newb (me) buys an LCD monitor, needs help

[the other mike]

long time reader, first time poster.
here goes:

just bought a spectre x20 naga III from costco ($319 after coupon and rebates). have just plugged it in and played the star wars "new hope" dvd. i've noticed a few things:

1- picture quality is great. no dead pixels. picture is a liiittle too bright for my tastes but i'm reasonably sure i can tweak that.

2- there's a very faint "x" that i've been reading about in other posts. its obvious only when i'm viewing movies, in the black area of the letterbox. the arms of the "x" don't go all the way to the middle, however. they sort of fade further in.

3- when i move the mouse, the arrow is kinda slow to react or rather its not moving as smooth as it did in my old CRT. is this the "ghosting" i've been reading about?

4- in the SW:ANH i played, the movement is not as smooth as in a normal tv. there have been faint "stutters" or "juddering".

question:
should i bring it back to costco? or is there a way to work out the problem?
i appreciate any and all help.



-mike

ps- BTW:
my system is a 2.3Gig dell, 512 Ram with a radeon x300... if that helps.

 

[the other mike]

sh!t. sorry for the double post. i know ! i know! f***ing newb.

 

[xtknight]

1. That should be fixable.

2. Lowering the brightness will both help the X and make the image less bright for you, so I recommend doing that.

3. Do you mean there's an afterglow? Moving your mouse just one pixel will show the needed pixel transition time (up to ~60 ms for the type of panel your LCD is using). Certain colors will really exacerbate the afterglow on that type of panel, but this is quite rare as the effect will only be about ~20 ms or less in 90% of situations. (If you move your mouse on a certain (usually subtle/dark) color, it will be slower than on another color. Most actual transitions like video don't exhibit such a slow response time in 90% of situations though.) Sorry, I'm not sure if that's clear or not.

4. Not sure about that one. Do you have VSync on?

 

[the other mike]

1 and 2 thanks! i'll try to fix that

3- no, its not an afterglow. in animation terms, its like the movement (of the arrow) is missing every other frame. i shusser to think how things will be like once i play a video game. ( the monitor is meant to serve both a pc and xbox 360... assuming i can GET one.)

4- whats vsync?

 

[xtknight]

3. Well, what vertical refresh rate are you running at? 60 Hz? 75 Hz? I recommend running 75 Hz if possible. Does the mouse only appear to be skipping frames when you move it extremely slowly (1 pixel at a time) or is it blatantly obvious no matter how fast you move it? Does the mouse cursor seem to move differently when you move it over different colors on the screen or is it still obvious?

4. Vertical synchronization. Without it, graphics can appear chopped up.

 

[the other mike]

3- if i understand you correctly, i'm running it at 60 Hz - 65 Hz... but that's the optimal setting (according to the manual). the cursor is fine when i move it very very slowly. its normal speed thats skipping. its bad no matter where on the screen i move it dosen't matter what color. don't know how to change the vertical refresh rate. tried the properties->settings-etc. menu it seems its set to 60 only, tho.

4- how do i change the vsync?

 

[the other mike]

bump

 

[xtknight]

3. My guess is that your screen is defective. I don't think you can go to 75 Hz on your monitor actually but 60 Hz shouldn't really induce that problem.
4. Should be under the 3D section in ATI Catalyst Control Center. It may be called Sync to vertical or something. If it has sync and vertical in it, it's the correct one.

 

[Caecus Veritas]

3. what resolution did you run on your old crt? could it be that your monitor's native resoution might be too high for your current video card (thereby causing the "slow" movement on your mouse)?

 

[the other mike]

xknight:
3- that's what i'm beggining to suspect. in any case, i'm seriously thinking of switching to the 2005fpw and save myself from having to buy a kvm switch. (the monitor's for my pc and future xbox 360 to share. i probably won't be able to run both at the same time, but that's ok)

4- yeah i did that. seems there is a vsynch control for both "openGL" and "direct 3D". tweaked both. now the cursor is less jumpy (but still not as smooth) and both it and the dvd video look as if its working at a slower frame rate.

caecus veritas:
the res on my old crt was 1280x1024. the new lcd runs 1680x1050. but i don't think my card's the problem 'cause my dell's compatible with the 2005fpw and the 2005fpw's not too far away from the scepter... my card's a radeon x300 128bit, BTW.

wether i can make it work or not, i wanna thank you guys again for the help.

 

[the other mike]

did another video test. i put in "the incredibles" and noticed some constant tearing issues. could this be the "stuttering/jerking" problem i had before tweaking the v-synch?
jeez. not knowing the proper tech lingo is hampering how i describe the problem....

EDIT: i finally see what you mean about the speed of the cursor being diffrent in light areas and dark areas. iits moving choppy to begin with and moving over dark areas seems to magnify the problem.

 

[Caecus Veritas]

vsync is actually what helps to prevent tearing, so by turning it off i think you may have introduced the tearing issues.

also, the refresh rate really is only for crt's and the 60mhz is sorta non-relevant on lcd's. this should not affect your mouse movement.

the reason why i mentioned the resolution is because i've experienced similar 'lagging' and 'slow' feel to the mouse when the video card was underpowered for a particular resolution. have you tried setting your monitor to a lower resolution (at a 1:1 ratio)?

was gonna write some more stuff, but gotta take off. hope you solve your problem ^^

 

[Demoth]

The Naga III has a known tearing issue that can be fixed by contacting Sceptre as they need to update the firmware. Check the Newegg reviews on that model for pretty detailed info.

 

[the other mike]

actually i turned up the v-synch. all it did was make the dvd movie look like it was running at a slower rate. similar problem but slightly diffrent look. i downloaded the driver and i'm gonna see if that works.

 

[the other mike]

decided to return the sceptre. GREAT deal and great picture but i'm just not tech savvy enough to diagnose and fix my problems. i WILL still buy a damn LCD, tho. can't go back now after that first taste...
thanks for the assist, guys.
i shall return...