Question Does anyone use a 43" TV for gaming with VRR?

[Caveman]

On somewhat of a whim, I purchased a 50" Vizio M50Q7 (Costco Item #7507001) for $299 Cyber Monday! It's primary purpose is for watching Amazon Prime video content in a master bedroom.

I had no idea how awesome this experience was going to be, especially for the price. So far, I'm blown away by the color, blacks, resolution, and "gaming tech". Especially amazing is that I think the TV is upscaling the feed we get from Amazon Prime, etc, which I think is always at 1080P, yes? Anyway the upscale looks really, really good (to me anyways). I'm really impressed and AFAIK, I haven't even fed it any true 4k content.

This got me thinking...

About using a 43" TV for a gaming rig upstairs that needs an upgrade from the current 24" monitor it has. I've been thinking 27" 1440 or 32" 1440 or 4k monitor solution but now I'm thinking of a 43" (biggest TV in a space limited area) Samsung or Vizio TV would offer a better experience than a monitor at a far cheaper price. I have no idea how the gaming tech on this TV works, but I'm assuming it's some sort of freesync/gsync compatible arrangement...

Any thoughts about using a 43" TV as the primary viewal capability for a gaming PC? My primary questions revolve around feeding the TV a 1080 or 1440 signal from a 1080 Ti or aMD 6800 XT and having it upscale to 4k? Is that even possible? Should be, right? It seems to be doing that amazingly well already on movie content, why could that not work for gaming to keep the framerate up? I looked up the VRR tech and it's AMD freesync but understanding is that it should probably work with an nvidia card as well since it's a "new" TV...

 

[CP5670]

You could consider the 48" LG CX if it fits your budget. They have pretty good scaling from lower resolutions, and input lag is comparable to gaming LCDs (6-11ms). I use 1440 in some games that run too slow at 4K. TVs with HDMI 2.1 support VRR, but only on the latest generation of video cards (30x0/6x00). They also all have some slight issues with VRR that people are waiting on firmware updates for.

 

[dr1337]

On somewhat of a whim, I purchased a 50" Vizio M50Q7 (Costco Item #7507001) for $299 Cyber Monday! It's primary purpose is for watching Amazon Prime video content in a master bedroom.

I had no idea how awesome this experience was going to be, especially for the price. So far, I'm blown away by the color, blacks, resolution, and "gaming tech". Especially amazing is that I think the TV is upscaling the feed we get from Amazon Prime, etc, which I think is always at 1080P, yes? Anyway the upscale looks really, really good (to me anyways). I'm really impressed and AFAIK, I haven't even fed it any true 4k content.

This got me thinking...

About using a 43" TV for a gaming rig upstairs that needs an upgrade from the current 24" monitor it has. I've been thinking 27" 1440 or 32" 1440 or 4k monitor solution but now I'm thinking of a 43" (biggest TV in a space limited area) Samsung or Vizio TV would offer a better experience than a monitor at a far cheaper price. I have no idea how the gaming tech on this TV works, but I'm assuming it's some sort of freesync/gsync compatible arrangement...

Any thoughts about using a 43" TV as the primary viewal capability for a gaming PC? My primary questions revolve around feeding the TV a 1080 or 1440 signal from a 1080 Ti or aMD 6800 XT and having it upscale to 4k? Is that even possible? Should be, right? It seems to be doing that amazingly well already on movie content, why could that not work for gaming to keep the framerate up? I looked up the VRR tech and it's AMD freesync but understanding is that it should probably work with an nvidia card as well since it's a "new" TV...

Ive been using a 43" acer predator cg7 4k144hz monitor for a few months now. Not using VRR but also frankly I haven't found any reason I'd need it either.

To answer your primary question, really all you need to do is feed the display native 4k from your computer, and then configure the games you're playing to render at 1080 or 1440. Doing it this way also allows you to take advantage of perfect integer sailing when rendering at 1080. Also tbh idk what games you play but everything that my 580 cant handle Ive had a much better time turning settings down than just rendering at a lower resolution. But YMMV

 

[CP5670]

Integer scaling for 1080 is actually a separate issue, and most monitors/TVs don't do that properly. Newer Nvidia cards have a feature for doing it on the card itself though.

 

[dr1337]

Newer Nvidia cards have a feature for doing it on the card itself though.

afaik so does intel and AMD. You're right that most tvs and monitors don't do it properly, hence why I suggesting rendering at native by default and using the GPU to do all the scaling. Guess my post could have been a little bit more clear 😅

 

[MalVeauX]

I am curious about this too. I'd like to replace our current TV hooked up to our steam box (PC). I get sick of having to scale the screen to match the display (just 1080p) because its annoying to have it like 1840x960 or some weird resolution since 1080p never shows right on any of the TV's I've ever bought and on multiple GPUs. I'd love to find a fairly small TV (37~43") that is 1080p or 4k with good latency and good refresh (I dont need 144hz, 60hz is fine) that actually appropriately displays the full appropriate resolution without weird scaling needed.

Very best,

 

[mnewsham]

I use a 43" 4k monitor (not a TV) and it looks great at my desk with my normal ~3 foot viewing distance. It's only 60hz and no VRR though, but I have a 27" 1440p 144hz with Freesync (G-sync compatibility works fine) for most fast-paced gaming. However because my 43" is a monitor, not a TV, I'm using displayport, not HDMI, and I have no idea how TVs behave differently (if at all).

 

[MalVeauX]

Yea, I can't seem to find enough info. You'd think there would be simple lists out there with how many gamers there are that likely use TV's and not just monitors, with how many console gamers there are that obviously care about 4k since the latest consoles are all 4k.

Basically just looking for a TV that will do 120hz without tearing, 43" give or take in size, good contrast, 4k resolution, that does not require some dumb over/under-scanning with your GPU drivers to not leak over the edge of the display (I've yet to have a single TV, ever, that didn't require this).

Very best,

 

[VirtualLarry]

(I've yet to have a single TV, ever, that didn't require this).

Then you're either:
1) Incredibly un-lucky with your purchases, or
2) You didn't read the TV manual, and/or look up "factory settings mode" for your TV.

Pretty-much every TV that I've ever used as a monitor, and I've used "plenty", had a mechanism to disable the overscanning feature.

Likewise, NV and AMD at various points, add a bit of overscan, and you needed to load their drivers, and set the overscan to zero. (AMD is famous for this, especially with their chipset onboard video.)

If you use Linux, then perhaps you're just SOL, then.

 

[MalVeauX]

Then you're either:
1) Incredibly un-lucky with your purchases, or
2) You didn't read the TV manual, and/or look up "factory settings mode" for your TV.

Pretty-much every TV that I've ever used as a monitor, and I've used "plenty", had a mechanism to disable the overscanning feature.

Likewise, NV and AMD at various points, add a bit of overscan, and you needed to load their drivers, and set the overscan to zero. (AMD is famous for this, especially with their chipset onboard video.)

If you use Linux, then perhaps you're just SOL, then.

Maybe it's both for me then!

Each 1080p and 4k TV I have, no matter the brand, if I plug an HDMI into it it's always putting a larger image that goes off the screen edges and I have to use the GPU driver suite overscan to lower the resolution to scale it to the edges.

But if there's something I missed, I'm happy to learn what better to do to avoid doing that!

Very best,

 

[mnewsham]

Usually, you need to enable PC mode or a similar function. Not only does it generally fix any need to do over/underscan, it also ensures 4:4:4 chroma subsampling instead of 4:2:0

 

[MalVeauX]

Usually, you need to enable PC mode or a similar function. Not only does it generally fix any need to do over/underscan, it also ensures 4:4:4 chroma subsampling instead of 4:2:0

Sounds like I need to read the manual!

Very best,

 

[repoman0]

Basically just looking for a TV that will do 120hz without tearing, 43" give or take in size, good contrast, 4k resolution, that does not require some dumb over/under-scanning with your GPU drivers to not leak over the edge of the display (I've yet to have a single TV, ever, that didn't require this).

You are looking for the LG CX 48”. Pretty sure it’s the only thing that meets these requirements. I use it as a monitor and love it. No overscan wackiness, beautiful HDR mode and accurate in SDR mode, perfect blacks. Downsides are you need a new HDMI 2.1 GPU to actually push 4k 120Hz 10bit at 4:4:4 chroma, and need to treat the panel with some amount of care to avoid burn in. For me that means black desktop background, dark mode where possible, auto hiding task bar, black screensaver after a few minutes. Also it will ruin LCDs for you

 

[MalVeauX]

You are looking for the LG CX 48”. Pretty sure it’s the only thing that meets these requirements. I use it as a monitor and love it. No overscan wackiness, beautiful HDR mode and accurate in SDR mode, perfect blacks. Downsides are you need a new HDMI 2.1 GPU to actually push 4k 120Hz 10bit at 4:4:4 chroma, and need to treat the panel with some amount of care to avoid burn in. For me that means black desktop background, dark mode where possible, auto hiding task bar, black screensaver after a few minutes. Also it will ruin LCDs for you

Thanks, will check it out!

Yea burn in is a pain.

Very best,

 

[repoman0]

Thanks, will check it out!

Yea burn in is a pain.

Very best,

The good news is LG has been improving on it over the years, haven’t heard of anyone with burn in issues on the CX yet. It’s only been out a year but there are plenty of people in the multi thousand hour range. The five year Best Buy geek squad warranty will cover burn in for about 15-20% increase in price .. I personally skipped it. Black desktop background sounds boring but it’s actually cool on the OLEDs because windows just float on a screen that otherwise looks like it is off.

I didn’t want a screen this big but I quickly got used to it and wouldn’t go back. Wanted one of the 38” ultra wides at first but they are the same price as this and have their own serious compromises.

 

[CP5670]

To add to this, you can keep the desktop at a low brightness and turn it up only in games/movies. These TVs have several different modes and the settings for each one can be adjusted independently. They do take a little effort to set up and have some obscure settings you need (like the PC input), but the image quality and overall experience is absolutely worth it.