Building a gaming PC

[Restlessdingo32]

I am considering the BenQ more seriously even if it is around 700+ € which is a bit more than I wanted to pay originally. It has (almost) everything I wanted: 4K, high quality calibrated IPS panel, good ergonomic stand, good contrast and good features (flicker free, low blue light, HDCP, etc.). It does not have Freesync sadly, but either way most similar monitors seem to have a lame 40-60 Hz range. It does have 4 ms. response time and very low input lag (< 8 ms). It probably is still not good enough for competitive twitch FPS purists, but I think it's perfectly good for non competitive gaming.

Now at that price I could get a 2K 144Hz VA panel, the stuff "gamers" rave about. Now I am used to 60 Hz but way back when I had a CRT and then a VGA LCD I used to play at 75 Hz and when I switched to a bigger 60 Hz monitor I could swear I noticed some jitter and flicker. Is that just the light flicker from that generation of panels? Or does a higher refresh rate + framerate truly make a difference in fluidity? You guys know what kind of games I play. Is 144Hz only relevant for tournament level FPS?

If it helps any I ended up getting a 32" Samsung 4k VA panel recently and haven't been disappointed given the price. I don't believe it's a true 32" (31.5) but had 4k, Freesync (overrated in many cases, TBH), reasonable color gamuts, comparable brightness to other similar priced options and only cost around $350. It's not the greatest monitor but fit my needs.

In terms of VA... I haven't had any problems with it. I did a lot of reading on TN, VA, IPS and the various sub-categories of each before buying and the bottom line seemed to be each has it's advantages and disadvantages. I don't understand why people insist IPS is somehow magically superior to the other options. It depends on the application of the display. In fact, damn near every element to the display falls under the same lines. 2160p vs 1440p vs 1080p, refresh rates, input lag, etc. all depend on your intended application of the display.

Lastly, yes... Most 4k Monitors above the 27-28" range are ridiculously expensive if they have certain features. Some of which cannot even be fully leveraged (case and point, HDR on a display with a lowish brightness). Basically, they're jacking up the prices because they can .

 

[volsung]

At least for me the thing about IPS is the viewing angle and color consistency. I think VAs have much better contrast, but often people report color degradation if viewed from the side. Since I want to use this as a TV also, this would be important. How big of a deal is HDR really?

BTW I just found out the BenQ PD3200U has the exact same panel as the Acer XB321HK, a more expensive G-Sync "gaming" monitor.

 

[Restlessdingo32]

At least for me the thing about IPS is the viewing angle and color consistency. I think VAs have much better contrast, but often people report color degradation if viewed from the side. Since I want to use this as a TV also, this would be important. How big of a deal is HDR really?

I actually don't notice much difference with viewing angle at all on the VA monitor. Even if I stand at the edge of the room (Monitor is centered in the room, wall mounted). Everything I read indicated VA is kind of a middle ground technology. Some of the pros of IPS without some of the disadvantages. Short of hardcore FPS gaming I'd steer away from TN monitors. Even then certain IPS/VA can get pretty damn good input lag and response time.

In any case, I ended up getting it with an X1X. I also routinely use Netflix. Both of these offer 4k support. Most games on the 1X aren't going to get much from super fast refresh rates. My rig isn't going to get super fast refresh rates in newer games. My hardcore FPS days are in the past. I didn't see a need to go high refresh rate and wanted 4k content. I didn't want to break open the piggy bank either. This is the type of stuff I'd consider when going for a new monitor/display. What do you want it to do?

 

[SigilFey]

Reminder that we avoid the "PC vs. Console" angst.

Basically, they're jacking up the prices because they can .

You're absolutely right here. I went for almost 20 years buying this or that "top-of-the-line" piece of hardware for +/- $1,000, and I've had very few good experiences. I'd always be left struggling to make things work properly, downloading driver after driver to try to fix issues, being disappointed because XYZ program didn't support the cool new features (or did so poorly)...

Invariably, a few years later, the features would become standard, and I'd be getting middling performance. Meanwhile, a friend would build a new system with that same hardware. They'd be getting amazing performance. Of course, it only cost them a few hundred bucks, 'cause the price had really dropped...

My observation has been that if a piece of tech is brand new and super-expensive, it's a sign that the manufacturers know that sales and satisfaction will be limited. Therefore, they need to maximize their profits (primarily selling to whales). Once the issues are ironed out: manufacturing becomes smooth, the design is stable, performance increases, support is widespread, and prices drop off sharply. That's when I want to buy it.

How big of a deal is HDR really?

It's very nice to have, but I'd argue that its impact on my enjoyment of a game is very, very small. Occasionally, while enjoying a quiet moment or taking a screenshot of a sunset, it'll be like: "Oooh..." For the vast majority of any game, I don't even notice it. Plus, on PC, there are all sorts of ways (like SweetFX filters) that can be used to produce an almost identical result for free. Granted, there aren't presets for every game in creation...but neither will every game support HDR.

It's sort of the difference between a cake that's been frosted with a spatula, and an identical cake that's been artistically frosted by hand. It's not going to change what the cake tastes like.

 

[volsung]

Shit, back to the drawing board. Apparently the BenQ PD3200U uses a shitty panel that has widespread flickering issues, where the screen goes completely black and then back to normal. I read reviews where they said this happened when using DisplayPort and older GPU's, and considering it is a graphics designer monitor it would explain the many reports (I doubt most designers have modern GPU's) but that's still no excuse I suppose.

However I discovered the LG 32UD89, very similar monitor except it has a slightly smaller 31.5" screen, an arguably better quality LG panel, and 40-60 Hz Freesync. It even has some sort of HDR emulation. Price is similar to the BenQ.

Any experiences with the LG 32UD89? Any suggestions? I will also look into VA's a bit more, like the BenQ EW3270U. Sigh, I just want a big monitor... I hate shopping.

 

[SigilFey]

Shit, back to the drawing board. Apparently the BenQ PD3200U uses a shitty panel that has widespread flickering issues, where the screen goes completely black and then back to normal. I read reviews where they said this happened when using DisplayPort and older GPU's, and considering it is a graphics designer monitor it would explain the many reports (I doubt most designers have modern GPU's) but that's still no excuse I suppose.

However I discovered the LG 32UD89, very similar monitor except it has a slightly smaller 31.5" screen, an arguably better quality LG panel, and 40-60 Hz Freesync. It even has some sort of HDR emulation. Price is similar to the BenQ.

Any experiences with the LG 32UD89? Any suggestions? I will also look into VA's a bit more, like the BenQ EW3270U. Sigh, I just want a big monitor... I hate shopping.

In all seriousness, go to a Best Buy or similar megastore and look at the monitors they have on display. The great thing about monitors is: when you see it running, that's what it's like. If you like the image quality and performance, buy that one.

I can personally recommend ASUS, MSI, and the Acer Predator (if you want to go the Gsync route). I'm presently using an ASUS MX279H. Love it. The colors are just glorious. Huge viewing angle from all directions.

 

[volsung]

Yeah maybe I should go to a store. There are some large electronics stores in town but they mostly have TV's, and possibly not the monitors I am looking for. In another thread I mentioned how obsessed I become with getting the absolute best cost/benefit ratio, so choosing just some monitor in a store would leave me wondering what could have been.

Either way I think I narrowed it down to either the LG 32U89 or (still) the BenQ PD3200U. I read some recent reviews and people say theirs arrived flicker free or they RMA'ed it and got a flicker free monitor. Guess they fixed it.

So given that these are both 4K IPS panels, 32" (well LG is 31.5") with roughly similar specifications, what are your opinions? Things that might tip the balance are that the BenQ is known to be very fast and responsive, whereas I could not find the LG's numbers. The LG has no swivel but I could get a third party VESA mount, and it has better contrast and Freesync. I am pretty sure the panel on my Dell U2415 is made by LG, and after 3 years of constant use it is still in perfect shape. The BenQ panel is made by AU Optronics which for whatever reason appears to have a negative reputation.

 

[EngryEngineer]

Yeah maybe I should go to a store. There are some large electronics stores in town but they mostly have TV's, and possibly not the monitors I am looking for. In another thread I mentioned how obsessed I become with getting the absolute best cost/benefit ratio, so choosing just some monitor in a store would leave me wondering what could have been.

Either way I think I narrowed it down to either the LG 32U89 or (still) the BenQ PD3200U. I read some recent reviews and people say theirs arrived flicker free or they RMA'ed it and got a flicker free monitor. Guess they fixed it.

So given that these are both 4K IPS panels, 32" (well LG is 31.5") with roughly similar specifications, what are your opinions? Things that might tip the balance are that the BenQ is known to be very fast and responsive, whereas I could not find the LG's numbers. The LG has no swivel but I could get a third party VESA mount, and it has better contrast and Freesync. I am pretty sure the panel on my Dell U2415 is made by LG, and after 3 years of constant use it is still in perfect shape. The BenQ panel is made by AU Optronics which for whatever reason appears to have a negative reputation.

I agree with going and looking at them, but if it is down to those 2 options, I'd go with the LG solely because of the better contrast and freesync (assuming you have an AMD gpu).

I still feel a little mixed on the adaptive sync's necessity in most cases, but right now almost every card is going to struggle a bit when putting out a 4k image which means you are more likely to get fluctuating frame rates. I can personally deal with 30fps, it isn't optimal, but it is fine, but I find a signal that jumps between 30 and 60 really jarring, adaptive sync helps with that

 

[volsung]

I have lived all my life without adaptive sync so not having it won't kill me, but I would like to try it (especially at 4K). The reason I am interested in a Freesync monitor is "futureproofing". Every Nvidia forum is packed full of people bitter at Nvidia and their G-sync schemes, especially because allowing Freesync costs them nothing. I'm hoping maybe sometime Nvidia will finally be graceful enough to accept defeat and enable Freesync. Otherwise I would look into getting an AMD GPU, especially if they release something strong enough and energy efficient sometime soon.

On a different note, I don't understand why some reviewers praise some monitor for having a certain property, but complain about another that has a minimal difference. For instance, *absolute* input lag: gaming monitor 63 ms, non-gaming 65 ms. One is wonderful, the other merely tolerable and for "casuals". It seems like their minds are already made up before the review.

 

[SigilFey]

I have lived all my life without adaptive sync so not having it won't kill me, but I would like to try it (especially at 4K). The reason I am interested in a Freesync monitor is "futureproofing". Every Nvidia forum is packed full of people bitter at Nvidia and their G-sync schemes, especially because allowing Freesync costs them nothing. I'm hoping maybe sometime Nvidia will finally be graceful enough to accept defeat and enable Freesync. Otherwise I would look into getting an AMD GPU, especially if they release something strong enough and energy efficient sometime soon.

On a different note, I don't understand why some reviewers praise some monitor for having a certain property, but complain about another that has a minimal difference. For instance, *absolute* input lag: gaming monitor 63 ms, non-gaming 65 ms. One is wonderful, the other merely tolerable and for "casuals". It seems like their minds are already made up before the review.

Well, you can always find people saying things. People say a lot of things. Seems people never run out of things to say. My recommendation is never to put too much stock in recommendations. Go check it out yourself. It seems to me that whatever you're reading is very confused.

Response time has nothing to do with input lag. Response time is how quickly each pixel can light up, go fully dark, and light up again (basically, switch from on to off and back). You want response time to be as low as possible. 63ms / 65ms would be insanely high for even the cheapest monitors now. Gaming monitors will be between 5ms to 1ms. If there's a "response time" issue, you'll see moving images "ghosting". This is a sort of after-image that will trail after things on the screen. It's sort of similar to motion blur, but the "ghost" will be greyish, usually, so it can be visually distracting. It will only occur at extremely high FPS on modern screens (though it was fairly common in early flatscreens.)

Input lag can sometimes result if your refresh rate is out of sync. Games try to match input commands with rendering data (obviously...so that whatever you input happens on the screen). If the frame associated with an input call is dropped due to rendering being too fast or too slow (especially when using features like Vsync), then the control input can be lost, resulting in a feeling of controls being sluggish. The fix for this is to either increase the FPS, or cap the frame rate a bit below the refresh rate so that it has a couple extra frames to work with (e.g. Refresh Rate = 60, Frame Cap = 58). This is mostly up to the GPU and display being out of sync, and will have little to do with the actual monitor.

When people start making statements like "okay for casuals" -- that's nonsensical posturing and posing for attention. You can bet that whatever reasoning is included is probably not based on constructive understanding. There are definitely monitors that will aid serious players, but we're talking literally milliseconds of difference.

 

[volsung]

Yeah no I realize that even professional reviewers can be full of shit. User reviews can be even worse: I found plenty of "bad" reviews on stores like Amazon complaining about how the USB-C on their monitor wouldn't charge their freaking MacBook Pro or how they didn't like their monitor because it didn't have whatever feature it wasn't supposed to have.

Those numbers, 63 and 65 ms., were taken from the official reviews at "Tom's Hardware" for the Acer XB321HK and the LG 32UD99 respectively. I am aware those numbers seem ridiculous, not sure what they call "absolute input lag" either, but my point was that a 2 ms. difference warranted going from this reaction:

"In our test, 63ms is a great score for a 60Hz display. We don’t think input lag will be a problem with any of the top five screens, even for skilled players"

to this one:

"65ms total lag is acceptable for casual play and a 25ms response means average motion blur. If you are a serious competitive gamer, this monitor is not for you"

from the same reviewer!

 

[Triffid77]

what are your opinions?

Samsung s32d850.
1440p so no scaling issues. Flawlessly powered without a 2080ti.
Great image quality and uniformity.
Swivel, height adjustable etc.
VA - best blacks, no IPS glow. Yes i recommend VA over IPS.
Full 32" (no 31.whatever cheap out)

(early video reviews had a flicker issue but that was drivers with AMD cards - (circa early 2015, long been fixed)

Great price - it was $309 US on amazon last price but currently unavailable there. You still should be able to find it for sale somewhere.

Input lag & refresh are overrated on monitors (unless on a TV set). All are fine.

 

[M4xw0lf]

Hrrrmpf. I bricked my laptop yesterday in an attempt to bring fan noise down by renewing the thermal grease on the CPU and GPU chips. I even was grounded all the time by wearing an armband connected to the wall socket. Super annoying.

 

[Triffid77]

Hrrrmpf. I bricked my laptop yesterday in an attempt to bring fan noise down by renewing the thermal grease on the CPU and GPU chips. I even was grounded all the time by wearing an armband connected to the wall socket. Super annoying.

Could be from a number of things and static would probably be the least of them, regardless of the strap. Even if you didnt break it, unless there was some screwed up application of thermal paste during manufacture you'd only save a few degrees at best. Unfortunately with laptops there's really bugger all you can do to improve them. It's the nature of the beast.

Relegate laptops to what they are good at - lightweight, portable computing.
Power tasks for the *desktop. Configurable to your requirements and the hub of all your mobile devices.

(*Doesn't need to be on a desk. It can be in a little box near the TV. In fact never put them on a desk. Waste of desk real estate. Buy a $2 chinese LED disco ball if you want to look at tacky rainbow lights)

 

[M4xw0lf]

Even if you didnt break it, unless there was some screwed up application of thermal paste during manufacture you'd only save a few degrees at best. Unfortunately with laptops there's really bugger all you can do to improve them. It's the nature of the beast.

It was a lot better in the beginning though, and there were no large amounts of dust in the fan or anywhere. The old thermal paste was a dried up mess, and, as usual, applied in too large quantities. Well, I probably will never get to find out if it would have brought improvements.

Regarding the rest - I do have a desktop PC, which I use exclusively for gaming. The laptop is almost exclusively for internet, but also sometimes for work (presentations and the like).

 

[Triffid77]

It was a lot better in the beginning though, and there were no large amounts of dust in the fan or anywhere. The old thermal paste was a dried up mess, and, as usual, applied in too large quantities. Well, I probably will never get to find out if it would have brought improvements.

Regarding the rest - I do have a desktop PC, which I use exclusively for gaming. The laptop is almost exclusively for internet, but also sometimes for work (presentations and the like).

I'd open it up again just in case it wasn't something simple like seating or a plug you didn't put back in.
With dried paste it loses its flex so movement may cause micro gaps (and due to it being a laptop being thrown around thats more likely vs a desktop), but if its still connected there isnt any major degradation of thermal transfer.

Was the fan still good? id say theres more chance of improvement with replacing a fan on a 10yr old laptop than replacing the old, dried thermal paste.

 

[M4xw0lf]

The laptop is only two years old, the fan looks like new. I re-opened it twice already. There is no visible damage or missing connections, it has to be fried.

 

[volsung]

Damn @M4xw0lf I'm sorry to hear that.

Regarding my monitor search, today I went to a store and played around with a couple of HP VA monitors. One was a very nice 32" 4K (I think?) and I really like the size. But the real eye opener was a 34" curved ultrawide, 3440x1440. The resolution is not too impressive (surely better than my 1920x1200 though) but the experience of a curved, ultrawide monitor was honestly fantastic! Now these are possibly the first VA panels that I really pay attention to and I didn't actually see much color degradation from looking at an angle, but the colors certainly didn't look as good as they do in my current Dell IPS. Contrast was great, with deep blacks, but the color palette just seemed off in some subtle way I cannot explain. Like if somebody had just messed around slightly with the color levels. It might be fixable with some calibration, but that's the reason I like IPS panels and might stick to them (thanks for the suggestion though @Triffid77).

I now added the LG 34UC99 to the list, a 34" curved ultrawide with Freesync. I had my mind set on 4K but 3440x1440 seems quite good for anything from cRPG's to action/adventure, and shooters. Not quite the same pixel density but also lighter on the GPU. The only awkward thing would be watching TV with black bars on the side but we might just give up and get a separate TV.

 

[volsung]

So um, browsing around I found an amazing looking monitor (aesthetically), the HP Omen X 35. I am now obsessed with it and since it is roughly the same price as the LG, I am trying to find reasons not to get it instead. It has an AMVA panel, goes up to 100 Hz and even has G-Sync. I don't particularly care for G-Sync and don't really want to support Nvidia's anticompetitive practices but the monitor itself looks fantastic. So at this price range, does anybody have anything to say regarding an LG 34" IPS, 75 Hz w/ Freesync, vs. an HP 35" VA, 100 Hz w/ G-Sync?

Like I said I would normally favor IPS but the HP is too sexy to pass, in case it's any good. I normally don't even like "gaming" monitor designs but just look at this thing:

 

[EngryEngineer]

So um, browsing around I found an amazing looking monitor (aesthetically), the HP Omen X 35. I am now obsessed with it and since it is roughly the same price as the LG, I am trying to find reasons not to get it instead. It has an AMVA panel, goes up to 100 Hz and even has G-Sync. I don't particularly care for G-Sync and don't really want to support Nvidia's anticompetitive practices but the monitor itself looks fantastic. So at this price range, does anybody have anything to say regarding an LG 34" IPS, 75 Hz w/ Freesync, vs. an HP 35" VA, 100 Hz w/ G-Sync?

Like I said I would normally favor IPS but the HP is too sexy to pass, in case it's any good. I normally don't even like "gaming" monitor designs but just look at this thing:

My view is go with your card choice and what is currently supported, so if you will have an AMD GPU go with the LG, on the otherhand if you are going with Nvidia go with the HP. I understand that this view is pretty reductionist, and assumes Nvidia isn't going to support freesync any time soon (but that rumor has been going for literally years with no sign of happening yet sooo...), but they are the same resolution, nearly the same size/pixel pitch, the same color depth, same brightness, the HP has better contrast, both are VESA mountable, the only real difference is the adaptive sync and the HP's slightly higher refresh.