Samsung 275T vs HP LP3065

[TIGR]

Hi folks, I'm currently using a Samsung 275T as my main monitor. Its brightness, colors, and contrast are beautiful beyond words, but for my business (building custom computers) I need a WQXGA (2560x1600) LCD I can use for testing high-res game performance with different hardware. However, I don't want to sacrifice the beautiful high-contrast, bright, vivid image the 275T offers (I've yet to see better picture from an LCD.)

Another problem with keeping the 275T for me is its rather severe input lag. Don't have a source at the moment, but I think ~60ms more input lag is about the typical result people get testing this monitor against a CRT. I do a fair bit of twitch gaming (primarily CoD4) and want to minimize that.

Been looking at the LP3065 as well as Dell's 3007WFP/3008WFP and other 30" class LCDs, and am wondering what would be the best option for me. I do not care about inputs, gloss vs matte screen, viewing angle, or style. I have some vision difficulties due to a minor eye injury so having a very bright, high-contrast screen with vivid colors like the 275T is important, along with the WQXGA resolution and lower input lag. Would prefer 27" or greater, and I'll probably buy used/refurb as that's the only way I can afford it at the moment.

Suggestions?

[TheLaughingMan]

I can't claim to be an expert on large size monitors like these, but I do know the LP series from HP tend to have a very lack luster adjustment menu so you will most likely have few options to fin tune the monitor's picture.

Out of the two choices, I would go with the Dell. I think it will provide more options to fine tune the image to fit the way you want it.

[Robert-The-Rambler]

A few years ago when I bought it the price was $1400. For that price I expected a flawless presentation but it is not as perfect as I might have hoped and what bothers me is that the backlight does not seem to be as even as I would have hoped. There is a whiteness very visible in a dark room on the bottom right portion of the screen and the viewing angle is clearly more inferior to now much cheaper 1080p LCD HDTVs. I don't know where they got 178 * 178. It doesn't kill the deal entirely but man for the price I would have expected the perfect monitor without such a narrow viewing angle. I don't know why the monitor seems to have been so highly regarded for so long. I really like it but the flaws in just its visual presentation are obvious. On the good side it is simply the sharpest monitor I have ever seen and colors look incredible and bloody games really are mesmerizing but as I said the backlight is just a disappointment and really can be a distraction. You can control the backlight issue by dimming the monitor but that creates a more dull image and thus another problem. It is really good but not what I was truly expecting.

[blkhogan]

Even as tech advances with LCD's, its really hard to match a quality CRT. I still sometimes prefer my 20" crt over my LCD for some games. I just keep them on a switch and change when needed.

[TheLaughingMan]

There is no input lag for CRT's. Response time is less than 1 ms as well. It is their strongest benefit and why there are still some on the market.

CRT's also have no native resolution like LCD's either, so it will scale as high as you need within the constraint of your GPU and the size of the screen it has.

LCD beat CRT's with price, not quality. LCD's are cheaper, lighter, more durable, using less power, and have absolutely no flickr (for the most part). LCD's, while they are not as accurate in color as a CRT, their color brightness and black levels are better as well.

I mean, CRT is a 50+ year old tech, while LCD's are like on their 18th or so. The problem is they huge, heavy, expensive to make, and a bitch to find.

[Completely Bonkers]

Dell UltraSharp U2711

[Robert-The-Rambler]

Originally Posted by TIGR

Thanks for the replies so far.

I'm wondering if I should get a CRT, just for the personal gaming side of things (forgetting the need to benchmark games at 2560x1600 for the moment because I don't know of any WQXGA CRTs—please post if you do). I have the option currently to buy a used Sony Trinitron GDM-W900 (1920x1200 24" CRT) for $175 locally. How do you think the gaming experience on that would stack up against the 275T? It'd be giving up some significant screen size but wouldn't it have next to no input lag by virtue of being a CRT? How do you think the brightness/colors/contrast would stack up?

I don't remember the exact model number but be careful as what you buy today is either used or refurbushed as it was in my case. Now I love the fact that I can do higher refesh rates than 60hz. In fact I have the option of 1920 * 1200 @99hz.(Not sure if it was exactly that rate) I also have the very cool option of 2304 * 1440 @80hz. It is crazy how many pixels that is on such a small screen.

Now your purchase is inherently risky for a few reasons but the most important thing is the year the monitor was made. If you get an older one like me that is made in 2001 then the monitor will be very dim. Others have said that later models were brighter. Find out when it was made before you buy. These large CRTs have a very long warm up period. The brightness and contrast will not look right for a long time(washed out white) so if you happen to turn off the monitor when you are not using it look forward to a warm up period where, colors, contrast and brightness stabilize, of about an hour or so. A lesser concern is of course the screens are glass and subject to glare.

Anyhow, I really think you would be better suited with a 120hz 32" 1080p HDTV.(Hell or even larger if you sit back farther) CRT is just not as enjoyable as it might seem. LCDs are just so simple to work with and simply work out of the box.

Here is an example of a good 32" 120hz HDTV. I don't have personal experience with it but on paper that is quite awesome.

LG 32" 1080p 120Hz LCD HDTV 32LD550

[Robert-The-Rambler]

Originally Posted by TIGR

Robert, thank you for your extremely useful post. If I get a CRT I will ask about the year of manufacture. That warm-up period is a hard pill to swallow and I'm unsure now—I realized there was a warm-up period but didn't think it was anywhere close to an hour. Power consumption is an important consideration for me and I'd want to turn it off when not using it.

Questions, though, about the LCD HDTV. Firstly, will they be as sharp as an LCD screen that is meant to be a computer monitor? I use the 275T for browsing the web and writing code as well as gaming and multimedia. The sharpness and readability of text are a big plus on this Samsung. Secondly I have to ask about input lag, since that's the only problem I have with the 275T. What would that be like on an LCD HDTV?

I don't know anywhere that reviews 1080p HDTVs like they might review monitors in the way PC users would use them and what gamers would care about. Hell, I find many monitor reviews to be limited anyway. I have purchased two 32" HDTVs for use as gaming monitors. I bought a Sceptre X32BV FullHD from Newegg and while that has a very even backlight the response while using the VGA connection is really bad. You can see the image literally distorts with any motion via VGA. Funny I don't notice that with component video watching HDTV channels. So if you stick to HDMI with that set you get real great black level with a great uniform backlight without much response lag. But if you look real close you can see an ever so slight darkening of the image when there is motion on screen. (My Westinghouse 24" MVA monitors do that too and is not a big deal) As far as input lag I don't know how to test that and have never been in a situation where that would really matter.

The 2nd set I got is a Vizio VO32L 32" 1080p set. It does not have as uniform of a backlight. There is a whiter region in the bottom left corner portion of the screen. Response time seems much better than the Sceptre set and there is no darkening of colors while there is motion on screen. Both VGA and HDMI work good for gaming with HDMI offering settings more tuned for a sharper image and VGA with a softer image.

So unfortunately it is a crapshoot. It might help to try to go to retail stores and actually see the HDTVs you are interested in but really you won't know if you got exactly what you wanted till you test at home with the lights out. You really don't know the true quality of an LCD until you see what it looks like in a dark room. Only then can you see what the backlight really has to offer. A blotchy backlight can and will kill a cinematic gaming experience.

[Completely Bonkers]

IMO the CRT is a rather esoteric niche and I would not go down that route; for "normal use" of a PC, esp. internet, a CRT is much sharper and has zero flicker compared to a CRT. YES, a CRT has faster response times when you are playing games, but, are you REALLY concerned about that, or do you hope to have an "edge" in online games. Well, you wont. Because compared to a decent TFT your online gameplay will not be any better... and you will only start trying to find other "lag bottlenecks" like your mouse polling rate or your network card ping etc. etc.

Stick with a CRT, your eyes will thank you.

[TIGR]

To keep the thread clean and avoid double-posting, I've consolidated and updated my previous post into this one:

Originally Posted by Robert-The-Rambler

As far as input lag I don't know how to test that and have never been in a situation where that would really matter.

Input lag matters in twitch gaming.

This year, I tested the impact of monitor choice on gaming performance using CoD4 multiplayer, an experiment spanning six months and ~27,000 kills. This experiment was done with the same gaming system (other than monitor) in the same CoD4 server. Monitors tested were my Samsung 275T (high-input-lag 27" LCD), Samsung 2493HM (lower-input-lag 24" LCD), and Gateway EV700 (17" CRT).

My overall KDRs (Kill to Death Ratios):

275T: 1.8:1 (6500 kills, 3612 deaths)
2493HM: 2.4:1 (5500 kills, 2292 deaths)
EV700: 3.2:1 (14,974 kills, 4619 deaths)

For this to be a really scientific test, I'd have to have used identical viewable screen sizes, resolutions, and account for factors like the monitors' brightness, contrast, color rendition, etc. I worked with what I had and to me personally, the results are incontrovertible: input lag, at least for players like myself in twitch games like CoD4, matters. If anything, the "unscientificness" of my experiment skews the results in favor of the 275T, as it is easily the most high-end monitor here, with better colors, contrast, and size than the ones I found to be clearly superior for twitch gaming. I played at the native 1920x1200 on the LCDs and at 1280x1024 on the CRT, with constant 85fps framerates (CoD4 com_maxfps set to 85 and the system had no problem maintaining that at either resolution). The EV700 was a low-end model even when it was new, and it has dimmed significantly over the years.

I noticed no ghosting on either of the LCDs but easily noticed the difference in input lag and the impact it had on my ability to maneuver precisely and react quickly. Thus I don't hesitate to fully attribute the difference in KDRs to input lag.

Originally Posted by Completely Bonkers

IMO the CRT is a rather esoteric niche and I would not go down that route; for "normal use" of a PC, esp. internet, a CRT is much sharper and has zero flicker compared to a CRT. YES, a CRT has faster response times when you are playing games, but, are you REALLY concerned about that, or do you hope to have an "edge" in online games. Well, you wont. Because compared to a decent TFT your online gameplay will not be any better... and you will only start trying to find other "lag bottlenecks" like your mouse polling rate or your network card ping etc. etc.

Stick with a CRT, your eyes will thank you.

I'm guessing you meant to type "LCD" where "CRT" is bold in the quote above.

I came into this thinking the way you do, even though I immediately noticed the input lag when I first played CoD4 with my 275T. But knowing personally the difference in the feel of the game, and seeing the difference in my KDR numbers, there's no denying the significance of input lag. The input lag becomes immediately clear the instant I go into CoD4 and jerk the mouse around a little bit. It's simple to control precise, rapid movements with the CRT; attempting the same with either of the LCDs makes one feel intoxicated in comparison.

The difference between the EV700 and the 275T is night and day: the EV700 looks like crap but approximately doubles my twitch gaming performance (measured in KDR). It can only do 1280x1024 @ 60hz, yet I enjoy playing with it. So I can only imagine what it would be like to play CoD4 on a CRT like the 24" GDM-FW900 that can do 1920x1200 @ 85hz with vastly superior picture.

[ebolamonkey3]

If you can, go to the local Apple store and look at their 27' and 30' monitors. Apple uses LED backlight and those tend to give a more vivid picture at the cost of color accuracy. Other 30' monitors by Dell/HP/NEC all use CCFL backlight, have matte finish, and focus on color reproduction rather than vibrancy.

Usually I don't recommend Apple monitors, but in your case that may be the best option. They just released a new 27" for $1000 and the old 30" seems to have been discontinued. Down side is price, as always. The U2711 is cheaper for a 27" and the U3011 is cheaper than the Apple 30" by more than $200. You probably won't find many used Apple displays for sale either :\

[Completely Bonkers]

TIGR, you are right about my typo. I must have been up late. Sorry for the mistake.

I really like your twitch-ratio analysis. It's nice to work by numbers rather than intuition or feel. And interesting to see your results.

I do stand by my words however... your eyes will thank you to be on IPS if you do a lot of work/internet on the PC. Never mind a small loss of prowess on online games... if you WORK on the PC you owe your eyes the best they can get.