In the LCD industry newer doesn't mean better anymore?

V

vahrn

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I am struggling to find an LCD that suits my needs (office, games, movies, 24+ inches, great colors)

In the meanwhile I am using an old Acer AL1731 (20 ms) I bought used for 20 € from a friend.
Contrast ratio is not great, but this thing shows very very little ghosting and only in tests.

On the contrary the Benq EW2420 I bought and had refunded showed an insane amount of ghosting, blurriness even when scrolling webpages and it is rated 6-7 ms I don't remember exactly.
Then I noticed that many highly recommened displays on these forums are 1 or even 2 years old, save Dell's U-series which is far from perfect (and is already one year old). My old display the NEC 20wgx2 pro is still considered one of the best gaming monitors ever made...
Finally many displays show poor QC and ending up with a nice unit is like winning the lottery..

Does all this mean that the LCD industry has not been able to make any significant step forward in the last couple of years and in some cases has in fact stepped backwards?
 
The BenQ EW2420 is a VA panel, meaning it has very good black depth and contrast but slow response time.

There are 3 main panel types (TN, IPS and VA) and each have their advantages and disadvantages. If your primary concern is response time, then TN and IPS monitors are better in that regard and the age of the monitor has relatively little impact.
 
The EW2420 has a VA panel, and VA panels have always had trouble with ghosting unless overdrive is applied by analyzing the last couple of frames (which adds lag), so that's nothing new. The Acer has a TN panel, and the NEC has an IPS panel, both of which are natively more responsive than VA panels. The NEC was also one of the first IPS monitors to have overdrive, which helps make the slowest transitions faster. TN with overdrive and IPS with overdrive are the most responsive LCD technologies, so it's no wonder the NEC is still considered one of the best.

The Dell U-series monitors have LG IPS panels, and QC has always been poor with LG IPS panels. It's just a different set of problems now. Older IPS panels commonly had cloudy backlight bleeding, higher occurrence of stuck pixels, image persistence problems, and staining. Those issues are less common now, but color uniformity has become more of a problem for some reason, although older IPS panels were not immune either. You'll also find people complaining about grainy anti-glare films and black glowing at an angle, but those are nothing new either.

The LCD industry has stepped back in some ways like going from 16:10 resolutions to smaller 16:9 resolutions, but nothing much has changed otherwise.
 
Hmn... I have a VA panel and see no ghosting at all =.=

edit:

nvm, seems I'm on P-MVA. Faster response time.
 
In these forums you'll find many a tale of troubled gamers trying to find that perfect, but nonexistant LCD monitor.
 
BDV said:
Hmn... I have a VA panel and see no ghosting at all =.=

edit:

nvm, seems I'm on P-MVA. Faster response time.
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Even the fastest 120Hz TN panels have ghosting. Some people just notice it more, some less.


Ultima99 said:
In these forums you'll find many a tale of troubled gamers trying to find that perfect, but nonexistant LCD monitor.
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Indeed. There is no such thing as a perfect monitor. :(

All panel types have significant disadvantages.
 
Ultima99 said:
In these forums you'll find many a tale of troubled gamers trying to find that perfect, but nonexistant LCD monitor.
Click to expand...

Yes a lot of old bitter CRT jockeys. I have somehow managed to accept my fate. But it all depend on my success with 3D on my XL2410T or I may become a whiner again.

It´s really sad that still today my 3 year old LCD TV is so much better in term of pure IQ over the BenQ G2400W. And it´s not even close to what I had on my Trinitron CRT.
 
oqvist said:
Yes a lot of old bitter CRT jockeys. I have somehow managed to accept my fate. But it all depend on my success with 3D on my XL2410T or I may become a whiner again.

It´s really sad that still today my 3 year old LCD TV is so much better in term of pure IQ over the BenQ G2400W. And it´s not even close to what I had on my Trinitron CRT.
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I know what you mean about the CRT, but anytime I start to feel nostalgia for them I just remember how thick and heavy those things were. My old desk (which had a thick top to it) had to be reinforced at the back to support the weight of my then huge 19" CRT.
 
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I too have the magic NEC 20wmgx2. Wonderful product. I sometimes feel like I won a small lottery by having it, even though I paid a premium for it.

There is some new hope as of late in the form of a new line of Gamer oriented IPS panels from LG. They displayed one of them at CES. No real news of the new line of LCD's has been provided since, but it doesn't seem to be vaporwear at all. Google the following:
LG E70V.
Noteable features: IPS, "thru mode" for very low input lag, and RTC for anti-ghosting of course, and even a remote control. Granted, these will have LG IPS panels in them and could be subject to LG's second rate quality control as the previous posted commented.
I share the OP's desire to find a new monitor as I don't see my wonderful NEC lasting indefinitely and would like to have a second monitor anyway.
 
Im currently using a Samsung PX2370 LED which is a TN panel, the only thing keeping it from amazing status is the black levels and backlight bleed but it does have very accurate color and very little ghosting (2ms response / 3ms input lag vs. CRT) plus the 1080P res and HDMI input is a bonus.

I'd still take my FW900 CRT back if it were working (needs a new flyback transformer). I even had an NEC 20WMGX2 sitting next to the FW900 (shown here). and ended up sending back the NEC within 30 day return period because it just couldn't hold up to the CRT overall. Keep in mind the FW900 is not a typical CRT it was pretty much the best you could get.

It seems the LCD HDTV market has the more advanvced models vs PC, why cant they come out with a full array LED local dimming PC monitor? that would pretty much cure the black level problem.
 
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You are screwed, sorry.

I am just chilling out on my CRTs until they die or something really good comes along. If I see a good FW900 or 21"+ CRT cheap I grab it. I think that honestly we may be screwed and the only real chance we have is to see OLED scale up to monitor sizes. I know it looks good on phones but I cannot tell how it will do with speed and games. It seems all development and news to do with SED/FED has dropped off the face of the earth. At least with TVs plasmas seems to be regaining some traction.
 
mathesar said:
It seems the LCD HDTV market has the more advanvced models vs PC, why cant they come out with a full array LED local dimming PC monitor? that would pretty much cure the black level problem.
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Well they cost a lot more, and it seems PC folks just aren't willing to pay that price for a good display, hence the proliferation of cheap TN monitors

I am considering a TV with full array LED with local dimming if I can find one that is small enough for PC use, 32 inch or so
 
Joining the CRT crew here. Just settled down with an FW900 and gonna hang on to it until some decent tech comes. I'd be happy with SED/FED, OLED, but I am surprised no one seems to be mentioning what is for me a minus with these displays, they are all fixed-pixel displays with a native resolution.

I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who likes to fire up the old DOS or mid-to-late 90's games every once in a while to take a break from all the soulless eye-candy shooters these days, and no matter how you decide to stretch or scale 640x480 that just looks plain bad. On the FW900, you simply hit ASC, and there you go. Considering the number of pixels, it's quite viewable. Not something I could have said for my old Samsung LCD, I pretty much gave up playing old games on that thing.

As such, for me the ultimate display technology would be Laser RP, something Mitsubishi has demonstrated in their TV's, and it has proven VERY nice in the 75" LaserVue model they have out right now. This is the kind of stuff I would like to see on my desk. Multiscan. Laser guns, wider color gamut than any other technology. Does not fade with age. Blacks as good or better than CRT. Almost as thin as LCD. Less power draw than LCD or Plasma. How could you not want this thing? Unfortunately, does not seem to be getting the attention it deserves, probably because of the high asking price as of now. Take a look for yourself, I get amazed even seeing it filmed.
 
LaserVue has bad viewing angles though, like DLP TVs, and the blacks aren't CRT levels
 
Have you seen one? This is not what the owner says, I asked him specifically about the black level in the comments of that video, you can see. I don't see any reason for the blacks not to be as good. There is no backlight. I assume the lasers shut off for black pixels just like a CRT gun. Obviously, proper calibration still comes into play here. From what I can see the viewing angles are great, certainly better than anything LCD has to offer.

P.S. This is their second model. I'm pretty sure once this technology has been given some time to mature (CRT had over a 100, LCD & Plasma what...20?) it will wipe the floor with everything else. It has extreme potential - this is laser light, the purest light source available.
 
From what I see; black is as dark as it can be in that lit a room, the screen doesn't appear to be matte. When the lights are off, it's as black as everything else, doesn't seem to be much halation (something CRT can't come to grips with), viewing angle is certainly better than what I've seen from LCD's so far. It may not be CRT like, but I'm pretty sure that can be improved upon.

Also, viewing angle seems to only effect brightness from what I can see (as laser light is rather focused, they are probably using diffusers of sorts) and doesn't have that horrendous color/gamma shift that LCD's exhibit. What I can tell you is that if I had the money I would have one shipped here right now (as a TV of course). Fast forward 2-3 years and hopefully, I'll have one, in the form of a 27-30" PC screen.
 
Colours look great that's for sure!
Although I thought the space scene looked a bit washed out - need good contrast/black levels for these

I do think it has a lot going for it, no pixel and backlight issues like LCD, and none of the geometry issues that plague CRT.
A lot cheaper and less complex than OLED, SED and FED.

Won't be thin though
And some people say there is a "rainbow" effect like in DLP?
 
Newer is not better? That is the case. In a recent thread where the OP was looking for a decent 1920x1200 display, he rejected a suggestion to look at a Samsung 244t or NEC 2470WNX (available at the time on Ebay), because he did not want to deal with warranty issues or whatever. It was a reasonable position he took. So, he said, that leaves the newer 24" IPS displays with their issues.

Personally I feel the that HP LP2465, the Samsung 244t, and especially the NEC 2470WNX if you can find it, are superior to anything that has come out since the NEC LCD 2490WUXi.
 
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