massively with the game's framerate.
2. The display would have variable levels of flicker which would be very distracting, and it would limit the lower range to about 50H - if that. The minimum refresh rate that NVIDIA allow ULMB to be enabled at is 85Hz.

Which takes us back to what I said in my previous post.
A G-Sync monitor will eliminate latency and give you smooth gameplay, but there will be motion blur.
A CRT monitor will give you smooth gameplay virtually without motion blur, but there will be a couple of frames of latency due to V-Sync.
Real hardware hooked up to a 15kHz CRT will give you all three - though it sounds like motion may not be quite as good as the CRT monitor.

If you're already used to the motion blur that you get with flicker-free flat panels, G-Sync seems like the obvious choice. Otherwise, you may want to hunt down an old CRT monitor.

[Xyga]

This is the current standard speech I don't completely agree with because it doesn't take a few real-life practice realities into consideration when we're talking old games and standard 15khz/60Hz crts.

The 'blur' I'm talking about again is seen more or less during vertical and diagonal movement, this is natural behaviour, depending on the speed there is a loss of definition and shaping, a form of blending between the lines.
Upscaled on a high-res pc crt is a different scenario.

Everybody is constantly complaining in particular while emulating with scanlines overlays/shaders that the lines 'disappear' and 'blend' while scrolling up and diagonal.
That's visible on 60Hz sample and hold flat panel displays in a stronger yet amusingly similar fashion to the real thing actually, though most people haven't noticed the resemblance because there's almost always smearing on top of it, plus some have displays with slow PWM flickering backlight, which makes everything worse.
Take a 60Hz lcd featuring among the fastest pixel responses available, and no PWM, the faster the least problematic and alienating the fading scanlines issue become.
The slow pixel response times (and in cases the PWM too) get more in the way of the clarity in this case than the 60Hz sample and hold does.

NOTE: please don't use 'fkicker-free' like that by opposition to strobed, it's very confusing because for everyone in the jargon that refers to PWM-free led backlights, not strobing.

People who push to extreme refresh rates and strobing for retro emulation assume this application (emulating old 15kh low res games) require actual results that would even eliminate imperfections that exist in real conditions on real hardware. Well if that works that's called enhancing.
My point is although it looks a bit worse on 60Hz lcd's, it's not so immensely worse we would absolutely have to dismiss those and desire to reach very difficult and costly highs like it's the only path that makes sense.

Some IPS screens today reach TN-level pixel response, something like an HP 27xw for instance (practically the top of what full-HD IPSes will achieve today in terms of response) can be had for less than 300€ and would perform brilliantly fot the task, the only issue being the unsufficient resolution for those who want to deal with quality shaders. And of course the absence of adaptive sync convenience.
An instant pixel response display like an OLED, combined with G-Sync would cover most of the actual needs, going to other extremities like adding strobing or doubled refesh rates would be almost superfluous for such a setup. We're not emulating CS dammit.

Another point, related to this, is about what people copy-paste on OLEDs being 60Hz sample and hold and it being a weakness of the technology.
W...what ? Where the hell did that come from ?
Well of course those are essentially only TELEVISIONS. Duh, what did they expect !? All TV's are like that, they will have interpolation and BFI at best and that's it. Why suddenly when it's OLED TV's it's considered a flaw specific to OLED to not feature things like the latest ACER and ASUS monitors ? Why is everyone parroting this absurd point accross all communities is beyond me.

Probably someone wrote that on blurbusters or something, maybe the chief himself since he always writes in details what's needed to reach optimal performances.
And everyone reading probably took it to the word, since for most readers what he writes is like the unique explanation appliable to all displays and scenarios ever (of course he doesn't mean it, but that's what people will get from him since they're here for the extreme, we're talking essentially ever-unsatisfied pc gaming crowds naturally).

People read too much into some particular topics and end-up with too high expectations, to the point they can't sort the different types of products manufacturers offer on the market for different segments nor replace products into context.
OLED makes TVs with fantastic properties including quasi-instant pixel response, bye bye ugly trails, but noes! people who've massively been using much inferior lcds for many years had to make an out-of-place complaint considering it's borrowed to the monitors world.
That's the internet's reflection: OLED lacks gaming monitor features = OLED sucks.

Bloody hell, the displays crowd is a funny one.
People call for extreme measures for small issues, but are not satisfied when several of the greatest they complained about for years get solved under their noses.
Don't misunderstand I think all those recently introduced blur/tearing/lag technologies are a good thing, but people again need to make sense out of the products and applications.
Do we complain that bicycles don't have engines ? or do we nedd a Ferrari to commute to work everyday ? See what I mean ?

[Xyga]

Sorry for double-posting; just to mention I hadn't noticed the BL3201PT (BL3201PH) actually supports FreeSync 48-60Hz.

So that makes it the other best 32" for AMD owners this time, and it's cheaper than the nVidia-oriented XB321HK.

Two absolutely splendid monitors.
*sigh* Too bad even the BenQ remains too expensive for me, and I don't own an AMD gpu anyway...

[Exidna]

This is the current standard speech I don't completely agree with because it doesn't take a few real-life practice realities into consideration when we're talking old games and standard 15khz/60Hz crts.

The 'blur' I'm talking about again is seen more or less during vertical and diagonal movement, this is natural behaviour, depending on the speed there is a loss of definition and shaping, a form of blending between the lines.
Upscaled on a high-res pc crt is a different scenario.

1. Who ever said that everyone talking about motion clarity was discussing 15kHz CRTs? Aside from this forum, most of the CRT enthusiasts that I still see online are primarily PC gamers using monitors - and I'd say that CRT monitors are a better comparison to modern displays.
2. Just because vertical or diagonal scrolling may not be perfect on a 15kHz CRT, does not mean that it isn't still significantly better than other display types.
3. We have the option of displaying these games on high-res CRTs, not just 15kHz CRTs. Why assume that everyone is trying to achieve the same look as a 15kHz CRT?

Everybody is constantly complaining in particular while emulating with scanlines overlays/shaders that the lines 'disappear' and 'blend' while scrolling up and diagonal.
That's visible on 60Hz sample and hold flat panel displays in a stronger yet amusingly similar fashion to the real thing actually, though most people haven't noticed the resemblance because there's almost always smearing on top of it, plus some have displays with slow PWM flickering backlight, which makes everything worse.
Take a 60Hz lcd featuring among the fastest pixel responses available, and no PWM, the faster the least problematic and alienating the fading scanlines issue become.
The slow pixel response times (and in cases the PWM too) get more in the way of the clarity in this case than the 60Hz sample and hold does.

I think you're confusing two issues here.
When most people are talking about motion blur, they are not talking about whether or not there are issues with emulated scanlines disappearing with vertical scrolling.
They're talking about anything moving across the screen becoming a blur.

NOTE: please don't use 'fkicker-free' like that by opposition to strobed, it's very confusing because for everyone in the jargon that refers to PWM-free led backlights, not strobing.

Sample & hold is exactly the same thing as "flicker-free". Only "flicker free" is easier for people to understand.
You don't need to know anything about televisions to know what someone means when they say that something is a problem which affects all flicker-free displays.

People who push to extreme refresh rates and strobing for retro emulation assume this application (emulating old 15kh low res games) require actual results that would even eliminate imperfections that exist in real conditions on real hardware. Well if that works that's called enhancing.

Again: who says that people are trying to emulate a CRT, instead of trying to get the best picture that they can.
Eliminating display flaws is not "enhancement", it's displaying the source as good as possibly look.

Some IPS screens today reach TN-level pixel response, something like an HP 27xw for instance (practically the top of what full-HD IPSes will achieve today in terms of response) can be had for less than 300€ and would perform brilliantly fot the task, the only issue being the unsufficient resolution for those who want to deal with quality shaders. And of course the absence of adaptive sync convenience.
An instant pixel response display like an OLED, combined with G-Sync would cover most of the actual needs, going to other extremities like adding strobing or doubled refesh rates would be almost superfluous for such a setup.

I don't think you understand the problem of sample & hold displays.
It doesn't matter if you have an OLED with 0.1ms response times. If you run it at 60Hz S&H, you have 16.67ms of persistence, which means ~17 pixels of motion blur for 1000px/s motion.
You get 16.67px of blur due to it being a flicker-free 60Hz display, and 0.1px of blur from the pixel response time.
Which means that OLED displays are far from being blur-free in their current state. I'm guessing you haven't used any for gaming.
Faster response times only help reduce image smearing and overdriving/inversion problems, not motion blur. The vast majority of motion blur is caused by image persistence, not response times.

And 1000px/s is not especially fast motion. This is 960px/s: http://www.testufo.com/#test=photo
That sort of speed is certainly not out of place in a 2D scrolling game.

Another point, related to this, is about what people copy-paste on OLEDs being 60Hz sample and hold and it being a weakness of the technology.
W...what ? Where the hell did that come from ?
Well of course those are essentially only TELEVISIONS. Duh, what did they expect !? All TV's are like that, they will have interpolation and BFI at best and that's it. Why suddenly when it's OLED TV's it's considered a flaw specific to OLED to not feature things like the latest ACER and ASUS monitors ? Why is everyone parroting this absurd point accross all communities is beyond me.

Not sure what your point is here, that all televisions should be assumed to be bad?
That anyone interested in gaming should only be looking at tiny monitors?

There is nothing inherent to "televisions" that makes them any different from monitors, except that they have a tuner built in.
Sony's televisions have modes which do proper LED backlight strobing to bring persistence down to ~4ms, and I think Samsung do as well.
Samsung's OLED TV had black frame insertion to reduce persistence to ~8ms, it's just LG's OLEDs that don't.

OLED makes TVs with fantastic properties including quasi-instant pixel response, bye bye ugly trails, but noes! people who've massively been using much inferior lcds for many years had to make an out-of-place complaint considering it's borrowed to the monitors world.
That's the internet's reflection: OLED lacks gaming monitor features = OLED sucks.

It sucks for motion if you're used to anything that's not an LCD or LCoS display.

People call for extreme measures for small issues, but are not satisfied when several of the greatest they complained about for years get solved under their noses.
Don't misunderstand I think all those recently introduced blur/tearing/lag technologies are a good thing, but people again need to make sense out of the products and applications.
Do we complain that bicycles don't have engines ? or do we nedd a Ferrari to commute to work everyday ? See what I mean ?

I actually don't "see what you mean".
You're saying that people should spend several thousand dollars on an OLED TV and just be happy when you find out that it has worse motion blur than your old plasma TV or a CRT?
That it has worse motion blur than newer LCDs which have strobe options?
That it has really high latency, making it unsuitable for gaming?

Why shouldn't people assume that the most expensive and most high-end displays available would be the best at these things?
The problem is that you think you're buying a Ferrari and you end up with a bike painted in Ferrari colors.

Sorry for double-posting; just to mention I hadn't noticed the BL3201PT (BL3201PH) actually supports FreeSync 48-60Hz.

Just as a warning, this will not support Low Framerate Compensation. The maximum refresh rate has to be ≥2.5x the minimum for it.
Probably doesn't matter for emulation, but would be an issue if you play 3D games, since it can be tough to keep your minimum framerate above 48 FPS at UHD resolutions.

[Xyga]

Exidna, no, you don't understand where I'm coming from, this here is at the very core a retrogaming community, and yes for many of us when it come to emulating old games on flat panels also it's about emulating 15hz crt's.
PC games, hi-res ? 3D games ? sorry ? You seem to have 'PC crowd' mindset, experience and goals, personally the only PC games I play are a few shmups.
What I'm talking about is different, references, goals are not the same, you're assuming I don't know what I'm taking about and keep pasting stuff I'm aware of, I believe you're the one missing it here.
Yes I'm specifically telling you sample and hold isn't as big an issue as people make it for that retrogaming purpose.

Now regarding the OLED sets I'm not asking anyone to like the status, I'm talking about a market reality, yes flat panel display TVs are inferior, at least they are for gaming, because they're not designed for it.
My point here is about those people bitching about a TV display that's not expected to have gaming features in any case, who are putting the cart before the horse ignoring that reality, their criticism becomes specifically out of place when they make that absence of a cutting-edge gaming-oriented spec a flaw iherent to the panel's technology, when it's a flaw of the product category.
Of course I too would like to see the new gaming-friendly developments added to TVs, but that's not on any manufacturer's schedule it seems, or in a fantasy world maybe.
Instead of complaining about OLEDs people should complain about the manufacturer's monolithic products segmentation unchanged in decades.

'flicker-free' you're absolutely, definitely, the only person I ever read using the term to designate sample and hold.
I understand your reasoning, but you're wrong to believe it makes it any easier for people to understand, it's the opposite since for many years on all dedicated websites, discussions, reviews, product pages and specs sheets, it's always meant PWM-free backlight (as using direct current) period.

[mookie3three]

Can someone recommend me a 27" monitor for my PS4. So 1080p, 60hz, HDMI and lower input lag then an LCD TV. Would something like the BenQ GW2760HM http://www.scorptec.com.au/product/Moni ... 2-GW2760HM be ok?

Cheers

[Exidna]

Exidna, no, you don't understand where I'm coming from, this here is at the very core a retrogaming community, and yes for many of us when it come to emulating old games on flat panels also it's about emulating 15hz crt's.
PC games, hi-res ? 3D games ? sorry ? You seem to have 'PC crowd' mindset, experience and goals, personally the only PC games I play are a few shmups.

I'm sorry, I thought I was in a topic asking about what PC monitor to get.
And it's pretty clear that higher resolutions benefit emulation. You get a better image on a high-res CRT monitor compared to a 15kHz CRT, and if you're using a flat panel you can do better CRT emulation via shaders, if that's your thing.
Just because your source is 240p doesn't mean that your display has to be.

Yes I'm specifically telling you sample and hold isn't as big an issue as people make it for that retrogaming purpose.

I can't see why you think that though.
We're on a shmups forum where the vast majority of games are scrolling the screen all the time, and you don't think motion blur matters at all!?

My point here is about those people bitching about a TV display that's not expected to have gaming features in any case

You may not expect a TV to have low latency, a lack of motion blur, or support for variable refresh rates, but I expect any display to do this. The first two points were standard back when CRTs were all that anyone had.
The only display where I'd understand a lack of these features would ironically be standard PC monitors that are just deigned for viewing text and images - but even a standard non-gaming monitor tends to be better than a lot of TVs.

Why should there be an expectation that the only displays suitable for gaming are ≤32" in size?
The entire concept of "gaming monitors" is only about five or so years old, not some kind of "product segmentation unchanged in decades" as you put it.

'flicker-free' you're absolutely, definitely, the only person I ever read using the term to designate sample and hold.
I understand your reasoning, but you're wrong to believe it makes it any easier for people to understand, it's the opposite since for many years on all dedicated websites, discussions, reviews, product pages and specs sheets, it's always meant PWM-free backlight (as using direct current) period.

Literally doesn't make a difference.
Flicker free, PWM-free, Sample-and-Hold are all exactly the same thing. It means the screen doesn't flicker so persistence is equal to the refresh rate.
I'm not sure what you think could possibly be different about them. The screen either flickers or it doesn't.

Now if it flickers, then you have to be very specific about what it's doing, because flicker can be harmful to the image (PWM, strobing at >1x the framerate) or beneficial to the image. (strobing once per frame)

[Ed Oscuro]

Can someone recommend me a 27" monitor for my PS4. So 1080p, 60hz, HDMI and lower input lag then an LCD TV. Would something like the BenQ GW2760HM http://www.scorptec.com.au/product/Moni ... 2-GW2760HM be ok?

Cheers

I was looking into exactly this type of monitor a little while ago, not sure where I put my notes but I wasn't able to come up with much hard evidence about lots of models. On the flip side, input lag tests suggest many should be fairly good, at least for known brands (check out the input lag table in the link below) and monitors using the same panel types from the same date should perform similarly - if not exactly the same due to using the same panel. There are a lot of options in this area, and by and large people seem to like the new stuff.

About the BenQ - we're in luck, TFT Central reviewed that one!
http://www.tftcentral.co.uk/reviews/benq_gw2760hs.htm

Some notes: It's a slow panel. Black content should look pretty good, but fast motion won't be amazing. It's a few years old at this point, though perhaps most 27" gaming quality monitors will be. Not massively outdated, but perhaps a bit. Finding good reviews of the latest monitors of this type is getting to be difficult, with sites like TFT Central looking more at 144Hz or 1440p options instead of classic 1080p at 60Hz.

In short, I would see if I couldn't find something a bit newer. Maybe switch to IPS if you want better color and speed, or even TN if you need the best speed and don't mind color shifts.

As a trick, I'll go to Amazon and look at the "first date available" for various interesting-looking monitors, which allows me to weed out the really old monitors.

[Fudoh]

It's a slow panel. Black content should look pretty good, but fast motion won't be amazing.

but to add a little perspective to that: it performs as expected from a VA panel. You gain excellent blacks and you lose some response time compared to IPS panels. VA is what you want from a TV as well. Large IPS TVs are the rare exception.

[Exidna]

It's a slow panel. Black content should look pretty good, but fast motion won't be amazing.

but to add a little perspective to that: it performs as expected from a VA panel. You gain excellent blacks and you lose some response time compared to IPS panels. VA is what you want from a TV as well. Large IPS TVs are the rare exception.

You lose the viewing angles of IPS too. Though you don't get inversion like TN panels, you get awful gamma shift and "washout" with VA panels.

IPS Viewing Angles
VA Viewing Angles

It's not just "some response time" either - VA panels are mostly responsive, but there will be some color transitions that cause massive streaking on the display because they have a response time of >50ms. All VA panels suffer from this.

[ZellSF]

I'm really conflicted about VA vs IPS. IPS glow is terrible, but VA response times seem bad enough that they would bother me.

Not that there are any 1440p+, 10ms- input lag, G-Sync, 85hz+, VA panels with HDMI inputs for me to upgrade to even if I wanted VA.

I want the 4K 120hz OLED announced by Dell of course, but 5000$ for a computer monitor is way outside my price range

Really like how far the PC monitor market has gotten. I remember IPS monitors being uncommon and pretty high end and everyone being stuck on 1080p because TV.

[Fudoh]

It's not just "some response time" either - VA panels are mostly responsive, but there will be some color transitions that cause massive streaking on the display because they have a response time of >50ms. All VA panels suffer from this.

I know. Did you never see any of my Sony VA smearing test videos ? But to be honest, small VA panels (like monitors) suffer from this considerably less than bigger displays.

[Xyga]

stuff

You really like to twist or ignore the points I make and force your own narrow vision of things. Fine, whatever...

[Ed Oscuro]

About VA response time - on lots of content I'd be OK with a fairly bad response time. My old Planar PX2611W claims a g2g response time of 5ms...with the caveat: 12ms rise/fall time. In practice it is more like that higher figure, at least in comparison to the new "4ms" panels; there's lots of streaking on fast content. This only really seems to be problematic for FPSes, third person games, and similar; and even so I've been tolerating it for years while remaining competitive. If the base input lag was better, I'd find the panel much better for all kinds of gaming content.

The new "4ms" displays (Asus PG279Q, XB271HU) certainly are a lot faster on these transitions, but yes, the IPS glow is maddening, and then you have probable backlight bleed issues. While there are some types of games which have pretty fast scrolling (maybe the fastest shmups in MAME, or a fast side view endless runner type game) that look very good on these panels, games with even faster content changes (the FPSes and TPS type games, again) still break up a bit - though it is better than it was before.

So if a VA panel had a fast input lag time, and was "just" able to match a ~2007 panel (I don't know what panel my slightly newer model uses) then I think that would be much better for gaming, especially many retro games. My reason for sticking with the fast IPS panels, for now, is that they bring a collection of good features while they remain useful for color-critical work...but the issues with glow remain.

FWIW, I don't find black levels on these new IPS panels problematic in of itself, but I do punch the brightness level all the way down to the minimum (or close) and any glow of backlight bleed will turn the blacks gray, and this is pretty noticeable in corners. In the center of these screens, blacks are fairly good, though, and tests seem to bear this out.

[Exidna]

Not that there are any 1440p+, 10ms- input lag, G-Sync, 85hz+, VA panels with HDMI inputs for me to upgrade to even if I wanted VA.

I think there are some VA displays on the way. They probably all use AUO AMVA panels though, which can be pretty bad.
Though response time is a problem, I think the bigger issue for people here is that they're not very good in tate mode due to the extremely limited viewing angle.

I want the 4K 120hz OLED announced by Dell of course, but 5000$ for a computer monitor is way outside my price range

No G-Sync though, which makes it a whole lot less interesting in my opinion, even if I did have the $5000 for one.
And that goes back to why it's so disappointing that LG's OLEDs are bad for gaming. You can get a 55" one of them for less than $5000 now, compared to that 30" monitor.

I remember IPS monitors being uncommon and pretty high end and everyone being stuck on 1080p because TV.

Well that's how we've ended up with "IPS Glow" being a problem though.
Those cheap AUO panels don't use an A-TW polarizer, which is what eliminates the IPS Glow problem.
Older high-end IPS panels all used one, so you never had that issue.



Monitor on the left is IPS with an A-TW polarizer, monitor on the right is IPS without an A-TW polarizer.
If I recall correctly, the 2490 WUXi was priced at about what the higher-end G-Sync monitors are costing today.
Most of the IPS panels with one of those polarizers are priced at $3000+ today though, and they aren't really suitable for gaming.

It doesn't do anything to fix the contrast of IPS, but does stop the glow when viewed at an angle.
But hopefully that will be improving soon. Apple have a 1600:1 IPS panel in the iPad Pro, and Microsoft have a 1400:1 panel in the Surface Pro 4.
It may not sound like much compared to those AUO VA panels with 3000:1 or the old Sharp VA panels with 5000:1, but even 1400:1 is a big improvement over the current 1000:1.

[Ed Oscuro]

Hmm, true. In my case the problem is that I'm moving from a screen like the one on the left in that image - with a polarizer.

FWIW, though, the color shift with those polarizers is a real thing. I have to really move around a bunch before it starts to appear, though.

[Exidna]

Hmm, true. In my case the problem is that I'm moving from a screen like the one on the left in that image - with a polarizer.

FWIW, though, the color shift with those polarizers is a real thing. I have to really move around a bunch before it starts to appear, though.

Yeah, it varies in severity depending on the type of backlight used with the display. For displays without a wide gamut, it generally only results in a slight purple tint near black, compared to the blue tint you typically see on most VA panels.
For what it's worth, not all IPS Glow is the same either. On the XB271HU it's a silvery gray color. On the ASUS PG279Q it's a golden brown color. The former is a lot more tolerable than the latter.

[Ed Oscuro]

I didn't really look closely at off-axis glow on the PG279Q. Head-on, backlight bleed / glow was blue in color, actually (photographing a black screen).

[Domino]

Man.....the IPS/TN debate is crazy. I love how non-bright my TN monitor currently is but it suffers on viewing angles.

The IPS panels is a lot brighter with a lot better viewing angles (my roomie has a IPS monitor) but I see more blur for some reason when he plays Dota. I feel like playing some Descent-style PC games in the future so I'm cleaning towards the TN panel.

[Domino]

After a lot of thinking over the last few weeks I ordered the DELL S2716DG TN panel. The local Microsoft Store had one on display and they allow me to pivot it. Of course they don't do any price matching so I got mine from Amazon for $580ish with tax free two day shipping. Standard TN panel stuff but viewing angles isn't half bad. I'm was willing to give up viewing angles for speed so this is a win-win for me. I don't always play shmups so when I want to play other PC games the panel will be more than enough for me.

Also my roomie's IPS panel is too bright for my eyes but has viewing angles. Also the G-Sync IPS panels are too much for me and I was looking to spend no more than $600.