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A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

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Re: A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

#71

Post by andrewzah »

CRTs are still heavily used in the smash bros. melee gaming community as the nintendo gamecube natively outputs to 480i.

Using a modern 720p+ display involves upscaling, which causes latency. This latency is wildly inconsistent across tvs, which makes competitive play untenable.

There are monitors with extremely low response time (~1ms), BenQ was the go-to for a while. It used to be that the cost was prohibitive, but now finding CRTs is more prohibitive... especially finding a good trinitron.

Re: A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

#72

Post by ddingus »

I love CRT displays myself. The standard 50/60hz is a bit rough, unless one is working on a high persistence phosphor. Older monochrome, amber, green screens often have that phosphor.

I like how simple they are to drive too. Managing a high resolution analog stream takes far fewer resources.

For personal electronics, retro fun, I recommend one.

Glowing phosphor in a glass tube just rocks!

There were variations too. I got to work on one of these in the 80's:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T-F7ZySfgZ0

In a dim room, these are beautiful. Up to 4k resolution in the 70's, no display buffer. Surprisingly techy looking and feeling.

I will miss CRTs when they are no longer available. They should be made in 16:9 for a while longer. People would use them.

All that said, current flat panels continue to improve. They are fine for the majority of things most of us do.

Re: A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

#73

Post by dghughes »

bserge wrote: post #8

My eyes used to hurt a lot on CRTs. A few hours every day in front of one and I could not go outside without sunglasses, anything would make my eyes hurt. Everything was fine if I went a week without using a computer. With LCDs, that's not a problem anymore, and I like it.

I remember when I switched from a CRT to an LCD monitor. The difference was so dramatic I remember my head aching. For me it wasn't the brightness it was the curve vs flat. Going from looking at a curved screen for years to a flat one was a massive change.

Re: A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

#75

Post by kristopolous »

Unless you play video games, the space, power and heat aren't worth it. I didn't have much desk space and higher resolutions became really cheap to come by.

So maybe 8 years ago I got rid of my 2 fw900s and now use rotatable 4ks that I put side by side in portrait mode, essentially getting a ~4kx4k square (18:16). It's $750 or whatever 2 go for now well spent. Most modern laptops can even drive two monitors as long you get the adapters right. It's a really good work set up. Highly recommended.

I'd honestly say it's the most significant thing that's affected how I interact with computers (and I've done foot pedals, gestural systems, custom made input devices I've designed myself, repurposed midi device for UX, my own window manager, etc ... 2 4k monitors in portrait is the top of the list, really)

Re: A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

#76

Post by rburhum »

nottorp wrote: post #4

I have a different problem with LCDs. I still think they're too bright. With a CRT you could set everything to white on black and you had almost no light coming out of the screen. Also brightness meant brightness and you could turn it way down for when working in dim light or darkness. Of course i'm talking about text work here. Maybe when OLED monitors become affordable we'll go back to monitors that aren't basicall…

I have OLED screens all over my house - I can never tell if the monitors are on or off unless the screensaver kicks in. 0 regrets spending that money.

Re: A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

#77

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

paulcole wrote: post #61
Sebb767 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For work, LCD is absolutely superior. Gaming - especially shooters -, however, are a totally different use-case: Refresh rate is absolutely necessary for quick reaction times, while something like readability is not as big of a factor (Games tend to use big and easy-to-read fonts). Of course, you still need some color quality to spot enemies, but it's very different from reading text for several hours.

> Refresh rate is absolutely necessary for quick reaction times This reminds me of weekend warrior bicyclists dropping $5k on components to save a few ounces of weight and go a tiny bit faster. Most people are average enough at video games (or whatever their hobby of choice is) that they’re still going to be average whether they have a CRT or an LCD (or whatever pricy pice of gear they “need”). Sure it’s fun to spend…

> This reminds me of weekend warrior bicyclists dropping $5k on components to save a few ounces of weight and go a tiny bit faster.

Was in a high end bike store in Philadelphia in around 2007 or so (pre-crash). There's a guy in front of me at the repair desk who is holding a carbon fiber bottle cage. The tech is looking at it, because it's cracked. He tells the guy that he probably overtightened the bolt holding it on ("very easy to do on the carbon cages") and suggests that he just puts a metal (even titanium!) washer between the bolt and cage, and everything will be OK.

Guy says "yeah, but the extra weight of the washer that would mean that it was pointless to buy the lightest possible cage"

I interrupt and ask the Guy if he ever adds slightly too much powder to his energy drink when going out for a ride.

/badaboom

Re: A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

#78

Post by Arubis »

srtjstjsj wrote: post #18
nottorp wrote: post #4

I have a different problem with LCDs. I still think they're too bright. With a CRT you could set everything to white on black and you had almost no light coming out of the screen. Also brightness meant brightness and you could turn it way down for when working in dim light or darkness. Of course i'm talking about text work here. Maybe when OLED monitors become affordable we'll go back to monitors that aren't basicall…

It's mildly annoying but easily fixed with a touch of ambient lighting or a software tool looks f.lux. Brightness isn't nearly as bad for eye strain has contrast between the screen and ambient light.

Better even than f.lux was Nocturne (https://github.com/strider72/blacktree-nocturne), though it hasn’t worked in years. (Maybe a decade? I can’t even find screenshots.)

Nocturne would let you invert your entire screen, then shift it to monochrome (ideally red). Obviously useless for gaming or color work, but I’ve not run across anything since that’s so great for late night text work across the whole OS.

Re: A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

#79

Post by ddingus »

vidanay wrote: post #51
elric wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many LEDs have an annoying flicker as well, which can be very annoying and distracting for me. Especially around christmas time, when everyone and their grandmother puts out thousands of cheap LEDs. Even when they're not trying to blink, they're still flickering. I suspect I'm sensitive to this kind of stuff because I suffer from migraines, but still, I can't imagine I'm the only one.

Christmas LEDs are technological abominations. They literally hurt to look at.

And they don't really twinkle like the heat driven, blinker style incandescent lights do. I loved to watch the pattern on the ceiling as a kid. It would change in subtle ways. Never the same, but sometimes really close.

I got a set and I am scared of them. Fire hazard. But I do run them once in a while for young ones at Xmas time. Just so they can check it out.

Re: A 20-year-old CRT monitor can be better than a 4K LCD (2019)

#80

Post by Sebb767 »

paulcole wrote: post #61
Sebb767 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For work, LCD is absolutely superior. Gaming - especially shooters -, however, are a totally different use-case: Refresh rate is absolutely necessary for quick reaction times, while something like readability is not as big of a factor (Games tend to use big and easy-to-read fonts). Of course, you still need some color quality to spot enemies, but it's very different from reading text for several hours.

> Refresh rate is absolutely necessary for quick reaction times This reminds me of weekend warrior bicyclists dropping $5k on components to save a few ounces of weight and go a tiny bit faster. Most people are average enough at video games (or whatever their hobby of choice is) that they’re still going to be average whether they have a CRT or an LCD (or whatever pricy pice of gear they “need”). Sure it’s fun to spend…

> Sure it’s fun to spend money on your hobby but to say it’s “absolutely essential” is a little silly.

Well, when optimizing for FPS performance, it is :)

I agree that it's rather unnecessary in general, though. You can game on an old TV with 60hz interlaced and 30ms response time just fine. But then you're probably very much not in the market for dropping four-digit sums on a display.

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