I finally made the jump from CRT to LCD

[liquid51]

It's probably been 4 years that I've been researching lcd's, biding my time for the right LCD and waiting for the finances to line up, putting up with 1024x768 the whole time. After reading about and seeing and testing a number of different LCDs, I thought that the time was finally right. So I took the dive on the westy through that great deal at costco.

You want to know what makes me the happiest about my purchase from costco? I can return it to a local store and they'll refund everything, even shipping. Yeah, I absolutely hate it. The features were awesome, the resolution and sheer size great, but I can't get over the slow response of LCDs. They're was no 'ghosting' to speak of, but every single thing moving is plagued by the worst motion blur. I tried to get used to it, but eventually hooked up my cruddy old viewsonic 17" (the one that hurts my eyes to look at in 1280x1024 because text is so blurry) to do a little comparison. There's no contest. That monitor is a piece of crap, but I'd use it for gaming and everything else in a heartbeat over any LCD.

I did a side by side comparison with some other LCDs (2405 and a reletively fast 5ms benq), and the westy competes very well, it's just that I'm not ready for the LCD market I guess.

Anyway, if there's some hidden setting that someone needs to tell me about, one that would help correct the motion blur, I'd be willing to try it. Otherwise, my anal self is sticking to the old crt technology for a long while yet to come. GDM-FW900 here I come...

 

[Matt2]

Sorry to hear that man.

My experience with LCDs has been the complete opposite. I had a nice 19" CRT (Sony Trinitron) and I loved it for a long time. I didnt think LCDs were that great either, but when I finally got one I was blown away.

I've never noticed any motion blur or ghosting, but maybe since I've used a LCD for so long I can't remember.

What amazes me is that the CRT monitor that I thought looked so good makes my eyes hurt and I get a headache if i stare at it for more than 5 minutes, even with 85hz+ refresh rate.

 

[liquid51]

Yeah, guess I should've mentioned that this definitely isn't a trash on LCDs. For the user that can appreciate them, I'm sure the right monitor is fantastic. I'm just one of those few that can't do it yet . My 'review' if you could call it that, is purely subjective. I wish I wasn't so anal, because I'd be writing the exact opposite right now and I'd be keeping one of the nicest setups available .

Thats the thing that sucks so bad about this; the monitor is so nice, and I know that. It's kind of like vicodin: it's so incredibly nice to have for those who need it, people in a lot of pain. I wanted somthing like that so bad after my surgeries, but I couldn't use it. Vicodin and codeine (all the hydrocodones) constipate me to no end

 

[liquid51]

Oh, I guess it helps to know that I don't get headaches from CRTs. Even my blurry 17" @ 60hz doesn't bother me.

 

[coloumb]

I may have something to do with the refresh rate difference between the lcd [which are usually at 60] and your monitor [this is probably set to 85 or higher?]. Plus you're literally doubling the amount of screen space [assuming it's a 37" LCD?] - you're definitely going to see some ghosting with that size of an lcd monitor. [that's the main reason why I haven't upgraded my Sona Wega TV to an LCD as well - I can see ghosting on those monitors...]

I notice the same thing on my 19" LCD [which has 5ms response time] - I can see a small amount of ghosting - but nothing as noticeable as you mention. Every now and then - I just can't play any games due to the "ghosting" issue - I literally get a migrane and have to take a break for a day or 2 [mainly happens from fps games].

If CRT's would run cooler, I'd go back to one in a heartbeat...

Oh..and found this by searching on google: "lcd headaches"

LCD Display Discomfort

 

[liquid51]

Y'know, I think I did notice a bit of discomfort while playing wow. It's when I'm running around another player in some pvp fight (or whenever my target is moving on screen, reletive to my movement. so basically, all the time) and my eyes are tracking my target. It was difficult to follow, and seemed like my eyes were continually trying to focus. The smaller LCDs were not so bad, but still plenty enough to be a deterrent for me.

 

[TanisHalfElven]

Originally posted by: liquid51
It's probably been 4 years that I've been researching lcd's, biding my time for the right LCD and waiting for the finances to line up, putting up with 1024x768 the whole time. After reading about and seeing and testing a number of different LCDs, I thought that the time was finally right. So I took the dive on the westy through that great deal at costco.

You want to know what makes me the happiest about my purchase from costco? I can return it to a local store and they'll refund everything, even shipping. Yeah, I absolutely hate it. The features were awesome, the resolution and sheer size great, but I can't get over the slow response of LCDs. They're was no 'ghosting' to speak of, but every single thing moving is plagued by the worst motion blur. I tried to get used to it, but eventually hooked up my cruddy old viewsonic 17" (the one that hurts my eyes to look at in 1280x1024 because text is so blurry) to do a little comparison. There's no contest. That monitor is a piece of crap, but I'd use it for gaming and everything else in a heartbeat over any LCD.

I did a side by side comparison with some other LCDs (2405 and a reletively fast 5ms benq), and the westy competes very well, it's just that I'm not ready for the LCD market I guess.

Anyway, if there's some hidden setting that someone needs to tell me about, one that would help correct the motion blur, I'd be willing to try it. Otherwise, my anal self is sticking to the old crt technology for a long while yet to come. GDM-FW900 here I come...

honestly its your own fault. your tryingto use a TV for a monitor. the question is how far were you from the screen. the 37" westy has the pixel concentration of using a 800x600 resolution on a 19" lcd (that 19" viewable). and your compareing its text sharpness to a 15" vewiable screen at 1280x1028.

look like your research wasn't very good.

you wanna use a lcd. buy a 20" widescreen for a 17" or a 24"

 

[deadseasquirrel]

I dunno. Something must be wrong. I see no motion blur on my Westy at all. And I've been testing it thoroughly since it was just delivered less than a week ago.

And I'm no LCD fan, believe me. I've got a perfectly good Mitsubishi 2070sb 22" CRT sitting right here. I held off from buying an LCD for years for several reasons, with most relating to resolution and size. I wanted something around 24", but my wife couldn't handle the small text of 19x12 desktop resolution. This Westy fixes that for me since she has no trouble at all reading text from 3 feet away now. And the resolution, although high, is still a little less strenuous than 19x12 on a 24".

And the price couldn't be beat. A 24" widescreen that my wife hated wasn't that much cheaper.

So far, every game I've thrown at it looks gorgeous, though my GPU does choke a little.

How did you hook yours up? via DVI? VGA? are you sure it was running native 1920x1080 @ 60hz?

 

[liquid51]

Looks like someone's pretty defensive about the subject...

My first post (hey, look at that, the one you quoted) mentioned that I did side-by-side comparisons. The westy, a dell 24", a benq 17" (5ms response), a benq 20.1", and my old 17" viewsonic crt. There was no contest. The crt won, hands down (read: my opinion).

I also never mentioned anything about text clarity, other than the fact that my old crt is blurry at 1280x1024. And you know what? I STILL like it more. Not even going into screen size vs. resolution vs. viewing distance. That's a no brainer.

Finally, I've seen a 17" lcd. I've seen a 20.1" lcd. I've seen a 24" lcd. I've seen a 37" lcd. And I compared them all to an old, beat down 17" crt. My thoughts after I did my research (which has been ongoing for the last 4 years and I still deem adequate): I don't want to use an lcd.

 

[liquid51]

Originally posted by: deadseasquirrel
I dunno. Something must be wrong. I see no motion blur on my Westy at all. And I've been testing it thoroughly since it was just delivered less than a week ago.

And I'm no LCD fan, believe me. I've got a perfectly good Mitsubishi 2070sb 22" CRT sitting right here. I held off from buying an LCD for years for several reasons, with most relating to resolution and size. I wanted something around 24", but my wife couldn't handle the small text of 19x12 desktop resolution. This Westy fixes that for me since she has no trouble at all reading text from 3 feet away now. And the resolution, although high, is still a little less strenuous than 19x12 on a 24".

And the price couldn't be beat. A 24" widescreen that my wife hated wasn't that much cheaper.

So far, every game I've thrown at it looks gorgeous, though my GPU does choke a little.

How did you hook yours up? via DVI? VGA? are you sure it was running native 1920x1080 @ 60hz?

It's connected via DVI. 19x10 @ 60hz. The motion blur I see is definitely noticable to me on every lcd I've ever seen (when compared to a crt), even on different machines. It's very noticable if theres text movement, such as wow. Names floating above every player become nearly illegible when moving across the screen. Compared to the crt, in which text remains as sharp as it was when it was still. I also see it on every moving object visible. It loses it's crispness, almost looking like it loses focus, while moving.

Remember, I am definitely claiming myself as extremely anal, so don't read into everything I say as me trying to convice others why lcds are no good. To me though, a crt is currently as close to visual perfection as I can reach, so I'll stick to them... for now.

Btw, that last post wasn't directed toward you deadseasquirell.

 

[liquid51]

Here's a good quote from the LCD thread sticky in this forum that pretty much sums me up:



"5. "Ghosting"
----------------------------------------------
Maybe you've looked at LCDs before, and find the colors great, the viewing angles good, but one thing you are especially worried about with your future purchase is the response time. There's a fundamental problem in explaining how good or bad the level of ghosting is. This may be the only way I can relate it to you: if you've ever used an aperture grille CRT and seen its faint lines but still love it regardless, the same thing will probably happen to you with response time.

Obviously the first week you get it, that's the first thing you're going to look for, because for most gamers it's the obvious disadvantage. So you bring your LCD home, plug it in and play some Battlefield 2 on it, then turn around a bit, and you can see some smearing. At that point, you're probably already thinking of returning it and thinking you'll never be able to live with it. In reality, once you take your focus off scrutinizing the ghosting and start playing your game, you will find it to be an extremely small obstruction, if it is any problem at all. In the end, that's all that matters. It's also worth noting some people may not even be able to see it if they look for it. Unless you have a panel with an atrocious response time like 25 ms. (min), then it will be a minor issue. That said there are some people who may be especially sensitive to it."


I guess I'm especially sensitive.

 

[forbin]

make sure your video card output is set to 1080p, NOT 1080i, which mine defaulted to upon hooking up to computer via DVI.

 

[liquid51]

Thanks for the tip forbin. I double checked it, but I am running in 1080p.

I think you all should just chalk it up as liquid51 being freaky sensitive and overly anal

 

[Mem]

I also never mentioned anything about text clarity, other than the fact that my old crt is blurry at 1280x1024. And you know what? I STILL like it more. Not even going into screen size vs. resolution vs. viewing distance. That's a no brainer.

Finally, I've seen a 17" lcd. I've seen a 20.1" lcd. I've seen a 24" lcd. I've seen a 37" lcd. And I compared them all to an old, beat down 17" crt. My thoughts after I did my research (which has been ongoing for the last 4 years and I still deem adequate): I don't want to use an lcd.

You must need new pair of eyes then,personally I'll never go back to my samsung 20" CRT,my 8 bit 20" widescreen LCD is far superior,text sharpness,graphics crispness,superior geometry leaves any CRT far behind.

Now we get to blurring,ghosting etc..personally this will always be subjective and vary between person and also the LCD they use,I find gaming on my LCD to be fine and I do a lot of online gaming in FPS etc like TFC ,CS,DoD,UT2004 etc...could I go back to CRT?...very doubtful, the Pros of LCD far outweigh any Cons ,so no brainer for me that my LCD is more enjoyable in gaming and for general use.

Anytime I see a new CRT or even old one I think how blurry and dark they look compared to crispness of LCDs,also the flicker of CRTs is another problem even at 85hz,LCDs on the other hand don't have these problems.

One last thing all CRTS will lose focus over time,LCDs don't suffer this problem so at least my eyes thank me .

 

[Valour]

I hear you, Liquid51. I'm in the same boat, with the exception that I didn't take the plunge yet. I spent a small fortune on my current monitor a few years ago (22" NEC MultiSync FP2141SB), just because I couldn't find an LCD that could do the job nearly as good as a CRT. I was hoping that time would fix the issue (which I think it probably has greatly since then), but it still just isn't an attractive proposition for me. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on the eye of the beholder), I too am extremely anal on things like what you describe. I wish I could pay to have that "feature" removed from my brain, because life would be a lot easier.

I was hoping that shooting for a lower resolution (maybe 1280x1024) on a smaller LCD with fast response time would do the trick for me. I'm odd I guess, because I actually like that resolution, and it doesn't beat the crap out of my GPU (spotty FPS kicks in the whole anal problem again [that didn't sound right! ].

Anyway, thanks for posting your opinion and thoughts on this issue. I'm toying with an upgrade right now, so the timing is good. Of course, with my luck, I'll get the perfect LCD, but it will have a dead pixel to drive me insane. :laugh:

 

[ArchAngel777]

To each their own, I just have a hard time believing anyone could come to that conclusion. I don't think anyone is offended by you not liking the westy, I just think they can't comprehend how someone cannot like it. I can't comprehend it either, but I respect your opinion and preference on the matter

 

[gramboh]

I switched from a low-end 19in CRT (Samsung 997MB, $260CDN) to a Dell 2407WFP in March. I agree with liquid about the motion blur of LCDs. I see it in the exact same way he describes it, in both FPS and RPG type games (things get out of focus during quick movement).

For me, even though the motion blur issue was annoying, I wasn't going to game on my old CRT at 1280x1024 (or 1600x1200 as it was too blurry on my low end CRT) or deal with trying to find a good high-end CRT so I just sucked it up and am now used to it. I still notice it sometimes, but I am nearly up to my old skill level in FPS (CS/CS:Source/DOD 1.3/Q3). It has actually taken months to get used to it, but now I am happy.

For desktop usage/media viewing, it is superior no question. Overall, I'd probably prefer a Sony FW900 24in CRT but I didn't want to deal with trying to find a good one, getting a stronger desk and dealing with the damn heat output of those monsters.

 

[liquid51]

Well, I'll be going to check out several fw900s tomorrow. There's a woman locally selling a mess load of them. $230-280 for the gdm-fw900 and $175 for the HP branded models. She's going to have them hooked up too so I can pick the one (or ones ) I like.

I'll post back if I pick one up and tell you what I think.

 

[HopJokey]

Originally posted by: liquid51
Well, I'll be going to check out several fw900s tomorrow. There's a woman locally selling a mess load of them. $230-280 for the gdm-fw900 and $175 for the HP branded models. She's going to have them hooked up too so I can pick the one (or ones ) I like.

I'll post back if I pick one up and tell you what I think.

Heh liquid, I think you are gonna probably going to have to stick to CRTs until the next big thing after LCDs comes along in display technology (SED, OLED, etc.).

 

[soybeast]

How about flat crt? Anybody remember when those were supposed to be the next big thing...guess not

 

[liquid51]

Originally posted by: HopJokey

Originally posted by: liquid51
Well, I'll be going to check out several fw900s tomorrow. There's a woman locally selling a mess load of them. $230-280 for the gdm-fw900 and $175 for the HP branded models. She's going to have them hooked up too so I can pick the one (or ones ) I like.

I'll post back if I pick one up and tell you what I think.

Heh liquid, I think you are gonna probably going to have to stick to CRTs until the next big thing after LCDs comes along in display technology (SED, OLED, etc.).

Yeah, I'm thinking that you're absolutely right

 

[Acanthus]

I highly reccomend testing a 5ms panel on display at bestbuy or a similar place.

Lower response times really help.

25ms bothers me, i currently own 2 20" Acer 5ms widescreens that are fantastic. (and only $200 a pop)

 

[Creig]

Originally posted by: liquid51
Well, I'll be going to check out several fw900s tomorrow. There's a woman locally selling a mess load of them. $230-280 for the gdm-fw900 and $175 for the HP branded models. She's going to have them hooked up too so I can pick the one (or ones ) I like.

I'll post back if I pick one up and tell you what I think.

After you pick out the ones you like, you might want to check the manufactured date of each unit. Obviously it won't tell you which ones has had the greatest useage, but I would grab the newest one out of the "good" ones.

Oh, and I would also bring along a USB drive with a variety of monitor test programs. One I've used before is the Nokia test. I'm sure there are other similiar programs out there for download.

Just make sure you let each monitor warm up for at least 10 minutes before testing. These things take a few minutes before achieving their optimum display. Some people recommend up to 30 minutes, but I think you have to take ambient temperature into account. They may have had theirs in cooler rooms than most people.

If you prefer your current CRT to LCDs, there's no way you'll EVER consider one once you own an FW900/A7217A.


They're THAT nice.

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: Creig
Just make sure you let each monitor warm up for at least 10 minutes before testing...

Actually, you're not supposed to 'adjust' LCD monitors for at least 20 minutes. I could prove this, but just take my word for it... please!

Why? They get brighter n' brighter for the first 10-20 minutes after you turn them on! Has to do with the flourescent backlight characteristics. Compact fluorescent bulbs, around your house, will do the same thing, yada, yada... depending on ambient temps like the previous poster said.

Without turning this into a diatribe... LCDs are Uber sensitive to adjustments... unlike CRTs!

I think this guys problem with ghosting/smearing is a matter of IMPROPER adjustment.

I had the same problem when I bought my FIRST LCD monitor... text looked like a series of little black dots instead of letters... took me a week to figure it out.

Bottom line: I turned the 'Brightness' down to 13% (not =<12% or =>14%) and I've lived happily ever after!

 

[ForumMaster]

well i've never used that LCD but my 17" crappy cheap LCD is much better then my old LCD. and if you spend a little more and get a good LCD, it will beat any CRT without a sweat.