Monitor Help

[Midnight_lightning]

I want to buy a 27" 1440p gaming monitor that will also be good for Pixinsight processing.

Finding something for gaming is easy but when I really think about it I don't know what I need for astro processing.

I can find any number of IPS monitors with wide gamut but IPS seems to typically have poor black consistency, contrast and HDR. Then there is the choice of colour bit depth - 8bit, 10 bit or 8bit +FRC. Very hard to see what bit depth gaming monitors have, many claim 10 bit in HDR mode but reviews suggest they are only 8+FRC - does it matter?

Basically I have spent a week reading reviews and ended up being put off every single one of them for one reason or another -  I am going mad 🤣

I would be grateful for any guidance on what is needed for PI.

What do you use, how good is it?

Do I need a HDR1000 mini IPS or is this just wasting ££'s ?

 

 

 

 

[pipnina]

I'll start by saying a few things: one is that you only need HDR if you plan on mastering your content in HDR format. Otherwise there's no point in having the feature.

Another thing is that many local dimming backlight displays (the tech that makes HDR possible in most cases) will not be overly suitable for astro images as stars are likely to mess with the algorithm that determines cell brightness, you are likely to see a lot of haloing on all but high end screens with that tech.

When it comes to bit depth per pixel, I would be wary of monitors that have HDR claiming 10-bpp colour as they MAY only support it in HDR mode. I do not know about dithered 8 bit however, as it relies on the program and operating system and graphics driver supporting it. It would however be relatively effective if it does work.

When it comes to astronomy image processing however, I think that while having a 10-bit or even 12 bit display would be NICE, I think it wouldn't help you improve your images much. You only notice banding on 8 bit displays in very low contrast and consistent areas. But our images are typically noisy enough to mask that entirely. Even then, everyone viewing your images probably uses an 8 bit display anyhow, and your images are likely to be exported as 8-bit jpeg eventually!

Colour accuracy and contrast are the most important factors, and then you need to consider the gaming use case too.

I currently use an ASUS PG-279. It's a great monitor but as you say the IPS panel leaks light in low brightnesses and the backlighting isn't 100% evenly illuminated as it is lit from the edges. This is a slightly older model mind you.

The current HOT topic is LCD-OLED fusion displays. These combine the best of almost all worlds by allowing OLED tech to be brighter, and LCD tech to have perfect blacks AND good response times. They are pricy though as it is an emerging tech.

Many in the tech scene right now would suggest looking at TVs, but they tend to be bigger...

If your budget stretches to it, I would also suggest 4K. My 1440p screen is great but compared to the 6000x4000 images my camera spits out, it's nothing! And sometimes it does feel a little cramped, especially doing mosaic work.

My personal choice would be to accept the poor backlight leak and go for an IPS panel with good colour and gamma accuracy. It's what artists lived with on professional screens for over a decade before laser projectors and OLED came along!

There's also quantum dot screens, which produce LOVELY colours, but the backlight bleed is absolutely atroceous so in the end I would choose to avoid, unless you can afford a screen using QD-OLED https://www.samsungdisplay.com/eng/tech/quantum-dot.jsp

 

Monitors are a very hard space to get your head around right now. But hopefully some of what I've said is helpful!

If you can suggest your budget range that would help us help you as well!

[Midnight_lightning]

Firstly thanks for your very helpful response, apologies for slow reply, only just saw it.

On 01/10/2022 at 23:57, pipnina said:

I'll start by saying a few things: one is that you only need HDR if you plan on mastering your content in HDR format. Otherwise there's no point in having the feature.

Another thing is that many local dimming backlight displays (the tech that makes HDR possible in most cases) will not be overly suitable for astro images as stars are likely to mess with the algorithm that determines cell brightness, you are likely to see a lot of haloing on all but high end screens with that tech.

When it comes to bit depth per pixel, I would be wary of monitors that have HDR claiming 10-bpp colour as they MAY only support it in HDR mode. I do not know about dithered 8 bit however, as it relies on the program and operating system and graphics driver supporting it. It would however be relatively effective if it does work.

I'm not sure what mastering in HDR would involve so sounds like I don't need it, particularly if stars could cause issues. 

Most of the monitors I am looking at provide sketchy details about colour depth - usually the just say 10bit. Then reviews will often say its 8bit+FRC and only works up to 120hz and only in HDR. I feel really out of my depth with this, I do like to print Images and have a library of Tiff's many of which are 300MB+. That said I only use sRGB even for printing, Adobe RGB sounds a bit scary. But if processing in 10 bits would make a noticeable difference to prints it is important to me.

I can't go 4k unfortunately, I would need a better GPU and also viewing distances wouldn't be ideal.

I am looking at monitors like:

Gigabyte M27Q X 27" QHD

MSI Optix MAG274QRF-QD

MAG274QRX

Asus ROG SWIFT PG279QM

 

I think some of these use Quantum Dot, I will check. There are also some nice Acer screens such as Acer Nitro XV272U Kvbmiiprzx but I am ruling these out as when using VRR they lock overdrive to "Normal" which produces ghosting at 60hz and I expect my gaming will be in the 60hz to 140 hz region.

In terms of budget I was looking around £400 but I would go up to £1000 if it made a big enough difference - A big part of my problem is not really knowing what I need to optimise the AP side of things - pretty much any of these monitors is fine for gaming.

[pipnina]

51 minutes ago, Midnight_lightning said:

Firstly thanks for your very helpful response, apologies for slow reply, only just saw it.

I'm not sure what mastering in HDR would involve so sounds like I don't need it, particularly if stars could cause issues. 

Most of the monitors I am looking at provide sketchy details about colour depth - usually the just say 10bit. Then reviews will often say its 8bit+FRC and only works up to 120hz and only in HDR. I feel really out of my depth with this, I do like to print Images and have a library of Tiff's many of which are 300MB+. That said I only use sRGB even for printing, Adobe RGB sounds a bit scary. But if processing in 10 bits would make a noticeable difference to prints it is important to me.

I can't go 4k unfortunately, I would need a better GPU and also viewing distances wouldn't be ideal.

I am looking at monitors like:

Gigabyte M27Q X 27" QHD

MSI Optix MAG274QRF-QD

MAG274QRX

Asus ROG SWIFT PG279QM

 

I think some of these use Quantum Dot, I will check. There are also some nice Acer screens such as Acer Nitro XV272U Kvbmiiprzx but I am ruling these out as when using VRR they lock overdrive to "Normal" which produces ghosting at 60hz and I expect my gaming will be in the 60hz to 140 hz region.

In terms of budget I was looking around £400 but I would go up to £1000 if it made a big enough difference - A big part of my problem is not really knowing what I need to optimise the AP side of things - pretty much any of these monitors is fine for gaming.

Looking at your budget and desire to game AND do photo editing you'll run up against some serious compromises.

That said, I think displays are better at the low end now than they were in the past.

I would discard the super high refresh panels (i.e. the 240hz+ ones) as they are least likely to produce a suitable photo editing image in exchange for their fast refresh rate.

Another thing to consider is you ideally want to look at independent colour reports of the monitors before buying.

I googled some for the Asus and the Gigabyte, and they trade blows in various ways seemingly. I might lean towards the gigabyte based on the charts I saw but it's hard to say.

Personally I don't believe having more than 8 bit colour will be beneficial for print. And I think all of the displays you linked to are IPS and not QDot.

If you wanted the best of all worlds in terms of screen quality you'd probably go looking for a QD OLED, and forget about the HDR features unless you want to produce HDR content or view video games in HDR (I think very very few support it, fewer implement it well). Sadly they are right at the end of your budget and come no smaller than 55" as I can find so rather massive. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-OLED-Built-LaserSlim-Ultrawide/dp/B09YMFT5MQ

 

 

[Midnight_lightning]

On 04/10/2022 at 01:46, pipnina said:

Sadly they are right at the end of your budget and come no smaller than 55" as I can find so rather massive.

Thanks pipnina, my office is only 4ft x 4 ft

I have purchased an MSI MAG274QRX, only had it half an hour but it seems ok so far, some edge bleeding but I think its fairly minor (I don't really have much to compare it to), the glo is worse than expected but I don't think it will be noticeable in use.

Other turning brightness down to 30% I haven't changed any settings yet and I will calibrate it when I work out how.

Fingers crossed!

 

 

[Alien 13]

I went through this a few weeks ago so had the pain.

Not sure if your monitor is a wide gamut model like mine but you will have fun trying to calibrate it..Thankfully mine has full control of Brightness and contrast when in sRGB mode which helps.

Alan

Edited October 5, 2022 by Alien 13

[pipnina]

20 minutes ago, Midnight_lightning said:

Thanks pipnina, my office is only 4ft x 4 ft

I have purchased an MSI MAG274QRX, only had it half an hour but it seems ok so far, some edge bleeding but I think its fairly minor (I don't really have much to compare it to), the glo is worse than expected but I don't think it will be noticeable in use.

Other turning brightness down to 30% I haven't changed any settings yet and I will calibrate it when I work out how.

Fingers crossed!

Congrats!

And yes, sadly uneven backlight bleed is unavoidable for edge-lit screens (the LEDs are around the edge and their light is diffused by multiple layers of film). My PG279 (original ver, no Q or QE etc) was almost £800 and still has this problem to a pretty great extent.

Here's a photo I took of it when new in 2018, fresh out of the box. Obviously the camera exaggerates it but even quality LCD displays suffer.

Regardless of this flaw, you'll find it a very capable photo editing and gaming monitor. My recommendation is to find the "sRGB" colour setting preset and use that for editing photos if possible. On my screen it makes the yellow and red colours seem much more natural than the other modes.