I need to buy a new monitor today, which one?

[sochet]

Hey guys,

For the life of me monitors are something I know nothing about. I'm a mixing/mastering engineer so as long as it's reliable it's something I pay no attention to!


Saying that I want to get a second monitor for my home MP setup. (I currently have a Samsung 226BW). I'd like to get a second to have more screen real estate, and something to plug a games console into (so it needs HDMI ports)

Past that I have no idea what to get, I'd like it to be 22" (to match the size of my other one, I think it'd be weird to have 2 different sizes)

Price wise I'd like to spend under £150 ($250) and certainly no more than £200 ($300). Colour neutrality doesn't bother me, in fact I'd like a "Larger than life" image for gaming.

My price range is probably way under everyone here, but do any of you have an idea of what I should look at? (no pun intended)


Ps. It now turns out my Samsung has died completely so I desperately need one now!

 

[holyjohn]

I own Samsung SyncMaster T240. It's 24" widescreen LCD monitor, with 5ms response speed and 20000:1 contrast ratio. It was release few years ago, so I don't know if the price went down but I've been using it for 2 years and it's still wonderful.

If you play alot of games, get ones with low response time, like less than 2ms if possible.

 

[borisiii]

I'd recommend the BenQ V2220H. It's 22", 1920x1080, led, very rich colours, really deep blacks. It's stylish and extremely thin. £145 on amazon. It has VGA, DVI and HDMI. They also make the V2420H which is 24".

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B003D8VXA2/ref=ord_cart_shr?ie=UTF8&m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE

 

[sochet]

I'd recommend the BenQ V2220H. It's 22", 1920x1080, led, very rich colours, really deep blacks. It's stylish and extremely thin. £145 on amazon. It has VGA, DVI and HDMI. They also make the V2420H which is 24".

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B003D8VXA2/ref=ord_cart_shr?ie=UTF8&m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE

Actually I've been looking at the benq range, and ebuyer has a BenQG2420HDBE for £150 (24"). How does it match up to the v222oh?

 

[borisiii]

Actually I've been looking at the benq range, and ebuyer has a BenQG2420HDBE for £150 (24"). How does it match up to the v222oh?

The V2220H and V2420H are newer and much thinner (also higher contrast and better general spec). Also, the ebuyer one has no HDMI. In terms of performance comparison I can't comment - I only have the V2220H, but I can tell you that it is really good.

 

[slughead]

I've always had really good luck with samsungs. I've bought a total of 4 that are all 100% functional. I have a 19" that I bought like 4 years ago that still works great.

However, I hear that they have crappy specs compared to competitors, and even Acers (which are cheaper) sometimes look a lot better.

 

[2contagious]

I've always had really good luck with samsungs. I've bought a total of 4 that are all 100% functional. I have a 19" that I bought like 4 years ago that still works great.

However, I hear that they have crappy specs compared to competitors, and even Acers (which are cheaper) sometimes look a lot better.

Same here, never had bad luck with Samsung screens. However, I would only recommend them for the use that you're after (gaming and general use).

 

[sochet]

Hey guys,

Thanks for all your help! In the end I just went down to Yo-yo tech in London and picked up a Benq G2420HDBL. It differs from the one I posted before in that it's LED not LCD and doesn't have a HDMI port (although is compliant to run an 1080p signal over DVI). It cost about £20 more than online, but I was in the middle of a big mix project!

One thing I will say, is straight out of the box it isn't as vibrant as my old Samsung. I need to fiddle around with the colour settings (Or get my gf to do it, 'cus she's a graphic designer ) but it defiantly is a lot brighter.


http://benq.co.uk/products/LCD/index.cfm/product/1157