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Apple LCD Monitors - Can they keep up in Games????
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Sep 2000
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Ok, I recently managed to get ahold of an Apple 15" LCD monitor. It's the last version Apple produced...not the three-pronged one that looks like the Cinema Display, but the DVI one with the oval stand. I don't think the differences are that great besides form factor, though I'd have to check....
Anyway, I'm debating whether to sell it or keep the thing. It is definitely a beautiful monitor...everything looks sharper than a CRT, Blacks don't turn grey under light....definitely beautiful.
However, a common issue noted with LCDs is the "ghosting" problem. It IS noticable on this monitor, especially when moving the mouse very fast or dragging scroll bars or files, etc. My big concern is in games; you see, I want to get a Dual 667 when they come out, and hook the monitor up to it (with another DVI video card, I know...).
Right now, I'm running on a 500 MHz G4, and in Unreal Tournament I see no problems with ghosting whatsoever (at HQ/~40 FPS). In fact, it looks far better than my 17" CRT, because of the flatness of the thing. What I'm wondering, however, is if I get a dual 667...under OS X, games will really fly and I'd expect some serious framerates in a game like QuakeIII. Once the framerates start hitting the ceiling a little more in the new machine, will the monitor be able to keep up with me, or wil I get the lag problems that are so often noted with LCDs????
Does anyone here with, say, 533s and an LCD see any problems when playing high-FPS games? I'm curious to see some hard evidence (Note that!) supporting one way or the other.
Right now, I wanna keep it...it looks that good playing UT. I'll see, though....
greg
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Though the day's been
really long
I still feel I'm close to
nowhere....
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Mankind's only chance is to harness the power of stupid.
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Addicted to MacNN
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No one around here with an LCD plays games????
greg
------------------
Though the day's been
really long
I still feel I'm close to
nowhere....
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Mankind's only chance is to harness the power of stupid.
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Jan 2001
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There is no refresh rate limits in LCDs, as far as I know. They are digital 1s & 0s from end to end (on Macs). However, in very heavy image motion, there will be some ghosting. But, you can just consider it as free FSAA and Motion Blur. 
If anything, the Apple LCDs are the best on the planet, and if there is any ghosting it has not affected my LCD while playing Quake 3 or anything.
Plus, I like playing on LCDs, since your eyes won't pop out and bleed like when you spend an hour on a CRT. 
[This message has been edited by NeoMac (edited 02-23-2001).]
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"Last time the French asked for more evidence, it rolled through France with a German flag." - David Letterman
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Apr 2000
Location: Denville, NJ.
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I've got the Samsung 17" LCD on my Power Mac G3 450MHz, 1 GB RAM, Voodoo 5500 PCI. Quake II and UT are smooth and crisp. I don't know about frame rates, but the action is beautiful. Never a hiccup here!
------------------
"There is no spoon."
iDisk: rseijas
Homepage: homepage.mac.com/rseijas
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Mac Enthusiast
Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: Belgium
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what is the difference in accually, my dad has a laptop pc and the lcd screen looks good in windows (yeah i know) but in games the image quality s**ks it is sharp and all that but the colors are ugly and there almost no contrast, i cant turn up the contrast also, only the brightness. Is this with the apple lcds also that you can't change the contrast?
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Junior Member
Join Date: Sep 2000
Location: rohnert park, ca.
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games look great on my lcd, brighter and more crisp that on my old imac. some games o i couln't play on the imac because it wasn't bright enough. No such problem on the LCD. I highly recommend it for gaming.
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Fresh-Faced Recruit
Join Date: Feb 2001
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Shortcut, I don't have any "hard evidence," but this article over at Ars contradicts what some folks have said here. I ain't got an LCD, so I can't comment, but here's the info. They were reviewing the 22" ACD specifically, but...
From http://arstechnica.com/reviews/4q00/g4cube_cd/g4-cube-5.html:"]http://arstechnica.com/reviews/4q00/g4cube_cd/g4-cube-5.html]http://arstechnica.com/reviews/4q00/g4cube_cd/g4-cube-5.html[/url]:[/url]
But speaking of games, there's one final problem: how fast can the image on the screen change? Active matrix LCDs are vasty superior to the old so-called "passive matrix" LCDs that suffered from extreme "ghosting" problems during any and all screen updates. You may remember this problem from the days when most laptops came with passive matrix screens, and moving the cursor produced a clearly visible "trail" of phantom cursors (and I'm talking about when the dubious "cursor trails" feature found on some laptops was turned off.) The best way I found to test screen update speed was to turn on a fast-moving OpenGL screensaver that bounced a spinning, morphing 3D object around on a black background. Whammo, ghost city. The effect is not detectable at all during "normal use" (e.g. using office-type applications, browsing the web, or even playing movies), but does show up during fast-paced games like Quake 3. Gamers, this is not your monitor.
My final answer based on performance factors alone is that the 22-inch Apple Cinema Display is not the "ultimate monitor." It's merely one of the very best, but you'd also need another one of the very best of the other breed (CRTs) to truly have the best of both worlds.
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Addicted to MacNN
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I know, that's why I posted this thread. They definitely have some problems with the 22" CD, but my 15" LCD looks gorgeous with my computer on any game.
Going back to my iMac that I'm now, it seems really fuzzy by comparison. Plus, when external light is on the screen gets very greyed out (you know, black looks like grey space...like a TV), while the LCD somehow doesn't reflect the light. Perhaps the perfectly flat screen has something to do with this as well.....?
Anyway.....
greg
------------------
Though the day's been
really long
I still feel I'm close to
nowhere....
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Mankind's only chance is to harness the power of stupid.
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Forum Regular
Join Date: Oct 2000
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I got my apple 15" yesterday and i like it alot! It's sharp as, i dont know what, printed paper perhaps?! =) and due to the digital signal interface, the image is absolutely stable!
i got rid of my 21" lacie for this puppy...
There is a refreshrate limit on tft's, it's related how fast the pixel/crystals can switch state.
Normaly they can do this in 40 msec and the refresh rates used is normally 60 Hz, but the latest tft's have lower switch times that give the possibility to higher refresch rates like 75 or 85 Hz! =)
Petter
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Petter
-the iconoclasts, the creative thinkers,
the folks who can't relate to beige.
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