4K - It's time

agnes

agnes

agnes

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My trusty 50" plasma is on it's last legs, I've been hovering over the 4K land for a while, wondering, questioning, wishing... It's time :(

I don't want to let my plasma go, it's just so pretty!!!! But, alas! 1080p has been fun and glorious. But it's time to move on.

So, price being no factor. I have some questions:

1) I don't want to go SLI with my 980 ti. Whilst I know it CAN handle the full 4k res, I know it won't be great. Can you scale down the res to a lower resolution on a 4K monitor/TV? Or is it 4K or go away sort of stuff?

2) PC monitors, same as above, at the moment, I'm on a 24" 1080p. Now, the way my home cinema setup is, I can't upgrade one or the other. It HAS to be both, hence the hold on to my 1080p plasma for so long. Are they any good at the moment? What's the general size of a 4K monitor?

3) Those that have made the jump, is it worth it? Or should I try and hold onto my loved plasma for another year or 2?
 
agnes said:
My trusty 50" plasma is on it's last legs, I've been hovering over the 4K land for a while, wondering, questioning, wishing... It's time :(

I don't want to let my plasma go, it's just so pretty!!!! But, alas! 1080p has been fun and glorious. But it's time to move on.

So, price being no factor. I have some questions:

1) I don't want to go SLI with my 980 ti. Whilst I know it CAN handle the full 4k res, I know it won't be great. Can you scale down the res to a lower resolution on a 4K monitor/TV? Or is it 4K or go away sort of stuff?

2) PC monitors, same as above, at the moment, I'm on a 24" 1080p. Now, the way my home cinema setup is, I can't upgrade one or the other. It HAS to be both, hence the hold on to my 1080p plasma for so long. Are they any good at the moment? What's the general size of a 4K monitor?

3) Those that have made the jump, is it worth it? Or should I try and hold onto my loved plasma for another year or 2?
Click to expand...

I can throw just about anything at my 980ti but I do have a G-Sync monitor, which is amazing... maybe you should start there.
 
I can't choose a res between 1080p and 2160p on my TV using an AMD card and DisplayPort, if you can with an Nvidia card using HDMI 2.0 I honestly don't know.

4k monitors come in sizes from 24-40" I believe, though I would be looking in the 30-40" range for such a high res I think.

It depends on what set you have now really and if its still working well. If its a high end Panasonic for example, it will be a hard act to follow even with 4k. What I will say though, in my personal opinion, the jump from standard definition to full HD was a game changer and a real revelation, the step from full HD to 4k is great don't get me wrong, but it doesn't have the same impact as SD to HD did IMO.
 
Well, I suppose explaining my current setup first might be better.

I sit in 2 positions for gaming. At the desk with mouse and keyboard, or on the sofa with a controller.

My PC is next to my amp. I live in a flat with my TV mounted in the living room and my desk in the same room.

In the below picture, the sofa on the right is the gaming sofa, the TV on the wall and to the left, out of shot is my little PC desk. So, 1080p allows me to swap between PC monitor and plasma easily.

yFilZwY.jpg


My PC outputs via HDMI (sound and picture) to my amp, my amp then sends the HDMI signal to a HDMI splitter. Which then splits the signal to both my plasma and monitor.

So, the source from my PC needs to be a res both the TV and monitor naively support.

At the moment, my PC monitor is a bit... Small, I'm tired of 24", going any larger means larger res. My plasa has got cap buzz pretty bad and I'm constantly having to wedge paper in between the TV mount and backplate to stop the buzz. I'll be trying to fix it long term this weekend. But, it's old.

The plasma is indeed a top spec plasma. Blacks are not really that black anymore however.

Really torn, the upgrade will be DAMN expensive. And I prefer 60fps over res... So, I'm not sure.
 
slick rick said:
I can't choose a res between 1080p and 2160p on my TV using an AMD card and DisplayPort, if you can with an Nvidia card using HDMI 2.0 I honestly don't know.

4k monitors come in sizes from 24-40" I believe, though I would be looking in the 30-40" range for such a high res I think.

It depends on what set you have now really and if its still working well. If its a high end Panasonic for example, it will be a hard act to follow even with 4k. What I will say though, in my personal opinion, the jump from standard definition to full HD was a game changer and a real revelation, the step from full HD to 4k is great don't get me wrong, but it doesn't have the same impact as SD to HD did IMO.
Click to expand...

To be honest my trusty 1080p panny 55vt50 had a more cinematic picture for movies and standard def TV looked better on it because you aren't scaling it up ridiculously

My 4k panny 58AX802B looks amazing with PC games, and yes via Nvidia HDMI 2.0 I can select 1440p whereas the old AMD card via Display port only allowed 1080p and then 2160p

So its a tradeoff. Slightly worse picture for less than UHD quality content and really amazing pictures for UHD gaming and do reels.
 
Also you will need a new receiver to passthrough 4k content with full rgb. And a HDMI splitter won't split a HDMI 2.0 signal either.

Even if your receiver says 4k pass through, that'll only be 1.4 which means 30hz - No good for gaming.
 
No such TV i'm afraid.

I still don't see why you need a Splitter though?

I had the same sort of issue with receivers but I got around it

With my 1080p plasma I used the HDMI 1.4 passthrough for sound/audio

When I got my 4k TV in December last year, there weren't any A/V Receivers with HDMI 2.0 (at the time)

I ended up running HDMI 2.0 in to the TV and then using the ARC (audio return channel) to send the sound signal to the receiver.
 
agnes said:
Really torn, the upgrade will be DAMN expensive. And I prefer 60fps over res... So, I'm not sure.
Click to expand...
You're probably gonna have to deal with upscaling from a lower resolution in a lot of the latest, more demanding games if you go 4k. Just no way around it.

Can you not output *just* audio to the amp, while having a display port cable from your PC straight to your monitor? That way you could go 4k for a monitor(or even 1440p if you wanted), while sticking with 1080p for your new TV?

At your distance, with a 50" TV, a 4k TV isn't gonna be a huge improvement over 1080p anyways. Especially not after a top tier plasma.
 
Because the amp only has one HDMI output.

This is a very, VERY rudimentary drawing of my setup haha.

aJBaidF.jpg


So, red is monitor and plasma. Main black box in the middle where everything goes in and out is my amp. Green box is splitter.

Going to my amp is Blu Ray player, PC, Sky and... Forgot the last one.

I'm trying to make it simple really. I'd rather just have the option to sit at my desk or plasma with nothing more than turning one off and the other one.
 
Seanspeed said:
You're probably gonna have to deal with upscaling from a lower resolution in a lot of the latest, more demanding games if you go 4k. Just no way around it.

Can you not output *just* audio to the amp, while having a display port cable from your PC straight to your monitor? That way you could go 4k for a monitor(or even 1440p if you wanted), while sticking with 1080p for your new TV?

At your distance, with a 50" TV, a 4k TV isn't gonna be a huge improvement over 1080p anyways. Especially not after a top tier plasma.
Click to expand...

Problem with that is if I get a monitor with higher res than plasma, I'll have to change the res every time I decide to take my gaming to the sofa. Too much hassle.
 
agnes said:
Problem with that is if I get a monitor with higher res than plasma, I'll have to change the res every time I decide to take my gaming to the sofa. Too much hassle.
Click to expand...
Ah ok, you're trying to game on both displays with your PC. I was somehow thinking you were console gaming with the TV. Think the 360 controller confused me.

That's a pickle. Sounds like you're stuck with 1080p for the time being anyways unless you want to get a new amp as well. Really bad time for your plasma to start failing. You could always just get a cheaper 'temporary' TV replacement for the time being. Then save up for a full 4k setup in a year or so? Or just ride out the plasma as long as it'll go...?
 
Seanspeed said:
Can you not output *just* audio to the amp, while having a display port cable from your PC straight to your monitor? That way you could go 4k for a monitor(or even 1440p if you wanted), while sticking with 1080p for your new TV?
Click to expand...

agnes said:
Problem with that is if I get a monitor with higher res than plasma, I'll have to change the res every time I decide to take my gaming to the sofa. Too much hassle.
Click to expand...

Why will you?

980 TI DisplayPort out to 1440p Monitor
980 TI HDMI out to Receiver.

Receiver feeds back in to the TV, voila.

Then use 'Extend these displays' on your desktop and you can have 1440p on your PC monitor and 1080p though the plasma without changing resolutions.

Steam big picture mode will even automatically load games up on your TV without you having to fiddle.
 
VincentHanna said:
Why will you?

980 TI DisplayPort out to 1440p Monitor
980 TI HDMI out to Receiver.

Receiver feeds back in to the TV, voila.

Then use 'Extend these displays' on your desktop and you can have 1440p on your PC monitor and 1080p though the plasma without changing resolutions.

Steam big picture mode will even automatically load games up on your TV without you having to fiddle.
Click to expand...

That's what I was going to suggest. But I think he wants 4K on his TV, which is possible using a HDMI 2.0 lead but like someone said it will only be 30hz, so stuck at 30fps... no good, wouldn't recommend.

Not sure if 4K TVs come with display ports, they should.
 
agnes said:
My trusty 50" plasma is on it's last legs, I've been hovering over the 4K land for a while, wondering, questioning, wishing... It's time :(

I don't want to let my plasma go, it's just so pretty!!!! But, alas! 1080p has been fun and glorious. But it's time to move on.

So, price being no factor. I have some questions:

1) I don't want to go SLI with my 980 ti. Whilst I know it CAN handle the full 4k res, I know it won't be great. Can you scale down the res to a lower resolution on a 4K monitor/TV? Or is it 4K or go away sort of stuff?

2) PC monitors, same as above, at the moment, I'm on a 24" 1080p. Now, the way my home cinema setup is, I can't upgrade one or the other. It HAS to be both, hence the hold on to my 1080p plasma for so long. Are they any good at the moment? What's the general size of a 4K monitor?

3) Those that have made the jump, is it worth it? Or should I try and hold onto my loved plasma for another year or 2?
Click to expand...

Not sure what 980 ti's some people have got, but mine doesn't break a sweat in 4k in all the games I've played. Must have a *magic* card then.
 
Panasonic one does [come with DisplayPort], nothing else AFAIK.

But anyway, he said he would stick with his 1080p TV but couldn't get a higher res monitor as he would need to change the res all the time, I was just pointing out that isn't the case.
 
davewhite04 said:
Not sure what 980 ti's some people have got, but mine doesn't break a sweat in 4k in all the games I've played. Must have a *magic* card then.
Click to expand...
Yes, you must have.

Or you just don't play enough modern, high demand games...

Try out The Witcher 3, Crysis 3, Ryse, AC Unity and get back to me.
 
Tried them(apart from RYSE), can even set the hair option on in the Witcher 3, which is apparently the holy grail.

I think the G-Sync monitor has been the best part of my upgrade.
 
davewhite04 said:
Tried them(apart from RYSE), can even set the hair option on in the Witcher 3, which is apparently the holy grail.

I think the G-Sync monitor has been the best part of my upgrade.
Click to expand...
If you're not capable of doing a consistent 60fps(there or there abouts), then your card is certainly 'breaking a sweat'.

Not everybody has a Gsync monitor, either.
 
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