The Best Gaming Monitor Makes Everything Better
Every single gamer will agree with this statement. The problem is that nowadays, gaming monitors come in a huge variety of sizes and include so much technology that it quickly becomes difficult to choose. In addition, choosing the very best gaming monitor for you is something subjective.
Although subjectivity plays a huge part in your final choice, whenever you buy a gaming monitor, it is important to know a few things. This is exactly what we will focus on.
Always pay close attention to the following to choose the best gaming monitor for your PC, gaming laptop or even for your console.
Resolution
This is always mentioned as the most important factor to consider when choosing a gaming monitor. Size is definitely not as any modern gaming monitor has its place on a gaming desk.
Most of the modern gaming monitors on the market have these resolutions:
- 1080p – Full HD
- 1440p – QHD/2K
- 2160p – UHD/4K
When the resolution is higher, there is a higher image quality and visual details are better. However, there are hardware limitations that could stop you from benefiting from a resolution that is over 1440p.
QHD quickly becomes the standard.
Most of the mid-range gaming PCs easily maintain 30 FPS in 1440p. UHD is not like that. The really modern GPUs are the only ones that can reach 60 fps.
To sum up, you need to think about the power of the GPU before you choose gaming monitor resolution. Usually, opting for a higher resolution is a good idea since you become future-proof but this means you have to spend more.
Refresh Rate
The monitor’s refresh rate means how many times it refreshes images displayed during one second. This will determine the number of frames that can be displayed. Usually, monitors have these refresh rates:
- 60 Hz
- 144 Hz
- 240 Hz
Having higher refresh rate in your gaming monitor is useless if the GPU is not strong enough to actually display that. The graphics card needs to be able to run games at high framerates to take advantage of high gaming monitor refresh rate.
Adaptive Sync
In order to avoid screen tearing when playing games, you need G-SYNC or FreeSync. FreeSync is free to add to a monitor so you will find the technology included even in the affordable models. The same is not true for G-SYNC.
G-SYNC technology comes from NVIDIA. Adding it to a gaming monitor usually adds around $150 to the base price. At the same time, it just works with the NVIDIA cards.
When one of the two technologies is enabled, screen tearing is removed without sacrificing performance.
Learn more about G-SYNC and FreeSync here.
Panel Technology
Modern gaming monitors usually have one of these panel types:
- IPS (in-plane switching)
- TN (twisted nematic)
The technical aspects of this can be complex. What should be remembered is that there is an all-around better visual quality with IPS panels. Color reproduction is more accurate and more vibrant. However, with the TN panel you have a faster response time.
Response Time
Many gamers make the mistake of thinking response time is practically the same thing as refresh rate. This is false. We practically talk about pixel response time, which is measured in ms. It means the time that is needed for the pixel to switch from white to black or between different grey shades.
For gaming, you want response time that is as low as possible. This allows smoother camera moments.
The TN panels have a 1 ms response time. IPS panels go lower, to 4 ms. Your choice is all about personal preference: visual quality vs responsiveness.
What also needs to be said is that you cannot really see the difference between the two unless you are highly used to low response time already or you compare monitors to see images with different response times at the same time.
Screen Size
It is so easy to be tempted to go for a larger gaming monitor but the truth is that this is not a very important factor to consider. Anything between 21 and 27 inches is considered to be really good for gaming.
If you choose a higher screen size, you need to stay away farther away from your gaming monitor. This is something that rarely happens, unless you play on a console, of course.
Extra thing to remember: Whenever you opt for an 1080p monitor, go under 24 inches since pixel density is lower and you end up with aliasing.
Connectors
Top gaming monitors include different outputs and inputs, like:
- DisplayPort 1.4
- HDMI 1.4/2.0
- 3.5 mm audio input
- USB ports of various types
- 5 mm Audio out
The really important ones are these but there are many others that could be present. Your choice is all about the number of USB devices that you want to directly plug into the gaming monitor and what special connectors you might want.
Conclusions
In order to choose the best gaming monitor for you, all you have to do is go through the factors mentioned above. This will always lead towards a very smart purchase.
To sum up, your choice will be subjective, just as with your gaming mouse and your gaming headsets. However, the facts mentioned need to be known.
