I created the above chart to try and make sense of it all, and perhaps save a few souls from the same existential dread I experienced. why, is it so hard to find a monitor that doesn't make you want to tear your hair out? monitor that doesn't cost more than our entire rig, a monitor that is, dare I say it…perfect & affordable.
Let us raise our voices! Let us implore the monitor gods to bless us with a display that is both affordable and amazing. Let us not be content with compromise! The future of PC gaming depends on it ! What monitor tech do you dream of? Are we doomed to a future of trade-offs, or is there hope on the horizon?
39 Comments
OLEDs have great small window HDR brightness but poor full frame sustained brightness vs. FALD displays.
I have a QD-OLED TV and an older FALD VA TV and honestly they both excel at HDR in different ways. They are both the best true HDR experiences you can get, but have different tradeoffs.
If you are planning on using the monitor for content consumption and gaming then you really don’t have to worry about burn in with OLEDs.
See hardware unboxed videos where he purposely burns in his oled.
Waiting for Micro LED monitors.
QDEL might be the answer, we’ll have to wait and see.
Otherwise, good simple chart. Maybe adding brightness characteristics might be interesting.
And yeah, monitor market kinda sucks right now if you don’t want/care for OLED. If you do though, you’re in for a treat, tons of great options.
I just bought a 240hz IPS. Was a lot cheaper than an OLED although I know that those screens are immaculate.
I would add to the downsides of mini-LED: increase in pixel response time when using HDR. So you have a choice: either high responsiveness without HDR, or HDR with terrible responsiveness.
Your top options should be equal and divided by Bright Room and Dark Room. Have you looked at a OLED panel in a really bright room, you essentially loose your contast ratio as it can’t hit a high enough peak brightness and your colors look less saturated where as a Mini LED will maintain its contrast ratio as it’s achieved from the peak brightness not from “True Blacks”.
Your VA cons are very outdated.
Text clarity with HDR is a topic I didn’t see discussed much when I was getting a new monitor. I picked up an OLED with a high refresh and the thing looks great for video and gaming. Text is a blurry mess when HDR is activated. Text clarity is something taken for granted and should be called out.
I’m cheap. I would buy a VA monitor. Second choice would be a Mini LED monitor. I don’t like an IPS monitor, because of the bad contrast ratio. That reminds me of early LCD TVs. The had bad contrast ratio. When I watch series that plays in the evening then the color black is not dark. It is more gey. It makes it boring to watch the series. I don’t like OLED monitors, because of burn in. I’m waiting for an affordable 32 inch Mini LED monitor. Until then I stick with my 12 year old TV,
You forgot to add CRT to this list
So basically, nothing is great, everything is mid ?
I currently use a TN monitor, but I’ll be getting a QD-OLED monitor in the near future to replace it. 😎
I disagree on multiple things. First of all, VAs: colour accuracy is good on good VAs, smearing and ghosting are worse than IPS, but on a good VA – not that noticeable. VA panels are also not universally worse than IPS, if you choose between decent VA vs decent IPS for the same price, it’s mostly down to personal preference.
“Excellent deep blacks” for VAs is wrong. 3000:1 is good, but nowhere near close to inf:1 of OLED.
“Fake HDR 400” is a thing, but it’s purely fault of marketing. Don’t blame technology for that.
“Excellent wide accurate colours” is not accurate. First of all, VAs can have similar colours. Secondly, not all IPS have good colours, and even the good ones, don’t have better colours than OLEDs. And yet it’s not listed as an advantage of OLEDs.
IPS glow
Looks like you forgot about the q LED models. I have a Samsung 32-in 1440p 144 HZ Qled monitor
Once you decide on a technology you can go rtings.com and see their best <insert monitor type> lists. They list the best of overall, mid range, budget options, etc. They have data from a wide range of tests so you can choose based on whatever is important to you.
The difference a monitor makes is very underrated on this sub. I upgraded to a $1200 4K OLED last year and it has been the biggest upgrade to my PC since getting SSD over a decade ago.
so.. the correct answer is to save up for a while and get a nice Mini LED display.. least in my brain, best without the possibility of burn in if you’re like me and hate having your taskbar hidden
How would a laser projector fit in here?
I would switch IPS by VA.
I get what you’re saying, but mini-LED isn’t a panel technology like IPS or VA, so it kinda feels out of place here.
It’s a way of *illuminating* your panel.
I’ve got a VA monitor with mini-LED and it’s awesome, btw.
My VA Samsung odyssey g7 had great colors, almost on pair with my OLED G6. There was no ghosting as well. The only major differences with my oled screen is the black colors and HDR.
Thank you kindly. I’ll use this to explain to others.
Btw, have you found one u like yet? What’s ur budget like?
You forgot VRR flickering with OLED
OLEDs also have a weird subpixel layout resulting in odd red/green edges. They’re great for entertainment, terrible for productivity.
I can never go back after getting OLED, everything just looks so amazing now. Got G4 for single player games and msi qd oled got multiplayer games. Yes the con applies here, very costly
IPS for me. Beautiful colours, great viewing angles, not premium panels anymore, tons of options from budget to medium high end.
I did the same a month ago. In the end I decided to keep my LG 27GL850-B for now.
Honestly I don’t agree with this, different panels for different applications there’s no one best panel technology, you want VRR for a lower power device? Well suddenly IPS is your best shot, you want better contrast but the risk of burn in? OLED is your shot
I’d agree with this graphic if not for the arrow going down the left hand side
You omitted the very important factor that most OLEDs have poor text clarity
mini led is the only answer
I just go with IPS, Relatively cheap available.Â
The next step is to check out if the monitor stand allows for height adjustment. My desk is too deep for mounted monitors so I need stands.Â
TN is still better than OLED for tryharding fps imo. I have both and while I use the OLED 99% for most things, whenever i break out my old tn i do way better and feel way more confident playing aggressively.
XG2431 is jack of all trades, master of none. Might be closest to what you want, otherwise yes, monitors are shit AND overpriced.
Mini led has some blooming, but IMO it isn’t noticeable or bothersome, at least on a 27″ screen with around 300 zones. I find it the best of both worlds
Put QD-OLED up there above OLED
When upgrading monitors recently to go to 4k I ended up keeping all three test monitors, one is a cheap ips microled from LG, the other two are mini led, one is a color calibrated 144hz panel and the other is a 185hz well reviewed panel. The 144hz color calibrated one became my center panel, the 185hz became my discord panel and the LG which I thought I’d be disappointed with ended up impressing me enough to become my second most used panel. The viewing angles are awful but when viewed head on it looks amazing.
I say all that to say that while this is very good, it honestly comes down to the specific monitor a lot of the time.
Bought a 2k oled second hand refurbished. Perfect condition. Not a scratch on it. in box and about £300 less. Was still expensive obviously but that made it much more feasible and I spread it out over 3 months as well.
Never really bought myself something so nice before. The difference from gaming on my old tv to this made my jaw drop. Cyberpunk is beautiful. Can’t wait to play Red dead 2 again. Death stranding as well. It’s breathed new life into gaming for me.
i’ve had my oled for 2 years and have had no burn in issues. i do take care of it and have it auto power off after 5 min of idling and have a moving wallpaper with wallpaper engine.