Samsung T200 or Samsung 2233SW ?

[sleepwalkerfx]

I'm in a big trouble of finding out which of these monitors are best

T200 has

2ms fast response time with
20000:1 dynamic contrast ratio,
1680x1650
and it's a 20" monitor

2233sw has

5ms response time
and 15000:1 dynamic contrast ration.
1920x1080 full HD resolution
and it's 21.5" monitor.

and in my country, prices are ,

T200 is US$254 and 2233SW is US$210.

I'm so confused with these different specs. 2233SW has full HD but less response time and contrast ratio campared to T200. And I'm thinking of buying a GTX 280 or an ATi HD 4850X2 VGA , so I'm not pretty sure about playing games in Full HD resolutions with this cards. But these cards can hande 1680x1050 with AA and FSAA flawlessly for most of games. So I think it's possible to play under 1680x1650 resolution with 2233SW which has native full HD res.

But I'm confused about buying which monitor. Should I pay $44 more dollars for T200's 2ms fast RT and 20000:1 CR ? but 2233SW has full HD resolution :S and 1.5" inches larger too.

I would like to know you ideas.

Thanks in advance

 

[rsilves]

Have you tried 2ms and 5ms displays and seen a difference? (I don't do gaming, so I don't care about the response time when buying my monitors, that's why I'm asking).

About the contrast ratio, I've been reading and studying about this. It is just a marketing thing.
The human eye has its limits, and it wouldn't notice a difference between 15000:1 and 20000:1 in a normal environment. If it was 500:1 and 750:1, it would be a bigger difference. Because those high contrast ratios are beyond the human eyes limits.
I wouldn't care about contrasts over 3000:1, because when calibrating the monitor I'd have to bring it down. More than 1000:1-3000:1 would render unreal images, and the monitor could be showing a lot of information (on the highlights and the blacks) that the human eye wouldn't be perceiving. So is it good actually? Nope.
This is all talking about a normal environment, a lit place. I encourage to research more about this, depending on your specific environment. I just wanted you to know that more is not always better.

I couldn't get much information about the color gamuts of the 2233SW, the T200 has a good color reproduction (for that price).
Anyway, the 2233SW is probably about the standard, not so different from the T200. (Reviews and specs say "wide color gamut", no info about percentages or gamut graphics).
If you're not going to do specific imaging work, which needs to be done over a standard, don't worry about that. Maybe if you compare both monitors side-by-side you would notice a difference. But it will not be noticeable if you watch one, then turn it off, wait a minute, and turn the other on.

About the resolutions, I have no idea if the 2233SW can handle 1680x1050 (I suppose it doesn, don't know). But it is not a good idea.
In LCD displays, the only way to get a sharp image is giving it its native resolution. If you use a lower resolution, all the sharp edges will look blurred (like text). Images will also be blurred but you might not notice the difference, if it doesn't have sharp edges.

Hope this is useful.
Rodrigo

 

[sleepwalkerfx]

Hello,

Thank you very much for the reply. I can understand that higher contrast ratio wouldn't make much differance in picutures. But I forget to tell that these 15000:1 and 20000:1 are not static contrast ratios , they are dynamic contrast ratios. Static contrast ratios for both monitors is 1000:1 . So I'm really don't know whether how much dynamic contrast ratio affect the picuture quality.

And 2ms is best for gaming but T200 doesn't have full HD resolution. I'm confused with the question which monitor to buy :S

 

[rsilves]

I would never buy any display that "thinks which is the best way to show each picture to the user". I didn't even imagine this exist. This is disrespectful both for the user and for the creator of that image.
Dynamic contrast ratio does this: If the image is dark, then it dims the backlight down. If the image is bright, then it brightens the backlight. This means that all the scene is affected.
If the image is very dark, but there is a very bright light in a part of it, that light will look grey (because the difference between the blackest black and the whitest white of that image is still 1000:1).
If the image is bright, all the black parts of it will look grey.

I haven't seen this yet, and hope I never have one. I work in filmmaking (director of photography) and color correction (colorist), and I am conscient that the decisions we make affect the audience in some kind of subconscient way. If those decisions are overriden by a selfish or dumb manufacturer who wants to sell more telling the people "here! more contrast! more brightness! more color!"... well... I wonder what will be of us filmmakers in the future.

I hope you disable the Dynamic Contrast Effect
Or buy a real higher contrast ratio display.

Rodrigo

 

[sleepwalkerfx]

Thank you very much for the advice! saved me heaps of time , thank you....