Ultrawide 1440 vs Regular 1440 Monitor *Upgrade*

[farmfowls]

Hello all! I have been trying to make a decision regarding my best option is in terms of upgrading my build and was wondering if any of you could help me out. As of now, I have three options to move forward:

1) Get a 980ti and a 3440 x 1440 Ultra-wide monitor.
2) Get a 980ti and a 2560 x 1440 monitor.
3) Wait for pascal and then upgrade.

I currently have an Asus 780ti OC and am playing at 1080p. I have decided to move up resolutions to either 3440 x 1440 (Ultrawide) or 2560x1440. If I went the Ultra-wide route I would either be getting the x34 Predator or the PG348Q from ASUS once it comes out. If I went the 2560x1440 route I would be getting the Acer XB270HU. Would you recommend anything else with my two options?

I am used to playing on a 144hz TN panel but long for the IPS quality and require the best experience I can get with what I have available to me in terms of hardware and fps performance. The only reason I am considering a 2560 x 1440 is my worry that one 980ti won’t be able to handle the 3440 x 1440 at a reasonable frame rate of 40-60fps. (Preferably 60fps but I have heard with gsync 40fps can look very good)

Right now, I'd only be getting one 980ti with the option to go SLI in the future if I so desired. As I have said, my major gripe that has me second guessing my options are if one 980ti card could handle the 3440 x 1440 resolution or not and run relatively smoothly. With all this being said do any of you have any suggestions for me? What should I do? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

 

[iam2thecrowe]

980ti will handle 3440x1440 pretty well, and yeah if you get a gsync monitor, no worries with 40fps, its still smooth like you said. At such a high vertical resolution you can turn things like AA completely off to gain some fps. If it was me, and i had the money to do that, i certainly would. The only issue you might find with ultrawide, is some games may not support the resolution, or you may need to tweak .ini files to get it to work.

 

[Cons29]

bought a similar setup less than a month ago. ultra wide 3440x1440, happy about it. though It did forced me to get a 980ti, doubt the 970 can handle it properly. I play bf4/bf3, no issues so far, had to OC my cpu though. the stock speed of 6600k could not handle large maps

 

[10tacle]

I will give you my experience. I upgraded to 1440p last year with a single 970. It would not push the games I was playing at 60FPS (minimum FPS specifically to lock 60Hz V-sync down), so I got a second 970.

In hindsight, it would have been smarter to wait and continue playing at 1080p and then wait for a single 980Ti for the same price as dual 970s over six months. I'd recommend continue playing high FPS at 1080p and wait for Pascal if upgrading GPUs. I also say this as an SLI owner who has seen less and less official SLI support in games being released these days. If that trend continues, my next GPU upgrade with be the most powerful single GPU one can buy.

 

[farmfowls]

At this point, what do you all think is the smartest approach?

 

[10tacle]

At this point, what do you all think is the smartest approach?

Put your credit card in the freezer and wait four months for Pascal and continue enjoying your current gaming.

Also don't forget that in the next four months there will be new 2016 year model monitors coming out from manufacturers as well.

 

[Non-Euclidean]

Yeah, I backed off from a 980ti. I upgraded my old box to a 970. (24 inch dell 1080 monitor)
I have ordered my new box, will put the 970 in that and the 6850 back in the old box.
I will wait and do a pascal + Ultrawide upgrade later this year, and move the 970 back to the old box.

 

[MasterZoen]

First, I'd have to ask how far you plan on sitting from the screen, in inches, and then what size the monitor is, in inches. Just to be clear on why, it's typically recommended by THX that a screen you are focused upon only take up approx. 40 degrees of your horizontal (left to right) field of vision to create "an immersive cinematic experience." To find this number you multiply your seating distance, regardless of whether in inches or centimeters, by 0.84. 2 feet distance, or 24 inches, equals a diagonal screen size of 20.16 inches.

On the other hand, SMPTE recommends that your screen occupy only 30 degrees of your field of vision, which is found by multiplying your seating distance by 0.625. 24 inches distance equals a diagonal screen size of 15 inches.

Even more importantly, is whether you will have any added benefit of the higher resolution, since the farther you are from a screen the less resolution you see. According to Carlton Bale's extensive research, which can be found here, a 24 inch screen would need to be 1 foot or less from your eyes to gain the added benefits of a 2160p screen resolution. At 1 foot, or 12 inches, of viewing distance that means the 4K screen would need to be no more than 10.08 inches diagonal according to THX, where as you only need to be within 3 feet, or 36 inches, of a 1080p resolution screen to gain full benefits, and 28.5 inches is the ideal viewing distance for a 24 inch screen.

Furthermore, ISF states that the most important aspects of picture quality are (in order): 1) contrast ratio, 2) color saturation, 3) color accuracy, 4) resolution. Yep, resolution is less important than color accuracy. It definitely might be time to start looking at some IPS screens.

This is why I have avoided any Ultra-wide monitors or multi-monitor setups. I sit only around 27 inches away from my 1920x1080 24 inch screen, which is either 1.5 inches too close or 1.32 inches too wide by THX's standard, but falls perfectly within the 36 inch maximum distance to see all details for the resolution.