I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Video Game Discussions and general topics.

Moderators: AArdvark, Ice Cream Jonsey

User avatar
Ice Cream Jonsey
Posts: 28878
Joined: Sat Apr 27, 2002 2:44 pm
Location: Colorado
Contact:

I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

I don't know that I've ever truly had a great monitor before. I would say the last monitor that I had that was even close was a .... 19" or 21" Trinitron CRT. That thing was a little ahead of its time. But when the flatscreen era came into being, I picked up $140 24" monitors and I've had them for ten years. Maybe 8 years - whatever, long enough.

My sister in law got a promotion at work and wanted a couple of monitors when she took her laptop home, so I am giving her one of the aforementioned 24" monitors. I saw a sale on an Asus PG279Q and the thing is amazing. I am using the "DisplayPort" for the first time ever. I feel like I stepped through a time machine.

I was adding a lot of vibrance in AffinityPhoto (hipster Photoshop) to my pictures when I did edits. And I realize, no, it was just the monitor. Hmmm.

Anyway, this is great. I hope I'm with all of you guys now.
the dark and gritty...Ice Cream Jonsey!

User avatar
Tdarcos
Posts: 9333
Joined: Fri May 16, 2008 9:25 am
Location: Arlington, Virginia
Contact:

Re: I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Post by Tdarcos »

If you saw my video (about my third monitor, on my second computer, that rotates to portrait mode), at one time my primary computer supported dual monitors, I had a 24" and a 27" monitor connected. When I ended up switching to another computer (which only supported one monitor) as primary, I of course kept the 27". Both monitors were in the $125-$160 range, since it was several years ago that I bought them I don't remember the exact price.
Alan Francis wrote a book containing everything men understand about women. It consisted of 100 blank pages.

User avatar
RealNC
Posts: 2244
Joined: Wed Mar 07, 2012 4:32 am

Re: I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Post by RealNC »

Make sure to actually select the high refresh mode! By default, Windows is probably selecting 60Hz. Select 120Hz for the desktop and 144Hz (or 165Hz if you enabled the "Overclock" mode, which isn't really needed though) for games. And make sure you play games in fullscreen mode, not in "borderless fullscreen" because otherwise g-sync isn't working or it's working very poorly.

I have an XG2703-GS monitor which uses the exact same panel as yours (there's 4 different monitor brands out there that use it.) IPS + g-sync + high refresh rate is pretty awesome. As I posted in another thread, it's great for emulation with RetroArch too, not just for modern games. Since it's an IPS panel, when you rotate it 90 degrees for vertical games like Dig Dug or 1943 it still looks great (the TN panel on cheap monitors results in inverted colors when you rotate them.) And if you enable g-sync + the appropriate RA options and use a CRT shader, this thing looks pretty close to an actual arcade monitor. I've been playing nothing else than retro games for the past couple of months :mrgreen:

User avatar
Ice Cream Jonsey
Posts: 28878
Joined: Sat Apr 27, 2002 2:44 pm
Location: Colorado
Contact:

Re: I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

Yeah, that refresh thing was an eye opening experience. Not something that I had dealt with before, ha. I started Mankind Divided and read that there is "full screen" and "exclusive fullscreen" I guess. Ah, new, delicious jargon!

I am not sure how to get the desktop of Windows 10 to not be 60 frames per second. I went through my nVidia control panel and set Gsync to be active. Who knows. It's like what pinback once said about configuring Apache - the people writing the documentation know what you want to do, but because they are awful people, they hide that as best they can. He said it in a snappier way, mind you.
the dark and gritty...Ice Cream Jonsey!

User avatar
RealNC
Posts: 2244
Joined: Wed Mar 07, 2012 4:32 am

Re: I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Post by RealNC »

G-Sync is for games. It doesn't do anything for the desktop.

You can change the refresh rate here:



The refresh rate selected will be used for the desktop and for games that don't run in exclusive fullscreen mode. Games that do run in exclusive mode will use the highest refresh rate automatically if the "preferred refresh rate" option in the "manage 3D settings" section is set to "highest available."

User avatar
Flack
Posts: 8822
Joined: Tue Nov 18, 2008 3:02 pm
Location: Oklahoma
Contact:

Re: I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Post by Flack »

I'm running three 27" Acer monitors (two display port, one HDMI). Out of the box they were okay, but look better now after half an hour of fiddling with settings. On my work rig I'm running two Dell 24" monitors and they are not as good as the Acers. Text is not quite as crisp on the Dells, and colors are a bit muted.
"I failed a savings throw and now I am back."

User avatar
Ice Cream Jonsey
Posts: 28878
Joined: Sat Apr 27, 2002 2:44 pm
Location: Colorado
Contact:

Re: I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

RealNC wrote: Thu Aug 15, 2019 6:28 am G-Sync is for games. It doesn't do anything for the desktop.

You can change the refresh rate here:



The refresh rate selected will be used for the desktop and for games that don't run in exclusive fullscreen mode. Games that do run in exclusive mode will use the highest refresh rate automatically if the "preferred refresh rate" option in the "manage 3D settings" section is set to "highest available."
Yeah, that was the thing I found last night... thanks, I would never have been able to find it again (not sarcasm, the UX is not great, not terrible).

But that's OK, I don't get these things for the USER EXPERIENCE, I get them to see colors that aren't faded and muted. Which I now can!!
the dark and gritty...Ice Cream Jonsey!

User avatar
Ice Cream Jonsey
Posts: 28878
Joined: Sat Apr 27, 2002 2:44 pm
Location: Colorado
Contact:

Re: I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

Flack wrote: Thu Aug 15, 2019 6:50 am I'm running three 27" Acer monitors (two display port, one HDMI). Out of the box they were okay, but look better now after half an hour of fiddling with settings. On my work rig I'm running two Dell 24" monitors and they are not as good as the Acers. Text is not quite as crisp on the Dells, and colors are a bit muted.
I can adjust the HEIGHT of the screen on this one! My spine has never been more thankful, Flack!
the dark and gritty...Ice Cream Jonsey!

User avatar
Ice Cream Jonsey
Posts: 28878
Joined: Sat Apr 27, 2002 2:44 pm
Location: Colorado
Contact:

Re: I bought a new monitor and Christ the world looks different

Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

test post
the dark and gritty...Ice Cream Jonsey!

Post Reply