120Hz Monitor Vs. 120Hz TV [HELP]

Technology and Gaming Help and Support
#1

I’ve been trying to decide, or rather rationalize, what’s more appropriate for my needs. i have a pretty good rig, I7/EVGA X58, GTX 285 2GB, 12GB DDR3, and i use a Samsung 2443BWT currently, which is great for documents and photoshop, but for gaming it suffers from lag.

I also use my monitor with my Xbox 360 switching in between VGA and DVI for different sources. because the monitor is 6:10, and doesn’t have 1:1 scaling, i have to run the 360 resolution at 1680 x 1050 instead of 1920 x 1080.

I have a mate who has a 240Hz LG 50" LED, and with the true motion and insane contrast it’s awesome for gaming on any platform. So i’m trying to decide if i should just buy a fast monitor or a really good tv, i’ve used a 32" samsung TV as a monitor in the past and was fine with the size.

I’ve kind of narrowed it down to two products based on my needs. Should i for the Acer GD235HZbid or the LG 32LD550

#2

If you want to watch TV as well, get a TV. If not, a monitor will do.

That’s the only decision it comes down to, that and a fancy remote

#3

yeah, i think i’m going to use this for PC, FIOS, PS3/bluray and my Xbox. So i might drop a little more cash and get the Samsung UN32C6500VFXZA

compared to the LG from my earlier post, this has 5,000,000:1 DC compared to 150000:1. also the samsung has 4 HDMI which is perfect for me.

what do you guys think?

#4

Don’t compare contrast ratios, there’s no “standard” for measuring them so they mean jack shit when comparing monitors/TVs. Read up on what people think of them, and take into account things like screen size/price/input options etc.

#5

we need 42" monitors :expressionless:

#6

120hz is a scam in both cases, but especially in TV’s.

#7

how so, i used to have a 120Hz CRT back in the day, and for CS, that thing was awesome. when i switched from the CRT to my old Acer 19" i noticed a serious drop in speed. I like the LG because i looked at it today at my local shop, but i feel like all their listed technologies are just a gimmick to jack the price up. i essentially just want a monitor with a lot of inputs with high response time and high contrast.

#8

i have a 100hz lcd tv and 100hz crt tv. it’s much better than 50/60 hz

#9

yes but I doubt you’re stupid enough to think CRT is similar to LCD technology

Also most CRT’s only go up to 120hz on low resolutions like 800x600

#10

Don’t know where you heard that. 120Hz tvs are a scam if they still double the 60Hz signal and use a wonky pulldown for 24fps sources, but a lot of the newer ones will give you a less jittery image because they use 5:5 pulldown, so each frame is simply repeated 5 times instead of broken up. Auto motion plus or any of the other motion interpolation equivalents that come with the TVs are pretty ugly though. A lot of people confuse that with the 120Hz “look,” but it has nothing to do with the refresh rate, it’s a software thing.

I’ve never had a 120Hz monitor, but it seems like it would be nice to run at higher than 60fps without getting awful tearing.

#11

I went to best buy last week and every tv/monitor was plastered with 120hz stickers, some even claim 200 or 300hz. refresh rate is the new contrast ratio.

#12

of course i understand the difference between CRT and LCD technology, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that my old CRT monitor which ran at 120Hz was noticeably faster. I wasn’t saying i’m going to go buy a CRT monitor, i was just stating a fact.

after 120Hz i cant tell the difference. My father has a 600Hz pioneer plasma and i can’t notice a difference compared to 120Hz. i’m not sure, maybe the eye can’t notice the difference, but i can notice the difference between 60 and 120Hz easily.

#13

Things to keep in mind.

Disregard dynamic contrast and just look at the normal contrast. If you are a gamer or do any amount of graphic art, you will not have these settings on. Dynamic contrast only turns when you enable those silly viewing modes like “cinema, game, Night view, Scenery”. Also to achieve these ridiculous contrast ratios what they do is brighten or dim the back light based on the average intensity of the scene. So what if 1/2 the screen is bright and 1/2 the screen is dark? it will pump up the back light making the blacks turn to grey and the contrast between the light and the dark will still be the same as the non-dynamic ratio.

Second think to keep in mind is HDTV lag. Out of the box almost all HDTV will have a higher lag than a computer monitor. Secondly If you plan on using a television with all of the fancy 120Hz smoothing and image post processing it will cause significant screen lag. The lag is bad enough in most cases that even watching television (with the audio split at the receiver) It starts to look like a Godzilla movie. But once you turn these setting off it will work much better.

Lastly if you want to purchase an HDTV as a monitor [COLOR=‘Red’]MAKE SURE IT HAS A 1:1/video stream/true picture setting. This will make sure that it doesn’t scale the incoming signal and it will map each desktop pixel to a pixel on the screen.

#14

One of my mates was looking at a 600Hz 42" LCD 1080p Samsung or something or other, I was like “600hz?” why would you want that then, he said “because its good” poor fucker didn’t have a clue what it is, but it’s people like him that get sold to so easily.

#15

Aren’t all plasmas 600Hz?

#16

I had a 42" philips plasma from 2005, no mention of 600hz anywhere, picture quality was the same as any other 720p TV.

#17

Why would plasma’s even be rated in Hz? I don’t see why that makes sense at all. Maybe if you’re referring to how often it checks for a change…

I don’t know, I can’t be bothered to go research how a plasma screen works, but I thought a pixel just stays the same until it needs to change. So why would it have a refresh rate at all?

#18

science!

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