Which Monitor Should I Get For PC Gaming?

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BrightCandle

Diamond Member
Mar 15, 2007
4,762
0
76
If you don't have the budget you don't have it. Most people on these forums look at comparing the higher end kit and largely don't know about the differences at the budget end of the market. The number of possible models of Monitor is so vast and the differences in performance are also vast unfortunately. Worse than that we can't extrapolate performance very well as its hugely dependent on the manufacturers choices and only somewhat on the technology used. Knowing that its cheap and hence TN tells us a lot about the colour quality and viewing angles but the low pixel switch speed is far from universal on a TN panel. That quality very much depends on the overdrive technology being used and differs panel to panel dramatically, as does the latency and even the colour gamut, contrast, brightness etc. All of these things can differ wildly in quality from one TN monitor to another.

Choosing monitors requires a high quality review, the same company can produce good and bad monitors and only individual models turn out to have the right properties to be worth buying compared to others at the same price point. The problem is that the budget monitors don't get reviewed, because they don't market lead in anything. So while the sites largely assume they are all bad, and they probably are in the measures we use "bad", you can't tell terrible from bad because no one reviews them. All we know is they are TN, 60Hz and you are taking a chance and it could end up being relatively good or atrociously bad for its price.

The other way to look at this is that there isn't a massive difference from the budget to more expensive monitors. Sure there is more contrast, brightness, faster pixels and lower response times but its all well without a certain level of tolerance given a particular technology. That last 20-50% of performance costs you about 200% in the monitor market at least. Colour quality is more like 400%. You could get a terrible monitor by many measures but I suspect you probably wouldn't know it until you saw one of the fancier expensive ones side by side and went "wow mine looks so washed out and lags behind yours". Doesn't mean given the choice we should buy the worse one of course.

There is no easy way to choose a budget monitor, its largely a gamble. But thankfully most people buying them don't notice the problems so if no one that buys them notices does it matter?! So like I said before I wouldn't buy one, because I don't have any reviews for them positively or negatively, so I assume its negative. But even if it was negative it might not be negative enough to warrant not buying it. I like many others here show very little interest in average kit, we look at the top end and the trade offs between what is on offer. I just don't know how to buy a budget monitor well, it might not even be possible.
 

runzwithsizorz

Diamond Member
Jan 24, 2002
3,497
14
76
Built my gaming rig a year ago and bought an Asus TN VH238H for 150.00, Older model, but for gaming just fine for me. Got a lot of good reviews and after tweaking settings, color is fine. Not meant for high end photography or other pro uses, but for games it is fine. I can always upgrade down the road if I want. IMO, I would stay with Asus, Dell...I dont't trust BenQ, but that's just me.

The Wife