New Monitor

[mrinmoyvk]

Hi All,

I am planning to upgrade my laptop to desktop and confused between selecting monitors. My basic requirement is 20" + screen size with minimum 1080 vertical resolution.

If I go for wide screen (16:9 ratio) monitors I would be limited to 1920x1080 resolution unless I go for 2k/4k which my budget does not permit.
If I go for square screen (4:3 ratio) monitors, I would get higher vertical & horizontal resolution.

Which would be better, 4:3 or 16:9 ?
I am not into serious editing so I wont use screen calibrating tools like spyder or similar, but would require basic calibrating capabilities in my monitor.

My total budget for computer is not more than 60,000 Indian rupees.
My budget for monitor is not more than 10,000 Indian rupees (is the ratio proper or should I spend more on monitor keeping the total budget same?)

Please suggest.

[davidedric]

I would go for 16x9. If you are editing a photo, that is most likely to be nearer 4x3. Having the wider screen means that you can have the image at its natural ratio, and have room at the sides for the editing controls, sliders or whatever.

Even for non-photographic use, a wide screen is much better for viewing multiple Windows.

Best regards,

Dave

[mrinmoyvk]

I would go for 16x9. If you are editing a photo, that is most likely to be nearer 4x3. Having the wider screen means that you can have the image at its natural ratio, and have room at the sides for the editing controls, sliders or whatever.

Even for non-photographic use, a wide screen is much better for viewing multiple Windows.

Best regards,

Dave

Ok, but what about screen quality? is 1920x1080 suffcient for 23" or 27" monitor?
I mean won't the ppi be too less?
This question comes because I am always fascinated by viewing the image on mobile screen than on the laptop screen...
full HD in 5" is dangerously awesome as compared to full hd in 23"
I had tried connecting my 47" samsung TV to my laptop as seondary screen and image quality was ridiculous.

[Shadowman]

Have you considered the all-in-one computers? Computer built into the monitor, you usually lose some functionality such as CD drive but monitors are large, just a matter of researching which brand meets all your needs.

[Manfred M]

With your budget, you are going to limit the type of screen you can afford to something fairly low end. You are not going to require something with a particularly fast refresh rate (which costs more) or high contrast ratio (again higher cost). Physical screen size and going from 8-bits per channel (sRGB capable) to 10-bits per channel (AdobeRGB capable) are also going to drive up your costs. 24" is going to cost less than 27" and the 8-bit technology is going to be a lot less expensive than the 10-bit technology.

My main screen is 27" 1920 x 1280 in 4:3 ratio, so close to what my output ratio is (often prints / print format length and width). Display resolution is fine.

If you are going to go to a single screen solution, the 16:9 might work better for you as it will give you the screen real estate to have other functionality open while you are editing.

In my system (which is dual screen) my main screen is around half of the system cost

[xpatUSA]

Ok, but what about screen quality? is 1920x1080 suffcient for 23" or 27" monitor?
I mean won't the ppi be too less?

The basic resolution of a screen is it's dpi or ppi by which I mean one group of RGB sub=pixels. This resolution does not vary much, even these days. It is around 96 dpi. Mine is 86 dpi.

So, the next question would be "how far do you sit from the screen?". Also relevant is "how long are your arms?".

You see, our brain prefers a certain field of view and, additionally, our visual acuity is limited. Exaggerated examples make the point:

Have a look at this:



Now, suppose you won the Bharathi Lottery and splashed out on a 4096x2160 4K monitor :-) At 96 dpi, that monitor would be 43" wide. A comfortable viewing distance is perhaps equal to the screen diagonal. So, you would need arms 48" long!

In the other direction of exaggeration, let's suppose you had a tablet with a 2K screen viewed at say 1 ft from your nose. I would suggest that quite a bit less than 2K would be perfectly adequate for viewing at that distance based on the average human visual acuity. I won't bother you with the math, eyes are already glazing over here, I'm sure.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_acuity

This question comes because I am always fascinated by viewing the image on mobile screen than on the laptop screen...
full HD in 5" is dangerously awesome as compared to full hd in 23"
I had tried connecting my 47" samsung TV to my laptop as secondary screen and image quality was ridiculous.

Rather than telling you what to buy, my advice would be to consider:

You own visual acuity (mine is terrible)
Your preferred viewing distance.
Your preferred aspect ratio.
Practicality (e.g a 27" monitor is too big for my computer desk and too wide for my seating position).

You mentioned "quality". It's worth reading up on contrast (auto or not) and color gamut before doing the right thing and buying constant contrast and sRGB ;-)

These considerations should lead you to a suitable personal choice.

Do note from the diagram that there are also 5:4 aspect-ratio monitors, which is what I use: 1280x1024px.

Hoping to help, rather than to confuse . . .

[Krawuntzel]

Ok, but what about screen quality? is 1920x1080 suffcient for 23" or 27" monitor?

It is ok; I am on a 27 (inch) screen on 1920x1200 and I have no problems with the quality of the screen (often I have problems with the quality of my pictures )

I mean won't the ppi be too less?

ppi = pixels per inch means what it says: pixels per inch; so if you have the 1920 pixels on a 23 inch screen a pixel has the size of ... you can do the maths yourself; if your screen has 27 inches, the one pixel is larger (and to quote xpatUSA: either you sit nearer or farther from your screen to have the human impression of sharpness)

This question comes because I am always fascinated by viewing the image on mobile screen than on the laptop screen...full HD in 5" is dangerously awesome as compared to full hd in 23"
I had tried connecting my 47" samsung TV to my laptop as seondary screen and image quality was ridiculous.

I am also often very fascinated by viewing a picture on the "screen" of my camera, only to learn afterwards on the "bigger" screen of my computer that the picture was not "sharp" enough (due to camera shake, moving targets, wrong settings by myself etc. etc). This IMHO has to do with the picture not sharp; nothing to do with the resolution of the "display" you use.
Erwin

[mrinmoyvk]

Have you considered the all-in-one computers? Computer built into the monitor, you usually lose some functionality such as CD drive but monitors are large, just a matter of researching which brand meets all your needs.

Yes, I have considered Lenovo all in ones but those are costly for my configuration. So thinking of getting a desktop assembelled from a local dealer.

[mrinmoyvk]

With your budget, you are going to limit the type of screen you can afford to something fairly low end. You are not going to require something with a particularly fast refresh rate (which costs more) or high contrast ratio (again higher cost). Physical screen size and going from 8-bits per channel (sRGB capable) to 10-bits per channel (AdobeRGB capable) are also going to drive up your costs. 24" is going to cost less than 27" and the 8-bit technology is going to be a lot less expensive than the 10-bit technology.

My main screen is 27" 1920 x 1280 in 4:3 ratio, so close to what my output ratio is (often prints / print format length and width). Display resolution is fine.

If you are going to go to a single screen solution, the 16:9 might work better for you as it will give you the screen real estate to have other functionality open while you are editing.

In my system (which is dual screen) my main screen is around half of the system cost

Can you please suggest a good 10 bit monitor which supports 1920 x 1080 resolution and is 20"-23" in size?
I will make some alterations in other specifications to fit it in my budget if possible.

[Manfred M]

I will make some alterations in other specifications to fit it in my budget if possible.

As I don't know the Indian market, it's hard to give a good answer here. If you are having your system built, then I would ask the shop that is putting your computer together for you. I (and some of the other members) use a Dell Ultrasharp.

Unfortunately the 10-bit is rarely mentioned in the spec. Generally you are looking for something else in the information; words like 99% AdobeRGB compliant or 1 billion colours as how they bury that fact. If you see a spec that quotes somewhere around 16 million colours or TN technology, you can be sure that it is 8-bit.

[mrinmoyvk]

As I don't know the Indian market, it's hard to give a good answer here. If you are having your system built, then I would ask the shop that is putting your computer together for you. I (and some of the other members) use a Dell Ultrasharp.

Unfortunately the 10-bit is rarely mentioned in the spec. Generally you are looking for something else in the information; words like 99% AdobeRGB compliant or 1 billion colours as how they bury that fact. If you see a spec that quotes somewhere around 16 million colours or TN technology, you can be sure that it is 8-bit.

Is there any specific graphics card required for photoshop? My currect laptop doent have any dedicated graphics card.
Any idea if it is ok to get any series of NVIDIA 1 GB graphics card?

[Manfred M]

Is there any specific graphics card required for photoshop? My currect laptop doent have any dedicated graphics card.
Any idea if it is ok to get any series of NVIDIA 1 GB graphics card?

Image editing is not particularly resource intensive, so frankly you can probably use just about any modern graphics card on the market. Photoshop makes very limited use of graphics cards capabilities; so any card that supports OpenGL2 will work.

At one time Adobe's graphics engine used nVidia's CUDA, but not any longer and the OpenGL 2 means most cards from the major suppliers will work just fine. Adobe lists the minimum as well as the recommended requirements here:

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/sy...uirements.html