[Sebastian]

I'm in the market for an LCD monitor. Basic question is how much of a difference does a digital connection make vs an analog? Is it akin to the difference between standard and hi definition television? or just a bunch of mularky? I'm essentially a home user, piddle around with graphics from time to time, but nothing heavy. Games get played plenty, so i know response time is important.

how about it - dv vs analog? compare and contrast please 8-)

[Eug]

Video card with excellent VGA - DVI and VGA will be very close often, but DVI still has a slight edge.
Video card with average VGA - DVI is worlds better than VGA, but VGA is tolerable.
Video card with poor VGA - VGA is unusable.

Ie. Get DVI if you can. DVI will always look great (because it's a digital signal), even if it's a crappy video card. Also, it depends on the monitor. Some LCDs seem to sync-up with VGA signals better than others.

As for DV vs. analogue, without more info the question can't directly be answered really. Analogue what?

[CatOne]

Originally posted by Sebastian:
I'm in the market for an LCD monitor. Basic question is how much of a difference does a digital connection make vs an analog? Is it akin to the difference between standard and hi definition television? or just a bunch of mularky? I'm essentially a home user, piddle around with graphics from time to time, but nothing heavy. Games get played plenty, so i know response time is important.

how about it - dv vs analog? compare and contrast please 8-)

DVI won't give you more resolution (you set this in the OS, subject to the limits of the monitor)

DVI won't give you a faster refresh rate (this is a function of the monitor).

What DVI *will* give you is sharper images, and much sharper text. Because the video is digital in the machine, and it can send it EXACTLY as-is to the monitor. With VGA, the signal must first be converted to analog by the video card, and then it's sent to the monitor, which converts it back to digital. These two conversions can introduce noise and inaccuracy into the signal... with digital it's all 1's and 0's.