monitors; Max Resolution:1600 x 1200 @ 76Hz

[acidvoodoo]

am i right in thinking that with this 172 monitor i am getting, i'll be able to play games at 1600 x 1200, but only at a fps of 76?

hope not lol

 

[Mavrick007]

That's not entirely true. Increasing the fps of your games depends on several factors, your video card, cpu, and monitor refresh rate come to mind. If you have a higher refresh rate that works with your monitor, it will let you get a bit more fps out of your games, but if your video card or cpu aren't powerful enough, you will not be getting that high fps anyway. Some cards now are even getting close to 300fps in games like quake at 1024x768 and I don't know anyone with a monitor that will do 300Hz refresh at any resolution.

It does have an effect if you can raise the hz on your refresh, but it's not the only thing that will make the fps go higher in your games. Higher refreshes will help with the flicker in high speed games. 76Hz is a pretty low standard for 1600x1200 monitors, look for something that will do 85Hz at that resolution and you should be laughing as long as your vid card is powerful enough.

 

[dullard]

There are three refresh rates that are important:

1) The rate that your game calculates. This depends on your CPU and video card. Sure some games can be calculated at 300 fps (but no monitor can display that fast and your eyes cannot see that fast). If this number drops significantly then the game feels jumpy.
2) The rate at which your monitor shows a full image.
3) The rate that your eyes can see. Obviously an image at 10 frames/second will be seen to flash on/off. And obviously we cannot see 1 million frames per second. In reality the human eye has a burst speed (maximum for a single, temporary image) of about 1/200 sec. If one image is displayed for less than 1/200 sec we cannot see it. However when seeing multiple images, we cannot distinguish them at a rate that fast - our eyes blur the images together. The rate that we can distinguish separate images is much closer to 50 fps. Flourescent lights turn on and off in America at 60 fps - if you can physically see all flourescent lights turn on/off then your eyes are better than most and can see a bit over 60 fps.

Now for the important conclusions.
A) If your monitor refreshes slower than your eyes can see, then you will get a headache. A refresh rate of 60 is fine for the vast majority of people. However the higher the number the less chance that you will get a headache.
B) Game refresh rates determine whether the game appears laggy. This has nothing to do with your monitor rate or your eye rates. A game refreshing at 50 fps will feel drastically different than a game at 100 fps. This is true even though your monitor cannot display at 100 fps and even though your eyes cannot see at 100 fps. A new game and new monitor with great refresh rate on a 5 year old computer with integrated video will be jumpy - even though you have a fast monitor refresh rate. A new game with a great video card on an old monitor with terrible refresh rate will play just fine - as long as you don't get a headache from the low refresh rates.
C) 76 Hz is plenty for me and for most people. The standard is now 85 Hz to avoid any possibility of headaches, but this is way above what is usually necessary.
D) Can you please tell me one current game with a current video card that plays at 1600x1200 with more than 76 fps?

 

[acidvoodoo]

i think i put my question wrong, sorry i'm new to this, just cause i saw some say on here that the monitior refresh rate equalles what the max fps u will get in games is. i will be using a radeon 8500 and athlon xp 1800 with this monitor, but anyway, i don't want to bring that into it,

heres the monitor specs

Modeliamond Pro 740
Screen Size:17" (16" viewable image)
Tube Typeiamondtron Aperture Grille
Dot Pitch:0.25mm
Rec Resolution:1024 x 768 @ 85Hz
Max Resolution:1600 x 1200 @ 76Hz
TCO Compliancy: TCO99

can i play half life or something at 1600x1200 at over 76fps, imagine i had a quad xeon P4 and g4ti or something, will the monitor let it?
to put it another way, if someone is playing quake 3 at 300 fps, is there monitor displaying 300 fps?

dam this is hard it's really confusing

 

[dullard]

<< to put it another way, if someone is playing quake 3 at 300 fps, is there monitor displaying 300 fps?

dam this is hard it's really confusing >>



It is confusing since people mix up the three types of refresh rates. No monitor displays quake at 300 fps. It just isn't possible with the current technology. Those people have the CPU and video card calculate 300 fps. However their monitor doesn't display all 300 of those frames. If you had a monitor set at 100 fps, then the monitor will display every third image. If you had a monitor set at 76 fps, then the monitor would display every fourth image. Since our eyes cannot see that well, there is no difference.

There is an option to have your monitor to not be in sync. That means that your monitor will display only a portion of each image. For example if a game was at 152 fps and if your monitor was set at 76 fps, then the top of the monitor will display every odd numbered image and the bottom of the monitor will display every even numbered image. I don't know what you gain with this though.

 

[Mavrick007]

I don't think you would want to play any game at 1600x1200 on a 17" monitor anyway. I have a 19" monitor and I don't play many games above 1024x768. If you can play at 1280x1024 on that 17", then it should be a very nice test as well cause that's about the max that I would use even on my 19".

It's true about what Dullard said though, the theory behind it is a bit ambiguous cause you see all these benchmarks with high fps and you think you are seeing them cause the game is so much smoother or faster looking, but it really is neglegible after you reach certain fps, like 100 for instance. Your monitor is only going to show you 1 out of every so many images and it's going to be so fast that it won't matter.

Hehe And I don't think you could even play half-life at 1600x1200 and get a very high fps anyhow, even with the fastest Radeon/GF4 card. If you can get above 60 in any of the present games at that res, I would be surprised too.

This reminds me when I tried to play Wing Commander on my old 486. The thing was so darn fast that I couldn't even play it. How fast do you want your game to play anyhow? j/k