Which TV/TFT to buy?

[Dust Signs]

Hi,

I'm currently thinking about buying a TV or TFT, but the various technical specifications confuse me a bit. What I'm looking for is a ~30" TV or TFT which I can attach to my graphics card to view HDTV movies (in the future, at the moment, there are only a few trailers - at least in the country I live in ;) ). I don't have a TV at the moment and I'm not planning to watch TV - only to "extend" my desktop to take advantage of the higher resolution to view HDTV material - and maybe work with Visual Studio ;).
There are so many different resolutions, standards etc. - so I don't really know what to buy. What I _think_ is the following:
* The resolution should be as high as possible to be able to take advantage of the high resolution movies
* I'll need a new graphics card to be able to display the movies without flickering
* I'll need to decide which connector I'm going to use - S-Video looks like sh*t - even on 1024x768 (I saw that on a 32" TV of a friend of mine), DVI scares me a bit because of HDCP (if I spend that much money, I want that thing to work in 2, 3,... 5 years at least)
What do you think about that? I'm not quite sure what to do at the moment... maybe just leave it for good and wait another year or two?

Dust Signs

[CWR03]

A lot of HDTV's have a VGA input, but it seems that fewer and fewer video cards have a VGA output. Most of them are moving to DVI only, or DVI/S-Video with a DVI adaptor to VGA. Some (mainly ATI) come with an R/G/B splitter for one or the other output which might be your best option.

I took a friend's laptop into an electronics store and hooked it up to a TV with a VGA patch cable and ran Half-Life² - it looked incredible. The TV was a Viewsonic 3260.

[Dust Signs]

Can VGA handle the high resolutions? I remember a 1600x1200 19" TFT which was some kind of blurry and partly noisy. A DVI->VGA adapter may lower the quality a bit, so is it a good idea to connect the TV to a DVI->VGA adapter on the graphics card's DVI port when running resolutions like 1920x1280? Or am I wrong thinking that for 1080p video material I really need the 1920x1280/1080 resolution?

Dust Signs

[SeeMoreDigital]

Don't allow yourself to get tempted with a 4:3 screen. Go for a 16:9 ;)


Cheers

[Dust Signs]

Don't allow yourself to get tempted with a 4:3 screen. Go for a 16:9 ;)

Isn't that a bit risky if I also plan to use it as extended desktop? A friend of mine bought himself a 16:9 screen and has to scroll around :D

Dust Signs

[CWR03]

You should be able to set the resolution for each display individually. I can set my TV for 16:9 with my normal display at 4:3. The TV display is of course squished because it's not widescreen, but I don't have to scroll anything.

[Shinigami-Sama]

nvidia I've seen is better with TV extentions than ATI, but that may just my bad luck
and I agree, 4:3 should die already
16:9 is much better for your eyes and looks nicer

[Blue_MiSfit]

DVI-> VGA adaptors do not reduce quality at all. The DVI ports on graphics cards support DVI-A mode, which sends the analog signal directly from the video card through the DVI connector. The adaptor is more like a gender changer than anything, it doesn't do any actual conversion.

VGA actually supports higher resolution than standard DVI. VGA can go all the way past 2048x1536 (My monitor does it :D ) Single link DVI maxes out at 1600x1200 @ 60 Hz, or 1080p with 5% blanking IIRC. Of course, most new video cards have at least one dual link DVI connector, which will drive up to one of those new Dell / Apple 30" monitors that do 2560x1600 Some high end cards have two dual link connectors, and the quadro / firegl series have 4 IIRC.

Anyway. Technical rant defending analog component video set aside... I would say future proof your system. Get a TV that will do HDCP over DVI. I know we all hate it over here, but do you want it to work or not? (until they figure out a workaround that is)

You will of course have to get a video card (once these become widely available) that supports HDCP over DVI, or HDMI with a DVI adaptor. God I HATE copy protection that forces you to get new equipment to make something work when your existing equipment would do it just fine otherwise!!!

I've heard really good things about Samsung's DLPs. Most of the cheaper ones only do 720p, but supposedly it's very good. I have to admit, I haven't really checked into the HDTV world TOO much recently, seeing how they're still out of my budget and I find myself incompatible with most flat panel technologies for one reason or another. I'm so spoiled by my G500 21" Trinitron!!

Projectors are the best solution IMO, but theyre expensive :)

~MiSfit

[SeeMoreDigital]

Isn't that a bit risky if I also plan to use it as extended desktop? A friend of mine bought himself a 16:9 screen and has to scroll around...You say you want to keep the screen for between two and five years. If this is the case, you've definitely got to go for an 16:9 shaped display!

Currently I run a 42" 16:9 plasma (HDTV) display and a 17" 1280x768 16:9 LCD monitor. I also have a 19" 4:3 LCD monitor.... I much prefer running the 16:9 monitors together ;)

Besides, 16:9 PC monitors are much more affordable now. And the chances are you'll require a new PC monitor within five years anyway!