What Resolution and Refresh Rate Are The Best Value? - August Q&A

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00:00 - Welcome Back to Monitors Unboxed
00:32 - Does Brightness Affect Calibration?
02:07 - Diminishing Returns When Buying a Monitor?
06:33 - Optimal Configurations for HDR Gaming?
09:05 - Why Do Companies Make Display Panels with Non-RGB Layouts?
14:16 - How Many LCD Dimming Zones to Match OLED?
16:13 - Do Cables Affect Performance?
18:03 - How Far Away Are DisplayPort 2.0 Monitors?
19:45 - What Power Supply Option is Better?
21:45 - How Come Overdrive Settings Aren't Better Tuned?
26:13 - How Has Using the Alienware QD-OLED Been Going?
27:30 - Outro

What Resolution and Refresh Rate Are The Best Value? - August Q&A

Disclaimer: Any pricing information shown or mentioned in this video was accurate at the time of video production, and may have since changed

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[blazbohinc]

Imho, it's best to have a good panel that does it's job properly and exchange that for lower framerate. I'm happy with 144hz or 120hz if that means I get zero overshoot, ghosting and excellent variable refresh rate support

[liquidsunshine]

Great video! I went from a 1080p 60hz ... to a 4k 60hz ... to a 34" 3440x1440 100hz .. and finally a 27" 1080p 240hz monitor!

My TV is a C1 4k 120hz OLED with all the game features.

[konga]

If I recall correctly, the 10, 000-zone macbook is actually 2, 500 zones, where each zone has 4 LEDs (so apple marketed it as a 10, 000 LED backlight). With that in mind, 2, 500 - 4, 000 zones would probably give a very OLED-like image in about 99% of dynamic content. What it still wouldn't do, however, is nail the look of text and other high-contrast screen elements. There's nothing like a pure stripe RGB OLED screen when viewing white text on dark backgrounds. A 4K LCD would need 8 million backlight zones to do that well :p

[jeffreymalone]

I recently upgraded from a 27” 1440p 144Hz monitor to a 28” 4K 144Hz monitor when I got a 3080, and at least to me it makes a really big difference! I sit about 32” away and have pretty sharp eyesight, so that may be part of why. Of course you can see more details in textures and such, but to me the best part is how “consistent” it makes the image with no aliasing on edges of objects. Fizzling and popping as a result of aliasing always caught my eye, so I personally see 4K as a good upgrade!

[ztz]

1440p 144hz i think is the best, the new gpu's will be able to fully utilise that aswell on most games. i'm aiming for a 4070/4080

[jshowe]

This channel is really going well! All the content is really good and what i would expect based on the name. Keep it up Tim!

[bilbobaggins]

I jumped into PC gaming just over a year ago and I was using a MSI Optix MAG274QRF-QD 27" 1440p IPS 165Hz gaming monitor but I was never really satisfied with PC gaming until I bought a 48" C1 5.5 months ago to use as my monitor...and I love it!!!
I am more than happy to go from 165hz to 120hz for the larger 4k true HDR picture.
I have already put over 2, 300 hours on my C1, and I last checked a couple weeks ago for any burn in after I crossed the 2, 000 hr mark...and no burn in yet.
I average around 14 hours usage a day and I have had no issues whatsoever.
Now my PC gaming experience is like console gaming but without having to choose between fidelity/resolution mode vs performance.

[-INFERNUS-]

I'm still happy 1 yr later with my ASUS PG259QN 360hz 1080p display, thanks Tim for that awesome review on it last yr. 😊 Even games like the new Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered will stress the GPU a lot at 1080p with settings maxed or very close to it. I'm using a 3070 + 5950x so it will be stressed more than the CPU.

[NathanOakley]

You may or not be interested in the set up I just ordered as it’s a little unusual.

The system (not the interesting bit) i9 12900k 3060ti
The monitor(s) 4k projector 60hz & …..drum roll…. A 4k 144hz 32” vertical! This is used as a 1080p 144hz gaming monitor as that’s what fits on the vertical screen.

The reason is because you can push the settings at 1080p and when I need high res (big screen) I don’t need high frame rates.



This will be the second time I have set my system up like this. My last setup was a 1440p monitor on its side so I ran 720p again at high settings and high refresh rates. That outgoing system 4790k & 980 and then 2060 12gb wasn’t strong enough for 4k so the screen wasn’t used for gaming.

Hope you find my unusual setup interesting.

[bryanviviage]

Just wanna say thanks. My CQ27G2 actually just arrived yesterday and I was completely blown away at how great it looked after calibrating it with the settings that you provided. It's my first time buying a monitor completely blind, as local tech stores in my area do monitors a great injustice by looping a very low res (720p-ish) video on them. This was a problem because I'm coming from another VA monitor, and as such I'm rather used to colors popping over being accurate. As a result, the few IPS panels they had on display looked....really bad, including a VG27AQ which from your and Rtings review were quite favorable. In a stroke of luck, the CQ27G2 went on a really nice sale earlier this week, so I did some research and pulled the trigger. Really can't thank you enough for all the work you put in to your videos. I guess if I had to ask a question, do you think the downsides of a VA panel are overblown whenever it gets brought up in a discussion? I understand that it's not perfect with some issues like black smearing, but honestly while gaming I can't notice anything at all, even if it may be present.

[Kadaj_]

Alienware AW2721D still the sweet spot and best Gaming Monitor for me in all cases - love it <3

[ThermaL-tybw]

i got the G7, bought it for hdr600, which Does help a lot more then the 3x hdr400 monitors i've had
it has 240hz 1440p, when i saw the desktop for the first time, the mouse was so smooth
games play with a new dimension, the game just opens up in front of your eyes going from 144 to 240,
even if the games don't do 240, the difference in smoothness and awareness you have, it's night and day, really !
i dsr the desktop to 4k and set scaling to 150%, nice smooth and crisp desktop
and games run smooth in windows 11 now, only using a 2080ti ventus oc, 8700K @ 5ghz, 32gb

[whosdr]

On the topic of subpixel rendering, libraries that render text in UI can query against the sub-pixel layout (which I believe is in the EDID) and adjust accordingly, so it is only video/image content that would suffer from issues by using non-standard layouts, and then the render engine for that content is likely to be scaling and processing on top already.

[Theartist]

Love what you guys do. Amazing and in-depth work and reviews.

[Rkcuddles]

Love love love q&a videos. I often have to spend hours scrolling through comments to find an answer or watching 8 more videos just to get an answer to a specific question. Please please keep posting this kind of content.

Surprised by your responses to a few of these. Is it easier to drive a 4k monitor at 144hz or a 1440 at 240hz?

With high res VR headsets, we regularly use two display ports to drive the resolution and refresh rate, how come we don’t do this with monitors?

Why don’t we see more more 5kx2k monitors that run at 120hz for productivity and 144hz+ for gaming at 1440? I know this compounds two questions, but still please someone clue me in.

Sounds like from a monitor standpoint, other than QD-OLED and 10k dimming zones, there isn’t much to wait for if I am considering an upgrade. DP 2.0 is unnecessary, and HDMI 2.1 is showing up more and more. Am I wrong? I know this question always depends… but generally that seems to be true, can anyone please comment?

[AlexCapi]

I like that you have a seperate channel for monitor stuff.

[fullmoon]

RE: Length of display cables:

If you need longer cables and/or you want better stability, you can get optical cables. Optical HDMI can go to like 100m, and their signal integrity is unparalleled compared to copper cables. Price can be a little expensive bc there are optical transceiver electronics inside both of the connector shells.

[beckyp]

Your content rocks! I just pulled the plug on LG C2 for my new gaming monitor. Found it for a $100 off sale plus no sales tax. Right now on the great river site buying a full articulating wall mount for it. Thanks for all the reviews and comparisons. Would have picked the Alienware 34" oled but need mine to be 38-42" range so it wasn't quite large enough.

[ViciousVioletteLV]

I'm so glad I found this video and your channel. I just upgraded to a 3080ti and have been in search of a monitor under a $1000 and you made it so easy for me. Thank you,

[ThunderingRoar]

Ive heard cases of DSC causing issues when using custom resolutions so having proper DP 2.0 would be ideal. We could also start seeing more native 10bit panels instead of 8bit+frc