Question on playing games in lower res than is LCD recommended

[Ozpa]

Hello everyone!

I wanted to ask you if there's any drawbacks when playing games in lower res than the standard recommended of a 23-24" monitor (1920x1080?)? Switching resolutions when playing games is annoying but what can you do, I don't really need to play in 1080p or even in 1680x1050 (AA enabled is enough) and I love smooth over 60fps gameplay.
Playing on a 19" in 1280x1024 right now. Mainly want a larger LCD because an LED will use much less energy, much larger windows desktop space(!) and larger screen to view those movies (who needs a regulart TV haha).

Thanks for replies

 

[mcloughj]

You could try playing 800*600 on your current monitor as the effect would be similar.

You'll want to keep the aspect ratio similar to your screen when you get it, otherwise you'll have to put up with distortion of graphics in game.

 

[HossHuge]

LCD monitor are designed to be used at their native resolution. They have a certain amount of pixels that go left to right (horizontal) and top to bottom (vertical). So if you lower that you will have 2,3,4 ...pixels etc used to show one. It makes the picture not as crisp and blotchy.

Also it depends what shape the pixel is. A 1920x1080 monitor is 16:9. Now if you change it to 16:10 or 4:3 it distorts it even more.

But if you're happy with the picture, go with it. It won't hurt the monitor or anything.

 

[Ozpa]

Oh yea sure, not messing with aspect ratio. I just don't know how today's LCDs react when they work in non-recommended resolutions - if the screen gets distorted, artifacts or whatever other glitches there might be. I'm just a little paranoid about the fact that there will be a significant fps drop when I change my current gaming resolution to 1080p.

 

[HossHuge]

If you are worried about drops in frame rates, imo it's better to lower some of the in-game specs (textures, shadows...etc) than resolution.

 

[xBruce88x]

some of the newer games ive played support auto detection of aspect ratio. i.e. it'll put in black bars instead of distorting the image.

that said take a look at ... http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/16:9

your gtx560 should handle 1080p in most games fine, but you can do 1600x900 and it should still look fine. 1366x768 would do too but at the 23in size youd notice the image to not look as sharp.

my monitor is 17in at 1280x1024 and i can pick out the individual pixels at times.... granted its pretty old LCD wise.

 

[qubit]

Try whatever resolution you want on your LCD monitor - it won't break it. Of course, the only resolution it looks good on is its native one. It will be a blurred mess at anything else, due to scaling to fit the picture to the whole screen.

 

[Peter1986C]

I heard rumours about getting lower than native is bad for one´s eyesight, which sounds plausible to me because my (crappy --> -10) eyes get tired and itchy sooner when I am below native.

 

[CJCerny]

Couple of notes: 1) larger monitor will likely use more power than a smaller monitor, even if it is LED lit. Panel size is a big determining factor here. 2) Video card drivers have scaling options. You don't need to fill the display if you don't want to. Just uncheck the scaling option in the driver controls and the game will not be stretched to fill the monitor but will remain in the configured resolution. This is helpful for old games that only support 4:3 or 5:4 resolutions. Some monitors also have this feature if you can't find the option in your driver controls.

 

[Ozpa]

Couple of notes: 1) larger monitor will likely use more power than a smaller monitor, even if it is LED lit. Panel size is a big determining factor here. 2) Video card drivers have scaling options. You don't need to fill the display if you don't want to. Just uncheck the scaling option in the driver controls and the game will not be stretched to fill the monitor but will remain in the configured resolution. This is helpful for old games that only support 4:3 or 5:4 resolutions. Some monitors also have this feature if you can't find the option in your driver controls.

Oh thanks for the info about scaling options!
If I remember correctly my current monitor is using almost 100W in power and the one's I want to get soon around 30W. Should be significant reduction unless this is not the only power draw measure.

 

[qubit]

Oh thanks for the info about scaling options!
If I remember correctly my current monitor is using almost 100W in power and the one's I want to get soon around 30W. Should be significant reduction unless this is not the only power draw measure.

A note about the scaling option in the driver, before you start tearing your hair out: it may not work. What you might see is that you can set the option for no scaling, but it doesn't take effect. When you next view that option, it's gone back to the previous setting. The other thing that can happen is that the option to change the scaling is greyed out.

Both of these problems are caused because the monitor doesn't support scaling, or has some funny way of doing it or it may only work with certain resolutions. Basically, it's down to the monitor being awkward and all the ones I've played with are to some degree.

 

[gaximodo]

in fact you won't notice much difference between 1366*768 against 1600*900, but there is a lot of differences just going from 1920*1080 to 1919*1079 (i know there isnt such a resolution, im trying to point out the differences between native and not native is HUGE, regardless percentage of pixels lost)

 

[qubit]

in fact you won't notice much difference between 1366*768 against 1600*900, but there is a lot of differences just going from 1920*1080 to 1919*1079 (i know there isnt such a resolution, im trying to point out the differences between native and not native is HUGE, regardless percentage of pixels lost)

Yeah, it looks blurred and 'orrible.

 

[Hayder_Master]

lcd monitor are designed to be used at their native resolution. They have a certain amount of pixels that go left to right (horizontal) and top to bottom (vertical). So if you lower that you will have 2,3,4 ...pixels etc used to show one. It makes the picture not as crisp and blotchy.

Also it depends what shape the pixel is. A 1920x1080 monitor is 16:9. Now if you change it to 16:10 or 4:3 it distorts it even more.

But if you're happy with the picture, go with it. It won't hurt the monitor or anything.

+1

 

[Mussels]

Couple of notes: 1) larger monitor will likely use more power than a smaller monitor, even if it is LED lit. Panel size is a big determining factor here. 2) Video card drivers have scaling options. You don't need to fill the display if you don't want to. Just uncheck the scaling option in the driver controls and the game will not be stretched to fill the monitor but will remain in the configured resolution. This is helpful for old games that only support 4:3 or 5:4 resolutions. Some monitors also have this feature if you can't find the option in your driver controls.

not true. my 24" uses only 22W of power, while my old 22" used the same. my old 17" used more.


power consumption of LED monitors is far, far lower than older CCFL monitors.