Any significant monitor improvements in the last 2 years?

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Cheezor722

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I currently use a Samsung 2493hm that I bought 2 years ago. I just wanted give a brief survey to see if new monitors in the $200-$400 dollar range have improved in any way since then.

I have about $500 dollars to spend and I'm curious if a new monitor should even be considered.

Thanks.
 
The only thing that is significant is the release of the e-IPS panel for more affordable monitors. They are less expensive to manufacture than traditional S-IPS or H-IPS panels and can truly produce 16.7m color, unlike TN panel monitors (like yours) which require dithering to upscale from 256k colors to an estimated 16.2m - 16.7m colors.

23" - 24" LCD monitors (1920 x 1080, 1920 x 1200) based on e-IPS panels have been announced (well at least for 23"), but none have hit the market to the best of my knowledge. Then again I don't really look at "low end" monitors much.

The Dell U2410 has sold for as low as $515 (to the best of my knowledge) when on sale. It uses a H-IPS panel and is generally good for gaming. Here's a review:


http://www.tftcentral.co.uk/reviews/dell_u2410.htm
 
What about LED backlights? Makes for brighter screens.

16:9 display ratio: This might not be such a good thing for you, but it's out there. Basically, you're looking at 1920x1080 instead of 1920x1200. Much more common these days than 16:10.
 
besides what was already mentioned, 120hz monitors are also fairly new.

good luck on the search
 
honestly to your question, I'd say no, unless you're unhappy with your current monitor for some reason or another, this isn't meant to discredit anything thats been said in the thread so far, its all good/accurate information, I'm just looking at things from a pragmatic perspective:

in the $200-$400 realm, you aren't going to get really any higher resolution (you can get 2048x1152, which is a few % more pixels, but you really aren't going to gain much display space over 1920x1200), faster redraw time, bigger panel, toys, etc

LED backlighting can be a benefit, but its somewhat rare, and doesn't (by itself) mean higher quality, a few displays do use it to their advantage (like the DreamColor), but those are relatively expensive

120hz is neat, but I doubt if you'll see any noticeable difference, and it means a drop in resolution and size

only thing left really is color definition or viewing angle arguments, which takes me back to my original point, if you aren't displeased with your current monitor, save your cash, no reason to get spendy just because time has gone by, and you should still have another year or so on that Samsung warranty
 
Thanks for the info. Those changes do sound appealing but not enough to compel me to buy a new monitor just yet. I'll wait another couple years and hopefully all that tech will make its way down to the low- to mid- end.
 
Bbq said:
What about LED backlights? Makes for brighter screens.
Click to expand...

Thing is, we don't need brighter screens. They are already way too bright even without LED so thats just for bragging rights.
LED is great in laptops but in desktop displays it more or less comes down to less energy consumption in practice. This might be especially welcome in hot environments since the heat is less likely to build up but other than that I wouldn't pay much just for the sake of LED.


I'd say e-IPS would be the most significant improvement in the last few years, and that only because of the price-point. The supply is rather limited though and whether it's worth it is a whole debate. But I'm with obobski, if you are happy with what you got stick with it and buy an SSD or something ;)
 
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A monitor is the main piece of interaction between human and computer, NO OTHER UPGRADE will improve your personal usage experience the way a monitor upgrade will. A bigger screen, a higher resolution screen or a higher quality panel will make the use of the PC much better.

1- Once you go BIG you never go back! Big screens fill your visual field and create an experience that will change the way you play games and watch videos.

2- Higher resolutions means more desktop space, better looking games. Again improving both working production, faster web browsing and improved gaming experience.

3-Monitors last. in 2004 Apple launched the monitor i am using now: a 30" 2560x1600 S-IPS. It's 2010 and the piece of hardware is still state of art. NO OTHER hardware from 6 years ago lasts that much.


With $500 i would consider dual 23" 2048x1152. There are offers from Acer, Dell and Samsung, in no particular order. At 2048x1152 you will not need neither dual link DVI nor high end graphics cards. a 4850/5770 can handle it just fine.

An SSD is a great upgrade, BUT will only improve load times, a small piece of the computer experience. A bigger screen with higher resolution will make everything look better.
 
geok1ng said:
A monitor is the main piece of interaction between human and computer, NO OTHER UPGRADE will improve your personal usage experience the way a monitor upgrade will. A bigger screen, a higher resolution screen or a higher quality panel will make the use of the PC much better.

1- Once you go BIG you never go back! Big screens fill your visual field and create an experience that will change the way you play games and watch videos.

2- Higher resolutions means more desktop space, better looking games. Again improving both working production, faster web browsing and improved gaming experience.

3-Monitors last. in 2004 Apple launched the monitor i am using now: a 30" 2560x1600 S-IPS. It's 2010 and the piece of hardware is still state of art. NO OTHER hardware from 6 years ago lasts that much.


With $500 i would consider dual 23" 2048x1152. There are offers from Acer, Dell and Samsung, in no particular order. At 2048x1152 you will not need neither dual link DVI nor high end graphics cards. a 4850/5770 can handle it just fine.

An SSD is a great upgrade, BUT will only improve load times, a small piece of the computer experience. A bigger screen with higher resolution will make everything look better.
Click to expand...

this is a bit opinionated, the Cinema HD is dated as far as 30" monitors go, it lacks features that are now standard among competitors, and costs more than that competition, its also among the worst in terms of power consumption, has an unimpressive mount (For $1800, you better believe I'm gonna nitpick it), and the ancient tech behind it is really starting to show

as far as 2048x1152 not requiring dual-link, thats flat out wrong, I'd be glad to scan the page out of my Samsung's user manual explaining the situation

honestly, viewing the monitor as "the single most important" thing to buy is your opinion, thats fine, but not everyone feels that way, your arguments for resolution are only valid if the resolution is used, or can be powered, 2560x1600 requires some processing heft for games, which costs quite a bit, and how exactly does it "speed up" web browsing? (pages will still load at the same speed), and the claim that "no other hardware" lasts that long is equally unrealistic, I've got plenty of other devices that are as old, if not older than, your Cinema HD that could be argued as "the single most important component ever that you interact with", keyboards, mice, cases, software, audio interfaces, headphones, speakers, etc, and most of them aren't even showing signs of age, let alone being displaced in the market by cheaper, better performing competitors

no, a high resolution monitor isn't a bad buy, no, there isn't an issue with having a nice monitor or nice things, but the notion that we should "max out" just to "max out" is pretty ridiculous, just because you've got the money doesn't mean you have to spend it, something that I think younger generations would be well served to learn

also, double negative fail
 
Nothing significant no.
Right now LED backlighting is more of a powersaving gimmick than an image quality improvement.
There's not much reason for you to upgrade unless you want better IQ and viewing angles from an IPS panel but the speed won't be better than the TN panel you already have.
OLEDs are still too expensive. That's why the biggest one you'll find is probably a 3.7" one on a cellphone that is subsidized by a 2 year minimum contract.
 
I'd argue that SSD is a better upgrade than a bigger monitor:
1) No matter size of your monitor, if you are waiting for you programs/data to load, you are wasting time anyways.
2) even though you can fill bigger screen with more open windows, slow HDD will make them useless because of constant loading/reloading of data (that is, if you don't have a data center with 24gb of RAM or something, most people have 4gb max). Multitasking craves for fast storage and having bigger screen won't make this particular problem go away, in fact, it'll exacerbate it - you'll want to open more windows but you get slower computer.
Best solution - have both bit screen and SSD :D
 
As already said, biggest improvements have been appearance of e-IPS screens, cheap and relatively fast screens with very good viewing angles, colors, and stable gamma.

Other is 120Hz monitors for gaming. Currently only ones market are 22" but there are alteast two 23-23.6" ones coming in a month or two. Suffer from typical TN problems like vertical gamma shift and bland dithered colors though.

Not much else. LED backlights on cheap monitors are still very rare, if not nonexistent but they are coming soon too.
 
Well,

One thing that may help you decide to upgrade is the HDCP compliance in newer monitors, if you like HD movies and similar content.

It 's really bad that HD content most often requires newer monitors, because people will not be as inclined to buy HD content, at least until they finally upgrade to a new display, if they haven't already.

Peace to you all,
C. Livingstone
 
Any significant monitor improvements in the last 2 years?
Click to expand...

No. The only noticeable (but not significant) improvements are full led arrays for HDTV and Displayport for PC (if you want Eyefinity). IMO, the real deal is OLED.
 
I'd agree with other people that if you are happy with your current monitor, especially it being TN panel, you just stick to it.

There is no miracle new super-fast 26" H-IPS for a "few bucks" now. Maybe I'd check out Dell U2410, but that's all. In more expensive range the DreamColour is probably a way to go fully utilizing its excellent RGB LED backlight.

I think the most panel development is now concentrated to TV panels, becuase many people still don't have flst HDTVs and these who already have them should be persuaded to buy ... 3D HDTV... tadaaaa! :)
 
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