I'm wanting to upgrade my Acer V173 TN 17" monitor to something larger and clearer (maybe 24") to go with my Mac Mini. I use my computer mainly for novel writing, e-mailing and browsing. I play no games, watch very little in the way of video and don't do anything like photo editing therefore colour rendition is not a high priority. What IS important to me is clarity of text on the screen. Monitors that offer flicker-free and low blue light technology are of interest to me though the latter can be obtained with an app. My question is what type of monitor screen is best for me needs. I read such varied assessments of the screen types but most reviews seem to focus on gaming which is totally irrelevant to me. VA screens offer greater contrast but I would welcome opinions.
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TN, IPS or VA?
- Thread starter mikethebook
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VA offers better contrast however it can suffer from color shifts at angle. IPS is the best in terms of viewing angle but has a glow effect making blacks never really black.
Personally I like VA panels. I think for your usage it may be better as well. If you like to read or write in a dark room inverting the text colors (black background, a lighter color text) may be more pleasing to the eye and with darks are what VA panels excel at.
Personally I like VA panels. I think for your usage it may be better as well. If you like to read or write in a dark room inverting the text colors (black background, a lighter color text) may be more pleasing to the eye and with darks are what VA panels excel at.
Thanks for your comments. Presumably black text on a white background will also be clearer, sharper too because of the better blacks. Is that correct?
Thanks. What model did you buy out of interest? And did you specifically go for a VA monitor for any particular reasons. I'm wondering how good you find the sharpness of text.
Here's a listing of IPS displays to check through:
Comprehensive List of S-IPS/H-IPS/e-IPS and other IPS Based LCD Monitors
Comprehensive List of S-IPS/H-IPS/e-IPS and other IPS Based LCD Monitors
It's a BenQ BL3200PT, which I picked partly because I was concerned about IPS glow, partly because the anti-glare treatment is very mild, and partly because running it at 2560x1440 gives me almost exactly the same pixel size as the old Apple running at 1920x1200. There's almost 1/3 more screen space available, at the same apparent visual resolution.
Getting into 4k didn't seem to give any real advantage and I would have had to change my graphics card. Text seems plenty sharp to me; I probably could have gone for 27 inch and got a perceived increase in sharpness, but at the expense of size or screen space. With this monitor, I suspect that my current limiter on text sharpness is my eyeglass prescription rather than the monitor. (which reminds me, I'm due ...)
The anti-glare was a bit jarring after living with the Apple LCD's lovely deep black blacks for 7 years, but I have to admit that it's nice not having to jockey around to avoid the reflections. Fortunately the BL3200's anti-glare seems pretty minimal, no cross-hatching or blurring that I can detect.
Getting into 4k didn't seem to give any real advantage and I would have had to change my graphics card. Text seems plenty sharp to me; I probably could have gone for 27 inch and got a perceived increase in sharpness, but at the expense of size or screen space. With this monitor, I suspect that my current limiter on text sharpness is my eyeglass prescription rather than the monitor. (which reminds me, I'm due ...)
The anti-glare was a bit jarring after living with the Apple LCD's lovely deep black blacks for 7 years, but I have to admit that it's nice not having to jockey around to avoid the reflections. Fortunately the BL3200's anti-glare seems pretty minimal, no cross-hatching or blurring that I can detect.
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Thanks for your replies. Thank you for the IPS list but I, too, would be concerned about IPS glow and VA would seem to be more suited to my requirements that TN.