widescreen or not?? cant decide

Why not just use 1280x960 which the GX2 does support?

Also, do not be put off by people saying you loose height going from a 19" traditional to a 20" widescreen. Whilst it is true they are physically shorter, it won't matter whilst gaming, as a widescreen aspect ratio mimics the human eye's fov more accurately than a 5:4 does, so it will seem like a better experience. :)
 
I used to have a 4:3 monitor and now i have twin 19" Widescreens and to be honest with you the widescreen is so much better than your normal 4:3

Get Widescreen, you will never look back! :D
 
Being that I'm into widescreen for films I recently purchased a widescreen TFT monitor. Gaming is far better, but you need a decent card that due to the extra pixels. Most games support widescreen. Age of Empires 3, Half-Life 2, Fear, Rome/Medievil Total War, Doom3 etc.

PC monitors are not the same ratio as widescreen TV (16:10 instead of 16:9) It's annoying they're not the same, nor the same resolution. You can't really use a LCD TV 40" for gaming due to differences in resolution. :( Windows will be fine though.
 
@ DrMekon & Spinna: You're systems are the kind of thing thats intended for a high res display. Why have a setup like that and want to stick to something around 1280x1024, it's so low (or even 1024x768, and on a 1900XT? CRAZY!). A waste of hardware. And you get so much more space on a high res display, it's much more pleasing and less confined to work with. And with widescreen you get more horizontal view with games, which can give you a bit of an advantage when fragging... aswell as just looking better.

I have two widescreen 24" Dells @1920x1200 and the only game i cant play at that res with max settings is Oblivion ...which i think is a game engine or driver issue. Your systems are quite equal to mine and i can run F.E.A.R, Quake4, Doom3, Half-Life2, FarCry, Battlefield2... all fine at 1920x1200 with max settings, even with AA + AF turned on for most of 'em. CS:S can be played completely smooth with settings maxed @ 1920x1200 + 8xAA + 16xAF + Vsync. F.E.A.R can lag a tiny bit in some areas of the game but it's always very playable.
When you have a high res you have to remember AA isnt really needed so if you did have performance issues you can turn it off and it will still look great.

...Or just turn the res down and not play games at native res, on the newer TFT's non-native res' normally look pretty good.
 
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Remember not to get tied up with the widescreen gives you more view opinion though - it's the resolution that still counts.

e.g. a 20" widescreen may give you 1680x1050 but a 20" 4:3 can give you 1600x1200, i.e. more overall. Each has its own compromise and application.

Some might even think that we are being ripped off with widescreen prices - yes, 1920X1200 is very nice but is it worth the premium in price over 1600x1200? - £300+ difference for the sake of 320 extra pixel width?

Thinking more about the smaller widescreens in particular, e.g. 19" and below, you might be better off plumping for a size larger in a 4:3.
 
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it's so low (or even 1024x768, and on a 1900XT? CRAZY!). A waste of hardware
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Why, beacuse at 1600x1200 my FEAR min fps is down to 25 (from memory) with eye candy on.. and ive never noticed any graphical difference at that res, and 1024 or 1280... other than the drop in framerates.... unless my 19" dell trinitron doesnt support such hi res, but im sure it does???

To be honest, I was expecting to play games at max res, with max candy..but I think in some, particularly FEAR it would struggle at full res.. then I do believe that this is meant to be one of the most demanding games to date???

Im going to do a bit more testing tonight anyway.. to see how higher res affects game play.. but I would rather have lower res with full eye candy.. than have max res with no noticeable visual benefit...

All this is imaterial now anyway.. as Ive jsut bitten the bullet and ordered the NEC GX2!!!

Incidently.. I am aware of ertain batches of this monitor with backlight bleed issues.. Ive read through the huge pst... but do NEC have a zero backlight policy???
 
DrMekon said:
If you check chaparral's sig, hes got a beast of a machine.. AMD 4400+ Dual core/ Leadtek 7800gtx SLI.. which can cope with widescreen resolutions much easier....
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Sorry i forgot to update my sig...I sold my two leadtek 7800gtx cards and i only been using a single x1900xt-x card for last 2 months now to run my games on my dell 2405.
 
DrMekon said:
Why, beacuse at 1600x1200 my FEAR min fps is down to 25 (from memory) with eye candy on.. and ive never noticed any graphical difference at that res, and 1024 or 1280... other than the drop in framerates.... unless my 19" dell trinitron doesnt support such hi res, but im sure it does
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It's a 19" CRT right? Then it should deffinately support 1600x1200... The difference between 1024x768 and 1600x1200 in games is very obvious though so i dont know whats going on there...
When you turn the res up things just look a lot more clear, less blocky, less jagged edges, and you can see finer details.

Heres something to try, put F.E.A.R on 1024x768 with 4xAA in it's graphics options, then put it on 1600x1200 with no AA at all. Your'll see it looks a lot clearer at the higher res and just better even though it has no AA. Although it might be better to try that with another game that isnt so dark because it would be more obvious then.
Think of it as like Standard Definition video vs High Definition video, the difference with HD is big, way more detail, and thats simply because it's a higher res.

Magic Man said:
Remember not to get tied up with the widescreen gives you more view opinion though - it's the resolution that still counts.
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Yes on the desktop the res counts, but in games if the game has widescreen options, you always get more scenery in view on a widescreen. The pics posted earlier are a good example.
 
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MR.B said:
...but in games if the game has widescreen options, you always get more scenery in view on a widescreen. The pics posted earlier are a good example.
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You should be able to get the exact same fov on a 4:3, the only difference would be that, given the same resolution, the image would be smaller - in addition, being a 4:3 you'd then gain vertical fov over the widescreen (either that or get a letterboxed effect).

Widescreen doesn't allow you to magically view anything extra than a 4:3 can display - there is no equivalent of a widescreen movie being shown in pan and scan on a 4:3, there is nothing cut off at the edges.

And the resolution does count, it always counts. You could argue that the vertical pixel height you sacrifice for a widescreen over a 4:3 of the equivalent size means that you loose definition since, by definition :D , you've got less vertical pixels to show the same image and so it can't be as fine thus, perhaps, requiring more AA/AF.
 
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Magic Man said:
You should be able to get the exact same fov on a 4:3, the only difference would be that, given the same resolution, the image would be smaller - in addition, being a 4:3 you'd then gain vertical fov over the widescreen (either that or get a letterboxed effect).

Widescreen doesn't allow you to magically view anything extra than a 4:3 can display - there is no equivalent of a widescreen movie being shown in pan and scan on a 4:3, there is nothing cut off at the edges.

And the resolution does count, it always counts. You could argue that the vertical pixel height you sacrifice for a widescreen over a 4:3 of the equivalent size means that you loose definition since, by definition :D , you've got less vertical pixels to show the same image and so it can't be as fine thus, perhaps, requiring more AA/AF.
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You forget one thing. It's fine trying to define everything mathematically and saying more pixels = better. When gaming (esp. FPS), a widescreen monitor echos how the human eye views its FoV far more accurately than a 4:3 screen does. So, from a perceived enjoyment perspective, it matters squat wether you have less pixels than a 4:3, your eyes "like" the image they see in 16:10 much more than they do 4:3, so your brain ends up enjoying it more.
 
I have been looking into widescreen TFT's but i am not sure it is the way to go at the moment. I decided to go for a 17'' Viewsonic TFT. The quality is very high indeed. Not to say i would not get a widescreen. Not sure if there are any problems with widescreen / games?
 
Magic Man said:
You should be able to get the exact same fov on a 4:3, the only difference would be that, given the same resolution, the image would be smaller - in addition, being a 4:3 you'd then gain vertical fov over the widescreen (either that or get a letterboxed effect).

Widescreen doesn't allow you to magically view anything extra than a 4:3 can display - there is no equivalent of a widescreen movie being shown in pan and scan on a 4:3, there is nothing cut off at the edges.
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Did you even look a the screen shots on the previous page? ALL the vertical field of view is kept on a widescreen monitor in games. When you set a game to a widescreen res/mode it dont cut off any vertical field of view, and it adds to to horizantal view. You do get more field of view on a widescreen monitor with games because no ones going to play a game on a widescreen setting with a 4:3 monitor, it would just look "squished" if it filled the whole screen, or you would have big borders at the top and bottom to stop that from happening.
 
I am considering getting a widescreen now. Not sure what one to go for. I like the Acer ones as they are well priced etc. Does it matter if they are VGA only?
 
OH MY fully star swearing please! GOD

What a sheer beauty of a monior!!! Just fired her up.. and will be giving closer inspection later... but first impressions are very good indeed!!!!

Blows my CRT out of the water!!!!!

My one and only quibble.. is a wonky button!!! But im sure with a little encouragement.. they should straighten....

If your in the market for a new monitor..definately consider this one.....!!!
 
MR.B said:
Did you even look a the screen shots on the previous page? ALL the vertical field of view is kept on a widescreen monitor in games. When you set a game to a widescreen res/mode it dont cut off any vertical field of view, and it adds to to horizantal view.
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That is true for most FPS games, but is not true for every game out there.

EQ2 for example does reduce the vertical FoV and does not increase the horizontal FoV. Very annoying, but sadly that is the way they decided to handle widescreen resolutions.

The majority of games though do increase the horizontal FoV.
 
DrMekon said:
OH MY ******* GOD

What a sheer beauty of a monior!!! Just fired her up.. and will be giving closer inspection later... but first impressions are very good indeed!!!!

Blows my CRT out of the water!!!!!

My one and only quibble.. is a wonky button!!! But im sure with a little encouragement.. they should straighten....

If your in the market for a new monitor..definately consider this one.....!!!
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Which TFT did you get? Any backlight bleed with it? Any pics etc etc.
 
Oh yeah.. sorry forgot to mention (but in an early post on previous page I think)... got the NEC 20WGX20... no dead pixels... but does suffer from a bit of backlight bleed. Doesnt concern me too much, however, Ive not really started to play with it yet, to see how distracting it is....

Turning the desktop to black, did result in a rather odd twinkling effect over the screen... ??? Can really notice the bleed during bootup, or again, if the desktop is black... will see if it settles down over nect day or two... and decide on whether to keep within the 7 days cancellation/refund period, or maybe rma it.

Will see how I get on with it....
 
MR.B said:
...When you set a game to a widescreen res/mode it dont cut off any vertical field of view, and it adds to to horizantal view. You do get more field of view on a widescreen monitor with games because no ones going to play a game on a widescreen setting with a 4:3 monitor, it would just look "squished" if it filled the whole screen, or you would have big borders at the top and bottom to stop that from happening.
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Yes I did look at the shots, did you read my post?

Yes I can notice the differene there but you could have also equally have said...
"When you set a game to a 4:3 res/mode it dont cut off any horizontal field of view, and it adds to to vertical view"

You could show that exact same image on the 4:3 monitor but it would be smaller to fit the same horizontal fov in the smaller width but you would then open up a larger vertical fov.

You are implying that the 4:3 image is missing the sides. Think of it this way, take that widescreen image and add the extra vertical pixels to make it 4:3 - you could then instead think that the widescreen image is actually missing the top and bottom.

Re. your quote above, instead of those "big borders at the top and bottom" fill that with rendered display - now which is showing more?

Yes, the fov of a widescreen is more natural to the eye and my next monitor will probably be something like the NEC GX2 but don't get into the mindset that a widescreen somehow shows more.
 
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