HDTV for PC usage.

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Manick2005

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Feb 19, 2009
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I've been thinking about my setup and I haven't been able to find too many examples of people who have an HDTV and use it as a monitor. Why is this? I wouldn't believe its only because people don't have the money, because smaller HDTV's really aren't that much more expensive than big LCDs. The biggest LCD I've seen in store was a Samsung 25.5", and it was only about 200 dollars cheaper than a Samsung 32" 720p HDTV. I do understand that the biggest difference is usually resolution, but It would seem to me that if you could afford a 1080p HDTV, you'd have no use for a regular LCD monitor since that's the highest resolution anyway.

P.S.
I own a 32" 720p Samsung HDTV, and a 22" Dell 2209wa. Had my Samsung been a 1080p HDTV, I probably would have never bought the Dell. I bought it because I needed a monitor with more viewable area for doing stuff like Photoshop or AutoCAD work.
 
I've seen more examples of people using HDTVs as monitors than I've ever wanted.

Monitors are better suited for desktop use - simply because they were made for it.
I generally don't see the point of having a bigger display if you can't fit more stuff on it. You sit a lot closer to a monitor than a TV so the size difference isn't that great anyway.

And unless you have poor eyesight or something using such a low-resolution display on a short distance is just appalling.
If you wan't to go large then you have 30" displays with 2560x1600 - about twice the amount of pixels than a full-HD TV...

TVs are also 16:9 which isn't as good for desktop use due to the low vertical resolution, so any 23-28" 16:10 monitor has a great advantage there.

Apparently there are different opinions on this (a true mystery).
 
Honestly I feel that HDTVs are a way better value in EVERY aspect compared to desktop monitors. Why should I pay 1000 for a 30" monitor when I could get, for example, the 42" vizio 120hz lcd 1080p from dell for 749? The extra resolution given by the 30" monitor really doesn't mean anything to me, because if I wanted to multitask effectively I would just buy a seperate monitor to accomplish that in a far superior fashion anyway. I've always seen it as you're paying 250 more for a smaller screen that likely fails compared to a dedicated tv for raw display quality.

I bought the hannspree hf289h at for 550 at BB when it came out, and yeah I was fully content with it for a long time. It wasn't until I sat down and watched a friend's tv and just realized the IPS panel tv destroys my monitor handily in black levels, color accuracy, and viewing angle.

After seeing that, I jumped on a panasonic 42pz80u for 850 and never looked back. The hf289h looks like trash if it is anywhere within 20 feet of the display juggernaut HDTV, and that quality is something I definitely appreciated. The fact that the tv is 1920x1080 is definitely not an inhibitor to me, because all newer games support it right out of the box and movies/tv look much better through cutting out that extra bit of black bar.

In the end I honestly wouldn't ever be able to justify giving dell 1000 dollars for a 30" monitor when I could buy an ln32a550 that is plenty sharp and competent for 750.

In the end I wouldn't be surprised if monitors start losing ground to HDTVs in the desktop market or monitors are going to be brought in line with HDTVs as far as price/value goes. These days 1080p TVs are experiencing aggressive technological changes, so the pricing is competitive to match that. It used to be you bought a monitor because it was cheaper for more than buying a tv to do it if the tv even had the necessary connections for it, but these days monitors are becoming less and less competitive since they're not really innovating much and your average 32" 1080p tv is well within the budget of the average populace now.
 
I thought HDTV's also came in 16:10 aspect ratio? But either way, since I have a second monitor, I don't care about the resolution on my HDTV so much; I still like it and use it a lot, especially if I want to watch something off my HD that I downloaded (720p bluray rips look amazing). But even then, I still occasionally use it for almost everything else, because its color quality is far better than any regular LCD, and its just addicting to look at. To me, having far better color quality is more important than just a few more vertical rows of pixels, but that's just my personal preference. And since 99.9999% of all LCDs on the market are TN, which are only 6-bit color, its extremely difficult to find an LCD monitor that can come close to the same color quality of a HDTV. Not even my 2209wa with its eIPS panel comes close.
 
HDTVs can make for a spectacular display. And 1080 by 1920 will be plenty for many.

However, they can be more expensive. And it can be tricky to get an HDTV that is truly PC compatible. (For example, text appears to be a specific challenge for some sets.)
 
TVs are designed to be looked at from 5 to 10 feet away. Monitors are designed to be looked at from 2 to 3 feet away.

A 30" monitor has 2560x1600 resolution, while a 32" TV has a 1920x1080 resolution. Simply put, the pixels are bigger. Get within 2 or 3 feet, and you'll notice the difference.

TVs do a lot of processing on the image to clean up video and movie artifacts and playback glitches. This makes movies look great, but messes with text. A few TVs allow you to turn this off, but most don't.

I think that people who claim that TVs look better than monitors for computer use have never actually seen a 30" monitor, and are defending their purchase.
 
if i were in a business or a pro artist of some kind, i would get a monitor for sure... but for most people that just play games and watch movies, a 1080p screen of any kind is great. i myself want to get a 32" hdtv and just push it to the back of my desk.... so i would still be 3-4 feet away from it, but it would still look huge. and with proper settings, i can read text on my sd crt tv with 120dpi setting... so text shouldnt be an issue really...
 
Sure, if all you do is play games and watch movies then by all means - buy an HDTV. But if you intend to do any actual work on it, naaah.

Atmadestruct said:
Honestly I feel that HDTVs are a way better value in EVERY aspect compared to desktop monitors. Why should I pay 1000 for a 30" monitor when I could get, for example, the 42" vizio 120hz lcd 1080p from dell for 749? The extra resolution given by the 30" monitor really doesn't mean anything to me, because if I wanted to multitask effectively I would just buy a seperate monitor to accomplish that in a far superior fashion anyway. I've always seen it as you're paying 250 more for a smaller screen that likely fails compared to a dedicated tv for raw display quality.
Click to expand...

Then buy a 30" and a secondary monitor for added multitasking?
No matter if you go for high resolution displays or many smaller you still want high pixel density - which is the exact opposite of HDTVs..

The trend is towards higher pixel density...
 
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