Should I get a 4k monitor or stick to 1080p

[ievi]

So I was looking at 4k monitors but they all seem to big for me, as I like to game on 24" monitors.

Should I just stick to 1080p at that size? If I was to stick to 1080p I'm thinking of getting this

 

[Isokolon]

what titles are you usually playing?
also this screen seems to be overpriced.

 

[Shotta06]

Ok... So why either 4K or 1080P? There is 1440P

 

[ievi]

what titles are you usually playing?
also this screen seems to be overpriced.

i play pretty much everything, fps, rts, adventure, rpg, racing and third person games.

and i watch blu rays on it

 

[ievi]

Ok... So why either 4K or 1080P? There is 1440P

the scaling will not be good for my blu rays

 

[Solandri]

Ok... So why either 4K or 1080P? There is 1440P

the scaling will not be good for my blu rays

Video is always scaled. Even if you're playing 1080p video on a 1080p monitor, it's scaled because video is overscanned. The video is enlarged to be slightly larger than the screen, and the edges are cut off.

https://www.engadget.com/2010/05/27/hd-101-overscan-and-why-all-tvs-do-it/

If you rip the Blu-rays and convert them to a playable media format, then the final product will be native 1080p. But the final product is still scaled, it's just that the overscan happened before the conversion process (otherwise you'll end up with a few lines of digital dots along the edges). So your 1080p video will essentially be a 1860x1048 or thereabouts source enlarged to 1920x1080. (Unless whoever did the conversion noticed that the overscanned areas didn't contain random dots and lines on this particular Blu-ray, and did a straight 1:1 conversion.) But if you're playing straight off a Blu-ray or DVD, then the playing software will overscan and scale it to slightly larger than your screen to hide any floating dots along the edges of the picture.

Anyhow, scaling of real-life scenes like video is mostly invisible. In 3D games, scaling can sometimes actually be helpful as it can act as pseudo-anti-aliasing. It's only the precise lines and fonts in computer UIs which don't respond well to scaling (especially if the fonts are using subpixel rendering).

 

[ievi]

Ok... So why either 4K or 1080P? There is 1440P

the scaling will not be good for my blu rays

Video is always scaled. Even if you're playing 1080p video on a 1080p monitor, it's scaled because video is overscanned. The video is enlarged to be slightly larger than the screen, and the edges are cut off.

https://www.engadget.com/2010/05/27/hd-101-overscan-and-why-all-tvs-do-it/

If you rip the Blu-rays and convert them to a playable media format, then the final product will be native 1080p. But the final product is still scaled, it's just that the overscan happened before the conversion process (otherwise you'll end up with a few lines of digital dots along the edges). So your 1080p video will essentially be a 1860x1048 or thereabouts source enlarged to 1920x1080. (Unless whoever did the conversion noticed that the overscanned areas didn't contain random dots and lines on this particular Blu-ray, and did a straight 1:1 conversion.) But if you're playing straight off a Blu-ray or DVD, then the playing software will overscan and scale it to slightly larger than your screen to hide any floating dots along the edges of the picture.

Anyhow, scaling of real-life scenes like video is mostly invisible. In 3D games, scaling can sometimes actually be helpful as it can act as pseudo-anti-aliasing. It's only the precise lines and fonts in computer UIs which don't respond well to scaling (especially if the fonts are using subpixel rendering).

So If I do move over to 4k my blu rays should still look fine? I mean I did read that there was really no point in having 4k if I'm gonna have a 24" or 27" monitor.

As for the 1440p I do not see many monitors that are 24" so I would need to get a 27" not sure If I will be comfortable gaming at that size though.

So with the blu rays It should be fine, but when it comes to dvds will it look really bad? As I have some tv shows that was only released on dvd, it looks pretty good on 1080p monitor 24" when i sit back, but if i was to get a 4k monitor or a 1440p monitor, will it look a lot worse?

 

[Solandri]

So If I do move over to 4k my blu rays should still look fine? I mean I did read that there was really no point in having 4k if I'm gonna have a 24" or 27" monitor.

Yes, you shouldn't notice much difference between 4k blu-rays on a 1440p or 1080p monitor, or 1080p blu-rays on a 1440p or 1080p monitor for that matter. Depending on how good the monitor's scaler is, the 1440p monitor may actually look slightly better.

Whether 4k is "worth it" on a 24" or 27" monitor really depends on you, your eyes, and what you're doing. I do photo editing, and even with my almost-50 year old eyes the pixels on a 24" 1080p monitor are pretty obvious. Completely obvious at 27". I'm not sure I'd need 4k at this screen size, but I'd definitely prefer 1440p over 1080p.

As for the 1440p I do not see many monitors that are 24" so I would need to get a 27" not sure If I will be comfortable gaming at that size though.

Yeah, that's one of the drawbacks I've noticed about 1440p.

Monitor size is not really the important metric though. What matters is how large the monitor appears to your eye. If you feel that 27" is too big, you can simply sit a little further back. (27 / 24 = 1.125x further back) and the 27" will look the exact same size as a 24". Your eyes will probably be a little more comfortable too since they don't have to focus as closely (probably not a big deal if you're young, but you'll start to notice it by your mid- to late-30s).

For gaming, the bigger issue is that 1440p is 1.78x more pixels than 1080p. So you should expect your framerate to drop to as low as 56% the FPS at 1080p. In contrast, a 4k monitor can be driven at 1080p when gaming with no compromise to image quality. You could in theory run the 1440p monitor at 1280x720, but that doesn't seem to be widely supported, and seems to make the UI on a lot of games obnoxiously large. As I mentioned before, you could simply play games at 1080p and scale it to 1440p. But whether that looks worse or better is highly subjective. Some people prefer it, some people are ok with it, some people hate it.

So with the blu rays It should be fine, but when it comes to dvds will it look really bad? As I have some tv shows that was only released on dvd, it looks pretty good on 1080p monitor 24" when i sit back, but if i was to get a 4k monitor or a 1440p monitor, will it look a lot worse?

DVDs are 840x525 anamorphic (means the pixels aren't square - a 4:3 aspect ratio with square pixels would be 700x525). So they have to be scaled to fit on 1080p, 1440p, and 4k. You shouldn't notice any difference watching DVDs on the different monitors. The 1080p might appear slightly better if the DVD were scaled to 1400x1050 (exactly 2x) and you viewed it with black bars not just on the sides but also above and below. But if you did that you'd also see the junk on the edges which overscanning is supposed to eliminate.

 

[ievi]

You have been a really great help Solandri, I will most likely buy this monitor its pretty expensive but I should be using it for a good few years, until the 4k monitors get a higher hz.

Right now I have a gtx 970 so I think getting a gtx 1080 as well to handle the higher resolution for a good few years.

thanks again for your help