I'm considering purchasing an LCD monitor, but seeing as I've always used CRTs, I figured I'd try to gleen some of the collective wisdom of the forums [smile] So, the 'obvious' choice seems to be to go with a 2ms monitor, as being totally uneducated it seems like the easiest way to avoid the ghosting monster. However, is that just an outdated problem and doesn't exist in 5ms models either? 5ms are usually a bit cheaper, but the biggest thing is that there is WAY more options in the 5ms than the 2ms. Any insight would be great, thanks!

Well, a 2ms response time would in theory get you a maximum refresh rate of 500Hz whereas a 5ms response time gives a maximum of 200Hz. Both of which are probably better than the CRT you've been using.

You won't see any ghosting (mouse trails) on either of those. The other type of ghosting (an faint image repeated to the right) is still possible as this is due to poor interconnect rather than the refresh rate. For the technically minded, this ghosting is due to signal reflection at the connectors, the distance the ghost appears from the orginal is proportional to the length of the cable between the PC and monitor.

Skizz

Interesting stuff, thanks :)

So, basically, if I'm understanding correctly, I really shouldn't worry about the difference between 2ms and 5ms. The 2 might be a bit nicer, but its not going to be a major thing.

And don't use a really long monitor cable, got it :)

Thanks much!

You should also be aware that not all companies measure the time equally. Some use from black to white and others from one gray to another. There's heaps of stuff to consider for the ones with the patience to do so ;)

I recently bought a Samsung 19" LCD monitor with an 8ms refresh rate(g-to-g i believe). It's better than my old CRT. There is absolutely no ghosting whatsoever.

I have an 11ms Samsung and I can't complain the slightest about image quality, so the difference between 2 and 5 IMO is totally negligible.

Be careful.

There is no particularly standard way to measure response time. Worse, response time changes depending on what the color changes involved are. There are monitors rated for 5 ms that show a worst case of 30ms or even higher. Try to find an article like this one. In particular, notice the response time graphs. For example, this is the graph for the first monitor in that article:

That FP91V+ is a 4ms panel. The worst case is 8 times that.

You shouldn't really check for ms response time, there are lot of others specs to check (like contrast ratio, view angles, etc). I got a Samgsung SynchMaster 931BF and it's perfect.

I recently bought this 8ms 19" LCD at TigerDirect. I have had no problems whatsoever with gaming, watching movies, or general productivity. Its also the cheapest 19" I found. I think anything less than ~12ms isn't very noticeable, but I could be wrong. I'm basing this assumption on my new monitor, reviews, and posts on various forums.

Years ago I bought an LCD screen with 12ms or 10ms response time, which was at that time marketed as a really short response time (I think before that the standard was 40ms or so).

I've been moving the mouse cursor around really fast to check out ghosting, and haven't detected any ghosting whatsoever.

I've never seen a computer game respond slowly on an LCD screen, I don't know where people got that from.