Tag: monitor

Are you ready to jump to Windows 8 yet?

Posted onAuthorTruXter

[poll id=”26″]
What measures have you taken to prepare yourself for the best Windows 8 transition experience possible?
Have you purchased a touch screen capable monitor?
Have you bought the latest motherboard,processor,memory and Solid state hard drive?

Yeah, me either.
Maybe I will wait a couple years for the computers to start shipping with windows 8 already on them. Not the ones that say “Windows 8 ready” or “windows 8 upgrade for free”. The machines built for Windows 8.

Typically when the new operating systems come out, we find later that current hardware is less than able to run the operating systems and soon after come new and improved hardware. Most often is ram/memory. but the inevitable is processor. with a new CPU it’s usually a good idea to get a new motherboard also. or you will be left behind.

The part you have to prepare for is, what is available now, at it’s max is usually just barely above minimum requirements of what ever software or operating system that has just been released. Like say, ddr2 memory was the highest we had when Vista came out. That memory capped out in it’s time at 2 gigs per stick. many motherboards have only two slots. Wouldn’t you know it, 4 gigs memory is optimal for windows 7. That’s not how it was announced but that’s what we have come to learn on our own. This will be the same case with windows 8. Now with Windows 7 out we have DDR3. Which has a cap of what I think is 8 gigs per stick. Count on DDR5 becoming the common with in the next year, and the first bloat pack (service pack) coming out and everyone realizing that new optimal for windows 8 will be crazy high like 8 gigs. best performance 32 gigs.

So hold out on your upgrade to any new operating system for a few months. let the new hardware come out. Let the first few updates come out. Let the internet swell with complaints. Don’t buy parts until you see the crying stop. Prices should level out to a fair cost. If you buy any parts or computers now, you are basically buying off the junk that the stores are trying to get off their shelves. They too know how it works. Every single time.

Fear Monger
Basically, based on past experience, if you are running DDR2 or older, you will be left behind. That mouse of yours is antiquated, and that video card you have that is the top of the line, is now ….. just cute. That 250 gig spinning hard drive will be pointless. Of course because the numbers are higher on everything, we will bloat out our videos and music. Count on songs becoming 1 gig minimum. So that one TB hard drive you have in the external case, will be antiquated, 50 TB hard drives coming with in the next two years. Easily. (not easy task, but is a must). Well at this rate . What does this mean?  It means your 250 gigs a month cap from Comcast, will easily be reached. Your 2 gig cap from at&t is less than laughable now. Just wait until ALL of your software is apps based and you begin to agree that cloud storage is the only logical option. That 250 gigs a month will be less than a week to break.

This of course is one hundred percent plausible fiction.

but as always. Software should always excel hardware. That’s how we evolve. If not for something to push the hardware to be better, faster, stronger, we would be complacent. We would not innovate. When we have greater speeds and storage, we can then come up with ideas that seemed farfetched and impossible.

I admit that I am currently satisfied with Windows 7, fearful of what Windows 8 could mean, and skeptical of any positive claims we see in the next 5 months of Windows 8.

So no.. I am not ready.

What I see From A Wide Screen

Posted onAuthorTruXter2 Comments

Face it, The first Wide screen (not in a theater) for public purchase that was for any decent use, was on our laptops. You can give huge thanks to the laptop computer creators for your new wide screen television, or wide screen monitor on your computer. sure there were a few devices out before the laptop computer that had flat screens . But this whole post is about anything  greater than 8bit. I am talking about something that evolved into a nation wide demand for higher resolution to be broadcast for television purposes.The better the laptop monitor got, the more appealing it got want that kind of thin screen on your personal desktop computer. And the more you wanted a flat  screen monitor, the more you wanted a flat-screen television. This would lead to so much more real estate on your desktop and your entertainment center. With all of this extra space we could now see ourselves with  wider monitors. That of course triggers the gears in your head. You find yourself saying “hey, at the beginning of all of the movies, they say the movie has been modified to fit my screen”. Now we have an idea.

So everyone has one these days, except for a few people. The world treats them as if they are leaving themselves behind. Or they are just stubborn. But really, are they? Could they just have better things to spend their money on?

I was using a 25 inch crt Monitor and had a 62 inch crt television. Now I am on a 19″  widescreen monitor and a 42″ widescreen television. Some how I tell myself I am better off because the videos fit my monitor and television. The truth is, it’s not any wider now. In fact I lost the whole top section of my monitor and top section of my television. Instead of the video being made to fit my tv, my tv is now made to fit the video. Sure the tv is now at a higher resolution than the old one. Now the colors are crazy now. One show is what they call “hot” while another  is not . So the red or the yellow bleed out.

I do know one thing, my desk isn’t bowed in the middle like it was with that big glass monitor. I am happy to move the television upstairs on a whim. Much lighter now. A bit more expensive still.

Do we really need wide screen monitors and wide screen televisions? or are we just happy with flat screens and our movies fitting the view area?

Selecting a Flat Screen Monitor

Posted onAuthorTruXter

So you are looking for a monitor for your computer. You are not 100% certain as to what you are looking for. Simply because you are either just coming off an old CRT monitor, or one of the first breeds of lcd monitor. If you are just now coming from the first breeds of flat screen monitors then I have to tell you, quite a bit has changed now. A nice new flat panel monitor will do you some wonders. If you are coming from a CRT monitor ( I will assume it was a very high quality CRT monitor) then you are not looking at better, or worse resolution, . What? what you say? We can feel safe in saying that this is a whole new ball game now. First gen flat screen monitors were no comparison to crt monitors. Now days it is finally a whole new game. It’s low cost high quality now. Wide screen areas. With the advent of High def televisions (HD tv). We got a huge choice in upgrades and tweaks and inventions that shot monitors through the roof in their evolution.
So let’s get into the budget tech review and explanation to help you select a good flat screen monitor. I will make this simple as possible. Bring the Flat Screen Monitor into an easy way to shop. After this you might as well upgrade your television. You can use this review when making that choice also. I just don’t believe the resolutions or image quality will be near as crisp as what you will see with your new monitor.
Here are 4 very important things to look at , Resolution, Scan Types and Contrast ratio and of course the one that isn’t listed on any boxes or manuals: blackness (black levels), view degree, light reflection.
Now to explain these qualities. I will use my best “Redneck definitions”. Well. In a sense.

Resolution
How many pixels across the top by how many pixels down the side. Screen size is not defined by resolution but a key ingredient in image quality is. You can have a monitor that is eleven inches across the top and six inches down the side (small wide screen)(not the right way to measure a monitor, but should be). The resolution for this flat screen monitor example could be 1440×900.
Then you look at a monitor that is 32 inches across the top and 17 inches down the side. This larger monitor could have the exact same resolution of 1440×900.
In this case, bigger is not better. Not at all. a monitor at that size would have to have a resolution of “4320×2700” to even compare. Kinda unachievable. but who wants tiny monitor ?
720p is better than 1080i.

Scans
Progressive scan and interlaced scan.
Progressive is the latest and newest higher quality. you are better off getting Progressive. Some videos and 3d programs still use interlacing so you may want to look into what kind of deinterlacing is used on the monitor or hope it is handled well with your video card.. Think of Progressive as very fast stacked lines to make an image.
Interlaced was dropped for the most part. Think of Interlaced as as static you would see on your old television. Every other pixel or so flashes while the next one is loading. Kinda

Most people can not see the difference between the two flat screen monitors. Unless they use both types of monitors for a while and then switch between them after long use. After using progressive scan, I get a headache when I use interlaced now.

Contrast ratio
There are two terms that get mentioned when talking about Contrast. Static and Dynamic
Static is very important, dynamic is bonus points.
Static is the Native settings fixed contrast.
Dynamic is your contrasts fluctuation range.
The higher the static, the better
If the dynamic contrast ratio is the only thing listed and it says something along the lines of 200,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, it might sound a bit fishy. but I would surely grab that monitor before I would even walk near a flat screen monitor with a 2000:1 static contrast ratio. Typically the static is 75%-90% of the dynamic. Usually. Good luck with that?
My monitor 10,000:1 . Does not list if it’s dynamic or static. I am assuming the static is atleast 8000. While the flat screen monitor in my office is 800:1. poor quality at work.

unorthodox but important, blackness, Viewing Angle, light reflection
If you turn the monitor on while a light is on in the room and the screen goes all white while you are looking at a Yin/Yang Symbol. Well the black levels on that flat screen monitor/ flat panel monitor are crummy
Light Reflection is what you see when you turn a light on and the glass (if it’s glass) reflects back at you so much that you can’t see the display.
Viewangle, stand dead in front of the monitor at a comfortable distance (3-4 feet), step once to the left and twice to the right and see if the imaging gets hard to see, watch the edges and the corners for a looming growing shadow as you move. People who stand dead beside the monitor to check it….. um…. you really have no idea how to use the monitor do you? really, why in the heck would you want to stand next to it while you use it ? but you do want to know it looks good when your loved one looks over your shoulder as you watch a video together.

So.. What is 720p 1080p and all that stuff about?
Easily said by today’s basic standards for a monitor’s design, look at the resolution for the side and round down to the nearest res.
So if the resolution of your monitor is 1440×900. Then you have a 720(look at the 900. yep that simple). It didnt use to work like that but pretty much all flat screen monitor companies use the same standards these days. You have a 95% chance of that being correct.

TLDR -(to long didn’t read) Summary below
My flat screen monitor tech specs.
Contrast Ratio 10000:1 (the ratio of the luminance of the brightest color (white) to that of the darkest color (black) that the system is capable of producing)
Brightness 300 Nit (Candela per square meter)
Maximum Response Time 2ms
Aspect Ratio 4:3 (The aspect ratio of a shape is the ratio of its longer dimension to its shorter dimension)
Horizontal Viewing Angle 170°
Product Type LCD Monitor
Vertical Viewing Angle 170° (viewing angle is the maximum angle at which a display can be viewed with acceptable visual performance)

I hope this helps you select a good flat screen monitor in your future.

Computer upgrading tips.

Posted onAuthorTruXter

There are a few things to First get to know when you are wanting to upgrade your computer. First one is simple. Figure out if the computer is a manufactured or a home built d.i.y. (do it yourself) computer. If it’s a manufactured computer just locate the production number and go to the manufacture’s website and see what upgrades you can get. In many cases it is best to use the parts they offer, unless you know what you are doing. If you do not but want to go the least expensive route, get a techy friend to help you. In most cases it is all about locating the part numbers, such as mother board numbers to find out what type of ram and or video card. I am pretty sure a good Google search will lead you to a safe forum full of people with the same issue, or willing to help you.

If it’s a diy computer, you might want to follow the last two suggestions I made in the earlier paragraph. Locate motherboard part number. Locate motherboard part number here. Locate the video card part number and locate the memory part number. Do the same with the hard drive. I would start with just putting the motherboard’s part number in  Google and let Google do the work for you. You should be able to find a large list of helpful links. Unless the model numbers consist of three  of the letter X. In that case you will not find anything helpful. In 95% of model number searches you will find specifications, unless your part is really out dated. Five or more years old, might be an issue. With something that old, you would benefit more to just shop online for a low cost computer.

If you are wanting to be really up to date and want to do it yourself, I have to say, buy a barebone computer. stick around 199-299 dollars. locate a really recent dated video card that is compatible with your new machine, most decent video cards  on pci-express X16 run anywhere from 50-500 dollars. Don’t be ashamed to buy the $50 one. It will only be slightly less superior to the $500 video card, and they both will be out dated at the same time.

hand full of words to remember when searching

DDR2

Pci-Express

Dual core or Quad core  if you really want to up to date with the very most recent.

500 watt power suply.

Dual layer dvd

multi card reader.

A machine like that should run you from $450 – $5000.  Shop smart on that. Remember there really is a small difference, Don’t listen to the kids that scream about the best. Really the decision is up to you and your needs and wants.  Overkill is and always will be overkill and useless. But an undershot is money wasted.

If you are looking for a monitor to upgrade Here are more phrases.

Refresh rate (lower is better)

Lcd

Hdmi

Wide screen.

Fair range is $12 an inch. But you can pay more if you must. But if you can beat $12 an inch then you are in the good, as long as the refresh rate isn’t stupidly bad.

Good luck with this, if you have any questions, bring it on. I would love to try and help.