Monitor for the 360 recommendations

Kreeeee · 13 May 2006 at 20:33

The monitor needs to accept DVI and VGA inputs and upscale a 1360*768 image well. Obviously it needs to be widescreen and say £350-400 budget.

Thanks for the help guys.

Edit: Will running a widescreen monitor and a 1280*1024 monitor from the same PC cause any issues?

Mud · 13 May 2006 at 21:13

Only a small, and sometimes stretched picture.

Kreeeee · 14 May 2006 at 01:57

Mud said:
Only a small, and sometimes stretched picture.

Can you expand on that? Will both monitors not display at their full resolution?

Mud · 14 May 2006 at 02:08

I was referring to 1280x1024 screens, sorry if that wasn't clear. The 5:4 ratio isn't supported well by a few games, like PGR3 and Oblivion.

If its a widescreen monitor it'll be 16:10 (not 16:9, the aspect ratio for HD), so you'll want a monitor that can run a small letterbox, unless you can deal with an 11% stretch. I don't know the full skinny on 20" widescreens, so I'll let someone else give you a full answer there.

Raikiri · 14 May 2006 at 02:10

If you are willing you push your budget and get an LCD TV, theres a samsung for £500 with DVI/VGA/HDMI and a 1366x768 res (27 inch model) available that would be very well suited to the 360 and alright as a PC monitor (from a distance)

Kreeeee · 14 May 2006 at 03:07

Raikiri said:
If you are willing you push your budget and get an LCD TV, theres a samsung for £500 with DVI/VGA/HDMI and a 1366x768 res (27 inch model) available that would be very well suited to the 360 and alright as a PC monitor (from a distance)

The problem is that this monitor won't be used for TV at all so a HDTV would just be a waste for me. When I mentioned resolution I meant the way my PC would react to the 2 monitors using a program like ultramon, the 360 currently has borders running on my 1280*1024 screen in 1280*720 mode.

The PC would use both monitors (DVI and VGA) and the 360 would use the widescreen one only (VGA). Any recommendations on exact models and why?

Thanks for the responses guys.

GuruJockStrap · 14 May 2006 at 12:40

I've got my 360 connected to a Dell 2005FPW via the VGA cable and perfectly happy with the picture quality.

Set my 360 to output 1280x768 and it looks fine on the monitor.

It has borders on your screen 1280x1024 with a 720p signal because the scaler in your monitor cannot stretch the image to fill the whole screen.

My Dell does exactly the same but you can change the setting in the OSD menu to stretch the image to fill.

Kreeeee · 14 May 2006 at 14:11

GuruJockStrap said:
It has borders on your screen 1280x1024 with a 720p signal because the scaler in your monitor cannot stretch the image to fill the whole screen.

My Dell does exactly the same but you can change the setting in the OSD menu to stretch the image to fill.

I chose borders because it looks stupid when you stretch a wide screen image into a 4:3 one.

Kreeeee · 14 May 2006 at 22:53

Ok so out of these which do you recommend?

Acer AL2051WS 20" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Black/Silver (MO-022-AC)
Price: £303.95 (£357.14 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Belinea 102035W 20.1" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Black/Silver (MO-003-BE)
Price: £279.95 (£328.94 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Viewsonic VX2025 20" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Silver/Black (MO-052-VS)
Price: £289.95 (£340.69 Including VAT at 17.5%)

All have:

- 1680 x 1050 (WSXGA) Optimum Resolution
- 16.7 Million Colours
- 800:1 Contrast Ratio
- 8ms Response Time
- 300 cd/m2 Brightness
- One Analogue Input
- One DVI Input

drupi · 14 May 2006 at 23:06

The Acer does not justify the price.

I would take the Viewsonic or the Belinea (in that order). Both are stunning displays.

Fanatic · 15 May 2006 at 00:18

I run my PC and 360 on my Belinea 102035W. The 360 runs at 1360x768 widescreen.

360 looks great connected via VGA and the sound is ok too coming out the monitor speakers (PC hooked up to 5.1). I can have both PC and 360 on at the same time and switch between the inputs to choose which one to look at.

Have been trying to find a software solution that would allow me to assign a hotkey that would switch between DVI and VGA inputs instead of having to go through the menus on the monitor but cant find one.

Kreeeee · 15 May 2006 at 01:48

Fanatic said:
I run my PC and 360 on my Belinea 102035W. The 360 runs at 1360x768 widescreen.

360 looks great connected via VGA and the sound is ok too coming out the monitor speakers (PC hooked up to 5.1). I can have both PC and 360 on at the same time and switch between the inputs to choose which one to look at.

Have been trying to find a software solution that would allow me to assign a hotkey that would switch between DVI and VGA inputs instead of having to go through the menus on the monitor but cant find one.

My 360 has its own 5.1 sound system connected to it. What output do you use on your 360 and can you get any close up pics of it?

Cheers.

Fanatic · 15 May 2006 at 15:18

I have my monitor connected to my PC via a VGA cable.

Then for the sound i use the microphone in port on the back of the monitor.

The VGA cable i bought splits into two - the VGA connector for video and a red and white jack for audio. I have a convertor that changes the 2 audio into 1 3.5mm jack so it can go into my monitor's microphone port.

Cant use my 5.1 on my 360 as i have Dell speakers and sub and i dont see a way to connect them up. Soon i hope to get some Logitech Z5500.