1000:1 vs 3000:1??

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theres 2 monitors ive got my eye on. the samsung SM-226BW 22" and the dell E248WFP 24". The dell is about £70 more then the sammy but its a lovely 24"

The dell is 1000:1 and the sammy is 3000:1, and this guy says I shouldnt get the dell cos of the low contrast ratio, These are the best monitors I can stretch to at the moment, and I so want a 24" monitor but I will stick with the sammy if im going to be disspointed with picture qual of the the dell, like my current lcd is 500:1 and it looks fine to me(see sig for monitor spec)... Your thoughts guys?
 
i have the 226bw and it is very good, was hesitant especially as when i bought mine (septemberish?) all that panel malarky was going on, but i think it is top notch, this is for movies,tv,net browsing,word and gaming.
 
its only 3000:1 on its own dynamic profile setting and it looks crap tbh(yes i own a 226bw).
i know nothing of that dell but what is more important is the type of panel and response times on the dell....the sammy is good but the dell could well be a lot better.

*edit* just had a quick look at the dell...didnt find out what screen type it was but it states a 5ms response time which is good enough...i would go for the dell...unless there are known problems with that particular problem anyone ?

besides the 226bw has that whole panel lottery thing
 
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Hi there

Contrast ratio's on monitors should not be taken too seriously. The reality of things is none of them are over 1000:1, the ones stating higher are dynamic contrast ratio.

Put it this way the 26" Hazro is 800:1 and next to it I have a 3000:1 Samsung 223BW and the Hazro has far far better and natural colours which the Samsung just can't match.
 
Thanks guys, I think gibbo post has just made my mind up, Dell here we come..lol. 1 last question how do games look at 1680x1050 on a 24"? Cos Im guessing I will be runing a lot of games in this res for maximum smoothness.
 
Hi there

Contrast ratio's on monitors should not be taken too seriously. The reality of things is none of them are over 1000:1, the ones stating higher are dynamic contrast ratio.

Put it this way the 26" Hazro is 800:1 and next to it I have a 3000:1 Samsung 223BW and the Hazro has far far better and natural colours which the Samsung just can't match.

I got sucked in by a higher contrast ratio, bought an LG with 3000:1 and am pretty disappointed tbh. Its fine for games, video and images but for text its not too good, it appears a bit blurry and hard to read at times. I'm thinking of trying to send it back and getting an Acer AL2016WB or a Dell of some kind, what do you reckon?
 
fairly sweeping statement there?! :)
Hehe, yeah I can name a Samsung with 60+ ms lag (244T) and a Dell with under 16 ms lag (2007WFP, or probably any of their TNs), so clearly you can't generalize to manufacturers. You can't even generalize to panel types and be sure to be accurate, although generally speaking you don't get TNs with excessive lag. That's about the only generalization I'd be happy to make.
 
I got sucked in by a higher contrast ratio, bought an LG with 3000:1 and am pretty disappointed tbh. Its fine for games, video and images but for text its not too good, it appears a bit blurry and hard to read at times. I'm thinking of trying to send it back and getting an Acer AL2016WB or a Dell of some kind, what do you reckon?

Hi there

Well I would never recommend an ACER sorry, yes we sell them but I won't recommend them. They are generally the cheapest because they are cheap, they are designed to hit price points.

DELL are always very good, the LG I am surprised about been blurry, you running it at a none native res?

If you go for a monitor with PVA, S-IPS they generally give all round best image quality and most natural colours.

TN panels are preferred sometimes by hardcore FPS gamers for 2ms response times and generally lower input lag times, but for most gamers S-IPS/PVA is still better, put it this way I far preferring playing games on my 30" DELL rather than a 22" Samsung as I far preferre image quality and higher resolution even though I generally run the DELL at 1920x1200 which is none native but it handles it fine.
 
Hehe, yeah I can name a Samsung with 60+ ms lag (244T) and a Dell with under 16 ms lag (2007WFP, or probably any of their TNs), so clearly you can't generalize to manufacturers. You can't even generalize to panel types and be sure to be accurate, although generally speaking you don't get TNs with excessive lag. That's about the only generalization I'd be happy to make.

yep, thats about as general as you can get with input lag really. Assume the Dell vs Samsung statement was perhaps a 2408WFP vs SM245B reference or something
 
Hi there

Well I would never recommend an ACER sorry, yes we sell them but I won't recommend them. They are generally the cheapest because they are cheap, they are designed to hit price points.

DELL are always very good, the LG I am surprised about been blurry, you running it at a none native res?

If you go for a monitor with PVA, S-IPS they generally give all round best image quality and most natural colours.

TN panels are preferred sometimes by hardcore FPS gamers for 2ms response times and generally lower input lag times, but for most gamers S-IPS/PVA is still better, put it this way I far preferring playing games on my 30" DELL rather than a 22" Samsung as I far preferre image quality and higher resolution even though I generally run the DELL at 1920x1200 which is none native but it handles it fine.

Can you go any lower res then 1920x1200 on your 30" or do games start to look rubbish,, cos at some point Id love to get a 30", but I would be have to upgrade my system a lot more often to keep games runng at 1920x1200.

Its a bit like buying a big car and cant afford to run it, Im guessing
 
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Hi there

Well I would never recommend an ACER sorry, yes we sell them but I won't recommend them. They are generally the cheapest because they are cheap, they are designed to hit price points.

DELL are always very good, the LG I am surprised about been blurry, you running it at a none native res?

If you go for a monitor with PVA, S-IPS they generally give all round best image quality and most natural colours.

TN panels are preferred sometimes by hardcore FPS gamers for 2ms response times and generally lower input lag times, but for most gamers S-IPS/PVA is still better, put it this way I far preferring playing games on my 30" DELL rather than a 22" Samsung as I far preferre image quality and higher resolution even though I generally run the DELL at 1920x1200 which is none native but it handles it fine.

I have the computer's display settings set at 1680x1050 which is apparently what the monitor also runs at, I'm sure when I turn it on with PC running into it, it says 1680x1050 briefly in the corner so I assume the monitor is set correctly as well?

With dells, do you think the extra cash for the "Ultrasharp" series is worth it or would I be fine with something like this? Might go up to 22" but I quite like 20" at the minute

Sorry for the kinda hijack :o
 
I got sucked in by a higher contrast ratio, bought an LG with 3000:1 and am pretty disappointed tbh. Its fine for games, video and images but for text its not too good, it appears a bit blurry and hard to read at times. I'm thinking of trying to send it back and getting an Acer AL2016WB or a Dell of some kind, what do you reckon?

Is it the text within Internet Explorer? You may have cleartype switched on, i know I had a similar situation and then switched off cleartype and the text was a lot sharper and clearer, YMMV :)
 
Is it the text within Internet Explorer? You may have cleartype switched on, i know I had a similar situation and then switched off cleartype and the text was a lot sharper and clearer, YMMV :)

Its within firefox, IE and other documents. I tried cleartype on and off, its still not as nice to read text on as my dell laptops monitor :mad: Think I'm about ready to ditch the LG allready tbh :\

edit - although the dells text is clearer and easier to read, its colours are pretty dull and greyish, whereas on the LG they're really vibrant and stand out nicely.. I really dont know what to do!
 
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Its within firefox, IE and other documents. I tried cleartype on and off, its still not as nice to read text on as my dell laptops monitor :mad: Think I'm about ready to ditch the LG allready tbh :\

edit - although the dells text is clearer and easier to read, its colours are pretty dull and greyish, whereas on the LG they're really vibrant and stand out nicely.. I really dont know what to do!

Hi there

Have you tried adjusting the monitor setting as its just the LG is a TN based panel just like all 22" panels and they normally display text fine. Try switching off features such as dynamic contrast or just turn off any features your unsure off and set the brightness/contrast lower and see if any of that helps.

You could always RMA the LG direct with LG, tell them your not happy with the image quality, explain text is blurry as you never know it could be a fault on the screen, though admittedly a rather strange one.
 
Hi there

Have you tried adjusting the monitor setting as its just the LG is a TN based panel just like all 22" panels and they normally display text fine. Try switching off features such as dynamic contrast or just turn off any features your unsure off and set the brightness/contrast lower and see if any of that helps.

You could always RMA the LG direct with LG, tell them your not happy with the image quality, explain text is blurry as you never know it could be a fault on the screen, though admittedly a rather strange one.

Yeah, I emailed LG and they said to check in the graphics cards properties/view all modes to see if it supports the resolution I'm trying to use. It's a Leadtek 8800GT 512mb and I'm trying to use 1680x1050 resolution.

Cant do that right now as I'm away from the pc until friday but does Vista even have a "view all modes" thing in the graphics card properties? I dont remember seeing it when I was having a look around.
 
Yeah, I emailed LG and they said to check in the graphics cards properties/view all modes to see if it supports the resolution I'm trying to use. It's a Leadtek 8800GT 512mb and I'm trying to use 1680x1050 resolution.

Cant do that right now as I'm away from the pc until friday but does Vista even have a "view all modes" thing in the graphics card properties? I dont remember seeing it when I was having a look around.

Hi there

As long as your running at 1680x1050 then that is correct, just make sure its set too 60Hz as well.

As daft as it might sound try downloading latest version of the NVIDIA drivers. Make sure you uninstall the old ones first and then re-install the new ones.
 
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