Comment by RajT88
3 days ago
Craigslist an older 1080p TV. People are getting rid of old "dumb" TV's, and sometimes you can get them free. I see seemingly undamaged LCD TV's out by garbage bins all the time. I sourced one such a TV for my wife for $100 a few years ago to use as a monitor - works great. No apps or anything - dumb as they come.
You're missing out on resolution (4K) and picture quality (HDR, contrast ratios, color gamut) improvements by doing this.
My experience with HDR has been pretty abysmal on a $500 4K TV. Badly tuned HDR is way worse than no HDR at all.
I have 20/20 vision, and I really can't tell the difference between 1080p and 4K for video games and movies. I will never do below 4k again on a desktop, but 1080p is more than fine for a TV. Higher framerate makes a far bigger difference than higher resolution for video games too.
You can see the difference in 4K when the bitrate is there, but most streaming platforms compress their videos too much for it to be worth it. It's definitely not the jump that 720p to 1080p is, though. I agree with everything else you said.
For gaming, the internal render resolution of a gaming console might not go over 1080p anyway. If it's a Switch 1 it might even be only 720p. So if that is the main usage, you are right, a 4k screen is a waste of money.
Whether 4k is worth it depends a lot on the size of the TV vs how far away you sit. For a 65" TV, I don't see much difference between 4k/1080p above ~8ft away.
HDR is indeed effectively a marketing gimmick on many cheap TVs. They are getting better though
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I have a 1080p TV and it's fine for watching TV and movies but i am going to upgrade to a 4K display because i can definitely tell a difference in games, and i do most all my gaming on my TV.
Yes, but I think you are missing out on the part where it is close to free. I have a nice monitor for photos and other crap, but most of the shit I do is text. I do not need 4k.
When those are needed, digital signage displays are the answer. They're more costly unfortunately but can be bought used and are guaranteed to work 12-18-24/24 in much less friendly environments than a living room. They're increasingly making use of Android or WebOS, unfortunately, but being aimed at the professional world they lack all those annoyances and the general crap the industry crams into home TVs.
If I (like my wife) was going to use a TV as a monitor at her desk, I would definitely want a 4k monitor. Up close, that is a video wall, with no need of window scaling.
Such as it is, I use 3x 1080p displays. It's fine for me, and approximates a larger curved super-wide display (while also being cheap). She does just fine with 1080p resolution however - rarely has more than 2-3 windows on screen at a time.
Good. Some of us don't need or want those things.
You're missing out on resolution (4K) and picture quality (HDR, contrast ratios, color gamut) improvements by doing this.
Not everyone suffers from FOMO.
I've only seen one movie that was worth the bother and expense of seeing it in 4K (Rear Window).
The rest of the things you mention are mostly for a very small slice of theoretical people with perfect vision in perfectly lit rooms at the perfect height and viewing angle.
Beyond icons on a sticker checklist, they mean nothing to the 99% of people who just want to watch sportsball or eat popcorn while watching Disney films with their kids.
You can put lipstick on a pig, but most people are still watching pigs.
The OP is not asking for a TV to watch TV on, he's asking for a TV to use as a second monitor for his laptop. When it comes to computer interfaces, the difference between 4K and HD is enormous. Especially for text.
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Pretty sure I read this same comment when the transition from DVD to 1080p/Blu-ray occurred and people were updating their TVs.
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I never want to go back to 1080p text editing on a monitor, personally.
Rear Window? A movie from 1954? Can you explain how that was better in 4K when the footage isn't even 4K?
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HDR is a mixed bag on PCs, and 4K comes at a system performance cost. OP said this was intended to be a monitor.
Be warned, 'seemingly' is a key word there. I have picked up eight TVs up from alleys over the past few years and each has had a broken screen only visible when plugged in. I have no idea how people are breaking so many TVs.
I can help: Children.
I can remember when the Nintendo Wii came out, and people I know were damaging things when the remotes would go flying. It's like the Wii release every day in a house with kids. My brother-in-law is on their third TV in 5 years.
We got our first flat panel and the Wii together on my sister's fifth Christmas and the TV was broken within 3 months lol