Monitor Recommendations

Can anyone recommend a decent quality monitor of screen size 25" or, posssibly, 24"? I have found Iiyama monitors good in the past. I am looking for the following: HDMI input (socket); 16:9 aspect ratio; full HD; and, preferably, adjustable height. I have seen 5 panel types, VA, TN, IPS, AMVA and AH-IPS. How important is IPS compared with AMVA or the other types for normal everyday usage?

Added:
For example, Iiyama Prolite XU2590HS-B1 at GBP171.07.

IPS is great – much better than whatever flavour of TFT my older (10 year+) monitors used. If I was buying a monitor today, that (or some other IPS variant) is probably what I’d go for.

Some more info/opinions:

https://www.pchardwarehelp.com/guides/lcd-panel-types.php (looks like it was originally written a few years ago)
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2019/06/18/gaming-monitor-panel-types-explained/ (gaming focused, but at least it’s from this year)
https://pcmonitors.info/articles/lcd-panel-types-explored/ (also this year)

In my experience, the used display technology is a poor predictor for overall screen quality. There are good and bad TN displays. Viewing angle differs vastly between models, not only between technologies. First I would decide if you need fast refresh rates. If that is not a deciding point, you can pick from a wider range.

I always start with a list of must-have and nice-to-have features and use that to drill down the available options. Usually, I end up with only three or four devices…last time I looked for a monitor, I started with “4K resolution”, “small enough to fit under the roof”, “at least 2 HDMI inputs as well as DP, VGA” and ended up with a selection of 1.

ast time I looked for a monitor, I started with “4K resolution”, “small enough to fit under the roof”, “at least 2 HDMI inputs as well as DP, VGA” and ended up with a selection of 1.

Same here – except I was perhaps a bit more relaxed about the size. Ended up with a TV not a monitor, and am very happy with it. It’s 43", but there are 40" 4K TVs around now – even 32", but they’re more expensive afaics.

I don’t even know what the technology is, but the viewing angle is excellent, and it’s fine in every respect. Even accepts 24 Hz screen refresh rate, so works with the Pi at 4K. It’s a Philips 43put4900/12. I doubt that model is still available though, I’ve had it four years.

Ended up with a TV not a monitor, and am very happy with it. It’s 43", but there are 40" 4K TVs around now – even 32", but they’re more expensive afaics.

The problem with TVs is that they usually don’t have DP input, and that their VGA input is usually very restrictive – mostly VESA modes and nothing else, sometimes even limiting fps to 60. Exactly 60. Not good for many of my playthings. And you always have to make sure that you can disable all those “picture enhancement” gizmos that ruin your pixel-perfect display.

Thank god that overscan is mostly no longer a problem, and input frequencies via digital input got a lot more relaxed since Blu-Ray introduced mandatory support for 24fps, 25fps and 30fps.

I admit that I give not a monkeys about DP or VGA, being as what the Pi and the Mac both output HDMI. I don’t know whether HDMI always supports 24, 25 and 30fps, but this one does (and 50 and 60fps, of course). As for “picture enhancement,” if this TV has any such thing I’ve never met it. What exactly would “picture enhancement” do to a 4K image displayed on a 4K screen?

I did just get a good deal on an IPS 24" which seems to have the (surprisingly rare) 1920×1200 res. It is height adjustable, IPS, tilt/swivel/rotate etc. I bought it for a specific customer who needed those features, but to be honest, the price was good enough that it should be a good choice for anyone. 1080p would be 20 pounds cheaper, but I think that the extra pixels of 1920×1200 plus the extra flexibility in height adjust are probably well worth it. Call me if interested. They are available for the lower-end of what we discussed at the show. Edit, just checked, the price has risen since Monday – I’ll need to shop around.

I will say that as someone who has seen a LOT of displays, I can’t agree with Steffen’s comments about TN. But that’s a personal opinion. I respect a LOT of what Steffen says, but he and I are poles apart on monitor tech. I find anything other than IPS difficult to produce a satisfactory, well balanced image. And yes, I’ve tried. Multiple times. Also, I use it for gaming and STILL prefer IPS. Basically, if you need fast refresh that badly, use a CRT. Otherwise IPS.

I think that really only twitch gamers running 144Mhz+ displays (mostly eSports) should look at TN and ironically, they’d be better with CRT (no ghosting at all). [See recent digitalfoundry videos]

I don’t see a reason for a RISC OS user to choose another display type, really, unless they’re going the TV route like Clive.

It’s more on the budget end but I have two HP 24w monitors on my desk and I can really recommend them. They’re currently £100 quid on Amazon but they drop regularly to 80 or so, which is what I paid. I’m really pleased with them, considering the price I paid. The only thing to note is that they’re not height adjustable.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B072ZBX5FV

Another crucial question: matt of glossy ? Personally I hate glossy screens and unfortunately this info is rarely provided by the online shops, you have to check the products documentation from the constructor to find that info.

Glossy screens seem to have become less popular, and apart from one glass-fronted screen I saw a couple of years back, almost all IPS displays are matt. I think one of the reasons for the glossy effect was to hide older TN panel’s limited colour range by trying to increase the colour “pop”. Also, many IPS displays were targeted for professional use, where matt panels work best due to office lighting etc.

Don’t get me wrong, a gloss display can look great, but it is much more location dependant, whereas a matt display should be good in most situations, but with slightly less “pop”. For what it is worth, I tend to hate “pop” in monitors, as it tends to make “ordinary” images (ie. documents, desktops etc) look unbalanced and unnatural, in an attempt to make colourful images more striking.

One thing to look for is colour space – at the very least you want 100% sRGB colour space, and as close to 100% as you can (some are more, in fact) of the extended Adobe RGB space. Many monitors have a “sRGB” mode, and whilst it can disable some calibration settings (bad) it is often the best “out of the box” mode for colour accuracy (good).

I have decided to go for a 25" screen sa I already have a 24" monitor. I have also decided to go for 1920 × 1080 resolution; because with RISC OS there are still resolution problems if one has a non-standard screen, e.g., the LapDock, Pi-top (and ARMbook?).

The Iiyama monitor I have my eye on (see my initial post) is not height adjustable, unfortunately; but it can be tilted. Is tilting as good as straight up and down if the vertical screen is not the right height?

I have been using AOC Q2577PQW monitors with RISC OS for the past couple of years or so, and am very impressed by them. They are 25in and have a resolution of 2560×1440, which RISC OS copes very well with on Pi, and ARMX6. It also does a grand job of 2048×1152 for a Titanium or IGEPv5.

Full specs are available here but in RISC OS terms, it works at native resolutions, EDID finds a wide range of resolutions, but it will do others (e.g. 2048×1152) using MDFs, and does work as low as 24Hz. It’s hard work going back from 2560×1440 to 1920×1080, once you’ve made the leap.

Ports-wise, it has DisplayPort, HDMI, DVI and VGA and has a fairly decent set of speakers built in for standard audio playback.

I was so impressed I went off and took a punt on an AOC 34in ultra-wide model, which is equally impressive.

It’s hard work going back from 2560×1440 to 1920×1080, once you’ve made the leap.

It’s hard work going back from 3840×2160 to anything less, once you’ve made the leap, believe me. Using a laptop has become almost unbearable.

This is what Robert Llewellyn calls “moasting”.

It sounds like a moan… but it’s actually a boast. ;-p

It’s hard work going back from 3840×2160 to anything less, once you’ve made the leap, believe me. Using a laptop has become almost unbearable.

You mean your laptop does not have a 4K display? Seems to be a bad buy :-)

I have a laptop and a tablet that both do 4k, but one is 13" and the other 10". However, I can just about use VNC on both at 1920×1200, but I would rather not. ;-)

You mean your laptop does not have a 4K display?

8~)

Too damn right. I don’t have a (useful) laptop of my own at all – it’s my wife’s MacAir. (I do still have a couple of PC laptops, but don’t use them at all any longer, although they do at least have bigger screens than Grace’s MacAir, with more pixels.)

a gloss display can look great,

When? Where?

I had a ridiculous amount of trouble getting photographs of the screens of my Minitel terminals because the screens were shinier than a girl’s patent leather shoes (and this is when they’re decades old and dusty). In the end, I draped a dark towel over the thing to shield the outside light and took photos at a sharp angle (corrected (sort of) in my photo editor) in order to try not getting a reflection of my phone from the display’s light.

Being that shiny, I can imagine it would have been quite fatiguing to use for any length of time, especially if there was daylight, windows, etc.

I have been using AOC Q2577PQW monitors with RISC OS for the past couple of years or so, and am very impressed by them. They are 25in and have a resolution of 2560×1440, which RISC OS copes very well with on Pi, and ARMX6. It also does a grand job of 2048×1152 for a Titanium or IGEPv5.

Q2775PQU here. The same, but 27in. Perfect.
I would love to have two of them on my desktop. With a Pi4? :)

Will be my config… soon :)

Thanks for people’s advice. I have bought another Iiyama, but this time a little bigger at 25" and 1920 × 1200 resolution. Model XUB2595WSU-B1.