120Hz; worth the premium?

[jammin]

Here is a review which I think shows that there is a difference between 60Hz displays and 120Hz displays, even for 2D applications.

 

Samsung 2233RZ Review - TFT Central

 

Ultimately it is down to personal preference what you decide is most important when buying a monitor of course.

[potatochobit]

if you can see screen tearing it means your LCD is 5 years old, get a new monitor

you will see no motion blur in a current gen 60hz monitor unless you buy the 'cheap as hell' model used

I hope you are not talking about televisions and you better not be complaining about a vizio

Edited April 7, 2011 by potatochobit

[wevsspot]

Further clarification - and my company is in the business of factory refurbishment of LCD monitors. I can't give you a customer list but lets just say it's extensive.

 

The majority of LCD monitors can only support a maximum refresh rate of 60Hz. That equates out to approximately 59.5 frames per second. I know for sure that the OP's current monitor at 1920x1200 only supports a 60Hz refresh rate. Now lets get off refresh rates as they apply to LCD technology. What everyone commonly refers to as "refresh rate" is more accurately described as frame rates. The term refresh rate was coined back in the CRT/Tube days when electron guns were used to beam and organize the graphics on the display surface. On a LCD monitor when we say "refresh" rate we are actually talking about the number of times per second data is written to the screen.

 

TN panels have been the favored choice for gamers because of lower response times - not faster frames per second.

 

Whereas IPS panels offer superior graphics reproduction - typically they also have slower response times.

 

If all you did was game, and color accuracy, reproduction and "pretty" wasn't a consideration then you would choose a TN panel that had the lowest response time + highest frame rate. Hence - a TN panel with say a 1-2ms response time and 120 frames per second would make an excellent gaming monitor. In all cases a 120Hz LCD monitor will appear smoother than a 60Hz LCD monitor - because the 120Hz monitor is actually rendering twice as much data in the same time frame as a 60Hz monitor.

 

Many of us have high end graphic cards in both single and dual/triple multi-gpu combinations that can easily overdrive the number of frames per second that our LCD is capable of producing. Not a bad thing, because that often means that you never drop below that 60 frames per second, therefore the game doesn't feel choppy due to low minimum frame rates. However, you could easily take the same graphic card setup and pair it with a good 120Hz LCD monitor and your whole experience changes for the better.

 

So - IMHO the reason people who swear by the 120Hz LCDs do so is because there is a difference in the experience between using a 60Hz LCD versus a 120Hz LCD. Of course many of these user's opinions depend on the content delivered via their monitor (i.e. games, versus video, versus photography or graphic reproduction etc.)

 

I'd say if the OP wants a 120Hz LCD screen that he won't be disappointed in the decision. Is it really all that? Well no............ but I can almost guarantee that he won't come back here and say it was the worst decision of his life either.

Edited April 7, 2011 by wevsspot

[VaporX]

Guys this is all I know, I have a Samsung sitting here with 60Hz and a 120 Hz model on the desk near by. I can tell you that at no time in any game was there ever any kind of noticable change in the way things look or reacted dispite the difference. The ONLY advanatge the 120Hz model has shown is it work with 3D Vision, ortherwise they look game game the same.

[redtigerdragon]

What?

Check out this article here. Basically dogs have a faster vision refresh rate than we do, so they need a faster refresh rate on tv's in order to see the moving images properly.

[wevsspot]

Guys this is all I know, I have a Samsung sitting here with 60Hz and a 120 Hz model on the desk near by. I can tell you that at no time in any game was there ever any kind of noticable change in the way things look or reacted dispite the difference. The ONLY advanatge the 120Hz model has shown is it work with 3D Vision, ortherwise they look game game the same.

CE - not disputing your own observations, but that is strange.

 

Are you sure that you've made the appropriate refresh rate settings in your video card's setup menu?

 

There is an option in both ATi CCC and nVidia's control panel to change the refresh from 60 - 120Mhz.

 

I'm not trying to call you out or ask a stupid question - just kind of a need to know, because my experience on a day to day basis has been completely different.

 

How old is the Sammy you're using?

Edited April 8, 2011 by wevsspot

[VaporX]

The Samsung model I am using is a Syncmaster 2233RZ and yes everything is set for 120 support.

[wevsspot]

Hmm, that is really weird. Maybe your eyes are set to vsync on

[hierovision]

Ed, perhaps you're not much of an FPS gamer. Maybe that's the reason you don't notice the difference when you use your 120hz monitor.

 

I used to play Return to Castle Wolfenstein religiously. There was a console command for maximum FPS. I could set it to 76 and play for a while, and then set it to 80 and notice a difference (on my CRT at the time, which was a 17" viewsonic made for gaming). I would notice a difference of even 2-3 FPS if I had been playing for a while before changing it. I would also notice a difference of 3-5 ms in my ping. I think I might notice a difference between 60 and 120 FPS. There must be a demographic market of others who notice the difference as well, people keep buying them.

 

That TFT Central review of the Samsung 120Hz pretty much covers it. 120Hz is a big improvement, and not just for gaming (although that is a huge factor).

[Bubbaxm2]

Myself as a heavy FPS gametype player can see where the op is coming from. The higher refresh rate isn't always about how the game looks. I spend time on every game I play to maximize the fps even to the point of sacrificing the looks of the game. For me it is more about the input lag associated with the lower fps, if I can lower the input lag by raising the fps of the game I am going to do it regaurdless of whether my eye can actually pick up on it. Just an example, if I run UT3 at stock settings with a fps cap at 60 I will have an average input lag of 17ms, if I run it as I currently do with lowered quality and a cap of 270 fps I have an average input lag of 3ms. Yes we are talking milliseconds here but hey if it gives me even the slightest atvantage over the next guy i will take it.

[DanTheGamer11]

Myself as a heavy FPS gametype player can see where the op is coming from. The higher refresh rate isn't always about how the game looks. I spend time on every game I play to maximize the fps even to the point of sacrificing the looks of the game. For me it is more about the input lag associated with the lower fps, if I can lower the input lag by raising the fps of the game I am going to do it regaurdless of whether my eye can actually pick up on it. Just an example, if I run UT3 at stock settings with a fps cap at 60 I will have an average input lag of 17ms, if I run it as I currently do with lowered quality and a cap of 270 fps I have an average input lag of 3ms. Yes we are talking milliseconds here but hey if it gives me even the slightest atvantage over the next guy i will take it.

 

then human lag comes in

[El_Capitan]

When you're talking in milliseconds, the advantage is only if you get the most accurate shot off first and hit your target. If you miss, all bets are off.

 

Latency issues are more noticeable.

 

I used to play FPS games where the host had 0 ping, and I had 56 ping. Yes, he had some advantages, but I'd just play smart tactically, and he'd never get a kill on me. If we both saw each other at the same time, if he didn't miss, he'd have the advantage, but if he did miss, I was just physically more accurate, thus killing him instead.

 

We're talking milliseconds worth differential here. It's not going to matter very much unless skiill level is equal, but then the tactical advantage always offsets any skill advantages.