LCD vs CRT

[Asheera]

Old_Man: how come it hurts your eyes? LCDs have more brightness and are harder on the eye -- less contrast so when you read you force your eyes more. If you truly are a nerd then you should use some glasses with protection against computer monitors foo!

Well here's an interesting comparison.

LCD screens also tend to produce less eye fatigue to the user. The constant light barrage and scan lines of a CRT tube tend to cause strain on heavy computer users. The lower intensity of the LCD monitors coupled with their constant screen display of pixels being on or off produces less fatigue for the user.

[Borsuc]

Nope, that's one of those myths. I mean, of course it will be unless you use 100Hz or 85Hz refresh rate, but who wouldn't? It's their problem, don't blame it on the CRT, blame it on yourself for not using that high refresh rate.

LCDs lower intensity? Does he even know what he's talking about, or did I miss something? They are a lot more bright, and cause eye-sore because of that, sometimes

(unless you manually lower their brightness, but then you can manually modify the refresh rate on CRTs too, so that's a moot point)


and yeah most CRTs come with 100% contrast -- who said you can't lower it? I have it at 50% and it looks superb

[Kalah]

Are you an expert on this, Borsuc?

[Borsuc]

Well if by 'expert' you mean good knowledge about it (or reading technical details, like how they even work/produce light, not just the specifications) then I am so-so. My point is that each have their own advantages -- lower power consumption being one of LCDs, even if we don't look at weight/size.

and I think it's just wrong to buy something because of "trend" too. Buying an LCD should be done based on its qualities and advantages (and disadvantages), well IMO.

[Asheera]

(unless you manually lower their brightness, but then you can manually modify the refresh rate on CRTs too, so that's a moot point)

But raising the refresh rate has impacts on power consumption as well, doesn't it? (and more heating, I suppose) Whereas lowering the brightness has no negative points.

[Kalah]

@Borsuc: I was just wondering whether your opinions were merely opinions, or if you were in a certain line of work. I don't want advice from some Lpatenaude-lookalike.

[ThunderTitan]

the only technical specification i trust is my own eyes... and my plasma monitor looks just as good unless you like looking at it from an angle of 45 degrees... and it don't matter if one is 10 times better at something when the human eye can't even perceive past 5% of it anyway...

But plasma & LCD TV's are still overpriced if you want one that looks good...

[Borsuc]

But raising the refresh rate has impacts on power consumption as well, doesn't it? (and more heating, I suppose) Whereas lowering the brightness has no negative points.

I have no idea about heating though, but I already said the power consumption is higher.

Usually if you keep the contrast high and the brightness lower in an LCD it could take more power/heating since it needs to absorb light -- they work the opposite of CRTs/Plasmas in that to produce black, LCDs absorb the light instead of just 'not producing any', so theoretically black should take the most energy in LCDs and heat (albeit insignificant), since the "lamp" produces light and to achieve black they absorb it. (if you apply a voltage to the liquid crystals, that's what they do )

and @Kalah: don't worry I'm not like LPatenaude, in fact I'm one of the few who get annoyed by what he says most times rather than take it as 'entertainment' (well unless he posts in off-topic where it is indeed entertainment, but not in technical forums).

[Caradoc]

LCDs last longer and use less juice.

[Kalah]

Do they last longer? My dad's old TV is approaching 20 years of age... it's almost as old as my sister.

[Asheera]

The one most annoying thing for me about LCDs is the risk of getting 'dead pixels' not the lower quality than the CRT

[Kalah]

But that's grounds for returning the screen to the seller, obviously...?

[Borsuc]

Well as far as I know (of course this is average), LCDs and CRTs are considered to have very long life span, while plasmas are considered short life span (depending on how much contrast) and a lot more fragile (they even depend on air pressure and thus altitude etc...). Also plasmas need lots of power too (some even more than CRTs!), of course I am talking about the same area-sized monitors, I'm not dumb enough to compare a bigger one with a smaller one (area is important, not the diagonal length, in measuring the "size" of a monitor!)

A disadvantage of LCDs is, like Ash said, dead pixels and the fact that they are somewhat fragile in comparison. However, a disadvantage of CRTs is that they are influenced heavily by magnetic fields (do NOT put a magnet near one). Compromises everywhere

Also, do not blow up a CRT's glass, it will result in implosion (it's a vacuum inside after all).

But that's grounds for returning the screen to the seller, obviously...?

You can easily cause that yourself especially if you move it around. (the 'advantage' of being light)

no one's gonna replace it if it's you who broke it

[Pol]

Obviously not. One doesn't qualify you for, if you have low cost solution.

It's going according the ISO norms..

[Asheera]

But that's grounds for returning the screen to the seller, obviously...?

For dead pixels that are there before you bought the monitor, sure, you can return it (most of the time)

But I was talking about dead pixels that you get in time, after using it a lot... theoretically you shouldn't get them, but sometimes life's cruel.

[Borsuc]

ah I forgot to mention, if your screen looks wacked up in a CRT, it may be because of some magnetic field -- eliminate the field, and then do a "De-Gauss" (most CRTs have it). Doing a De-Gauss too frequently can damage it however, it's recommended at least a 30 minute wait between them.

[Old_Man]

I have a flat screen CRT

Yes, but I'm talking about my experiences with CRT's and why I don't particularly like them. The only bad thing about LCD's is that you can damage the screens if you touch them. That kinda annoys me a bit, especially with my portable DVD player that I have, which uses an LCD screen and I'm often touching the screen when I try and pick it up and I'm afraid that I might damage the screen. It sometimes happens when I accidentally touch my desktop LCD screen too much especially when I try and turn off my speakers, I might accidentally touch the screen. I hate when that happens.

[Kalah]

I wipe my LCD clean all the time. No problems yet; it's built by Japanese, and not some blokes in India.

[Asheera]

I wipe my LCD clean all the time. No problems yet; it's built by Japanese, and not some blokes in India.

I wipe it regularly as well (once a week)

So far I didn't have problems either. I once had something black on a pixel, and I thought it was a dead pixel so I freaked out... but after cleaning it that pixel was restored so it was just some dust or something

Japanese? What is it? Panasonic, Sony? I have an LG Flatron... I just wish I had DVI input available, but when I bought it I had that old Video Card which didn't support it so I didn't care about that...

[Borsuc]

what's so great about DVI when the monitor already isn't capable of displaying colors so well (black for example)?

and with good video cards it's unlikely you'll need "on-monitor processing" or something.

also, DVI has a limited number of colors compared to (theoretically) infinite colors of an analog VGA or something similar. Unfortunately of course reality isn't the same as theory.