Analog vs Digital on LCD's

[burningrave101]

Which do you prefer and why? I'm sure most of you will say digital is better but what about the refresh rates of digital vs analog? For instance if your LCD can run 1280x1024 @ 60Hz digital and 1280x1024 @ 75Hz analog which is better? Picture quality is suppost to be a little better on DVI but what about the refresh rate of the screen? Do you notice a difference when your like dragging windows across the screen? I'm doing some testing now on my Hyundai L90D+ and it appears there is less "ghosting" when dragging windows quickly across the screen when using analog. The picture quality also seems to actually look better but that may be because the DVI on my 6800GT isn't as good of quality as the DVI on ATI cards, or so i hear.

There seems to be quite a few issues with the DVI port on 6800's and i'm not sure if its the video card itself or just the drivers.

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=831813&highlight=DVI+6800GT
http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=833025&highlight=DVI+6800GT
http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=40556

What do you guys think?

 

[Roger]

I have a Samsung 193P and DVI looks a lot better and the text is sharper. I wouldn't say it's a problem with nVidia cards having a lower quality DVI than ATI since I'm using a GF4 Ti4200 and the difference is pretty noticeable if you compare DVI vs. analog.

 

[burningrave101]

I have a Samsung 193P and DVI looks a lot better and the text is sharper. I wouldn't say it's a problem with nVidia cards having a lower quality DVI than ATI since I'm using a GF4 Ti4200 and the difference is pretty noticeable if you compare DVI vs. analog.

Now that i switch back to DVI i belive the slight "ghosting" i get when dragging windows is the same on both digital and analog but i still think the colors are better on the analog for some reason.

Several people have compared the analog and DVI on the L90D+ and said they couldn't tell a difference in IQ so i dont think there is much difference if any between the two on this panel however the nVidia drivers or the DVI on the new 6800's may not perform as well as ATI and the X800's.

 

[Domingo]

I've got a Sony HS94P (on an Nvidia GeForce 6800 GT) and was asking this same question a few weeks ago and essentially just kept getting "Digital looks better - if you don't think so, you're blind" or something comparing casette tapes to DVD-Audio.

In reality for this monitor you're not going to notice a visual difference either way. I got some of the highest resolution images I could find and using the "clone" setting tried both. I didn't notice a damned bit of difference except with the gamma settings. The digital looks a little darker by default, but with a little tweaking can be made to look just like the analog and vice versa.

What about games or motion? It varied a little for me. Unreal Tournament 2K4 and both Need For Speed Underground games seemed to ghost a little more using DVI compared to analog.
Half-Life 2, Doom, Simpson's Hit and Run, Vampire, and Max-Payne 2 look identical with both.
Knights of the Old Republic, Quake engine games, and Halo seemed to ghost a little more using analog rather than DVI.

Pretty much the main thing you'll have an advantage with in using analog is that in most cases you can boost the refresh rate and therefore your max FPS. For instance on mine, analog will go up to 75Hz but DVI is capped at 60. You can go higher (obviously) by disabling vsync in DVI mode...but most games will tear and I'd rather have a lower FPS than have my screen tear every time I look in a different direction. Do you notice a huge difference between 60 and 75 FPS in a game? I really don't. 60 and 100+...sure. But 15 FPS isn't that much once you get above 45 to me. If it is to you, stick with analog.

The final difference is that some games don't seem to like running certain settings in analog mode. For instance, fire up the old-school GLQuake in 1280X1024X32 in analog mode and it won't run on my monitor. Do the same in DVI and it works fine. I've had similar issues with older 3D games and even new 2D games running in hi-res.

I personally use DVI just because I got bored of swapping back and forth, but don't let people on here give you shit about analog's video quality. In some monitors you might notice, but not with this one.

 

[infiniti029]

FPS and refresh rate have NOTHING TO DO WITH EACH OTHER on an LCD.

 

[Domingo]

If they don't - why do my games cap at 60 with vsysnc on when using DVI yet when using analog and I up the refresh to 75...the game suddenly caps at 75?
Seems like a correlation to me.

 

[Error Macro]

I think Infiniti is saying that while it does limit your fps in terms of how many frames are getting sent to the monitor, in practical use, it's different on an LCD because the pixels don't refresh like on a CRT. They just change when there is different image information sent to a particular space.

 

[infiniti029]

I think Infiniti is saying that while it does limit your fps in terms of how many frames are getting sent to the monitor, in practical use, it's different on an LCD because the pixels don't refresh like on a CRT. They just change when there is different image information sent to a particular space.

$$$$$$$$

 

[systemlines]

I have the new Samsung panel and I can confirm that it makes no difference like the Toms article stated.

 

[Domingo]

It might not affect anything regarding visuals and whatnot, but it does still affect your maximum FPS when playing with vsync on. If you're pulling 60FPS...that's never a bad thing, but there are anal people that want 120 FPS with Vsync on and LCD's simply can't do that.