What monitor size and resolution? Also, Curved?

NooBish AbbZ · 16 Oct 2016 at 13:45

Afternoon gents,

Needing to upgrade my current set up which contains a 1080p 22" monitor, although a pretty poor television by all accounts.

I'm pretty sure i'm going to go for a 27" monitor, and have the current 22" as a second screen. The 27" will be used as my main screen on my PC which will generally be used for low graphics games such as football manager, general computing, watching youtube videos, watching Netflix and watching Tv programs/Movies.

As a result, I've started looking into 1440p monitors, due to apparently 1080p monitors starting to become slightly pixelated at this 27" size. Is this the right call? Or for what my PC is going to be used, would 1080p be fine?

I was also looking at curved screens, but am i correct in thinking that while curved would be good for short distance, e.g sat right at the monitor, curved while watching at a good few feet e.g. for movies, would completely detract from the experience, or even make the experience worse.

Finally, i'm not sure, can Xbox ones play 1440p? The monitor will also be used as a tv for my xbox one, preferably connected through a second HDMI cable.

From what I've seen so far, at the amount I'm willing to spend, 1440p and curved isn't an option. So it will be one or the other, or neither

Thanks gents

Seanspeed · 16 Oct 2016 at 18:10

I think if you're not doing any heavy PC gaming and you'll be watching a good amount of video(TV/movies), you will want to stick with 1080p for native content viewing. Yes, at 27", 1080p isn't the sharpest resolution in the world, but it's hardly BAD. It's exactly what I use and I'm just fine with it.

It also gives you a ton of affordable options as there's quite a lot of 27" 1080p monitors out there. I'd also highly recommend going with an IPS display for brighter, more vibrant colors. Or at least a VA monitor, which will give much better black levels. Both will improve image quality of content hugely over TN. Only reason to go TN is for budgetary reasons or if you're in the market for a high refresh rate display, of which there aren't many IPS or VA options, especially at the low-mid end.

As far as curved go, I wouldn't really bother. If it's just you at a desk, it'd be fine, probably not gonna hurt anything even from a few feet away, but dont pay extra for it or anything. It doesn't really add anything except a bit of style to the form factor.

EDIT: Oh, and your XB1 can use a 1440p monitor, but the monitor will scale the image. It wont look great. Native 1080p content(games, Netflix/Amazon/Bluray via XB1, Youtube, etc) will look better on a 1080p display. Plus any sub 1080p games on XB1 will be scaled by the Xbox, which will look better than letting your monitor do it in most cases.

Spudgun · 16 Oct 2016 at 21:48

I'd go 30" or above if you want 1440p, on a 27" screen it is a bit of a eyesight test and not great for prolonged work use. Yes, you can increase the size of things, but this is woeful in windows 10 and was much, much better on windows 8

james_2k · 16 Oct 2016 at 22:00

if you had to choose curved over 1440, id choose 1440 every day, all day.

of course id really recommend 1440 21:9 curved. its awesome, before that i had a normal 1440p 27" screen its a big difference (for me anyway) i couldnt use a 1080p 27" anymore. I don't use any scaling with 1440. 200% on my surface 4 pro, which also looks fine.

Phil2008 · 16 Oct 2016 at 22:51

I have just got the Samsung C27F591 27" curved LED 1920x1080 monitor, comming from a 27.5" 1920x1200. Im not all that impressed with the picture quality and it ghosts badly when scrolling through text on white background, even though its suppose to be 5ms response time panel.

Cern · 16 Oct 2016 at 23:08

Monitor size is rather subjective from person to person. As is whether you prefer colour accuracy over refresh rate etc.

For me 27" is about the sweet spot for 1440p. Beuatifully sharp and text is a decent size - my eyesight isn't so hot these days but I don't have any problems with 1440p @ 27". I think I would struggle with 4k @ 27" though.

If your focus is more on films, TV, video, photos etc then get an IPS monitor for the better colour accuracy compared to TN monitors. IPS will also have a better viewing angle.