Monitors and video cards

humanflyz · Post by **humanflyz** » Wed Aug 28, 2002 8:24 pm

I am just wondering what determines the number of resolutions avaivable for display. Is it the video card or the monitor, or both? What I am asking is: if I have a GeForce4 (which I don't), but then I have an old monitor, which device controls the number of resolutions I can have? For example, my maximum resolution available is 1024x768. Would I have bigger (numerically speaking) resolution if I get a better video card, or would my monitor also play a part in determining this? I want to know because I don't want to get a good video card and find out that because my monitor is old that it cannot display beyond 1024x768. Would I have to get a bigger and newer monitor to play games higher higher resolution than 1024x768 or do I just need to get a better video card, or both?

Mr Flibble · Post by **Mr Flibble** » Wed Aug 28, 2002 8:48 pm

Both.

The RAMDAC and amount of memory on the video card limit what resolutions you can output from the card, but it is also up to the monitors ability to display that output.

Most current video cards can easily display resolutions up to 2048x1600, however most monitors won't actually handle that but should easily be able to display resolutions up to 1280x1024.

Mr Sleep · Post by **Mr Sleep** » Thu Aug 29, 2002 5:06 am

I have an old 17" Dell monitor that will only display at 1152x768 which is all well and good but i find i still play nearly everything at 800x600....

Ned Flanders · Post by **Ned Flanders** » Thu Aug 29, 2002 10:41 am

ditto sleep except mine is a 19" monitor.

Most of dell monitors are crap unless you buck up for their trinitrons. I have all of our soft engineers on 21" trinitrons and it is amazing the amound of crap one can cram onto the screen.

Mr Flibble · Post by **Mr Flibble** » Thu Aug 29, 2002 12:19 pm

Most Philips monitors will only do up to 1024x768. One more reason I like Viewsonic.

Yshania · Post by **Yshania** » Thu Aug 29, 2002 1:08 pm

Originally posted by Ned Flanders
ditto sleep except mine is a 19" monitor.

Most of dell monitors are crap unless you buck up for their trinitrons. I have all of our soft engineers on 21" trinitrons and it is amazing the amound of crap one can cram onto the screen.

Do you mean as in resolution?? I have a Sony Trinitron, I forget what my old one was like but then my pc spec then was too bad to run higher than 800x600. I find with the Sony that I can run it easily on 1152x864, all resolutions above that I don't like the look of *shrugs*

Phantom Lord · Post by **Phantom Lord** » Thu Aug 29, 2002 2:41 pm

Resolution is one thing, frequency is another. Your monitor (if it ain't TFT / LCD) and vid card should be able to display the resolution you want at 75 Hz at least, but the higher, the better. Anything below 70 Hz is suited to cause headache in the long run. Most modern vid cards easily outmatch modern monitors concerning frequency possibilities.

humanflyz · Post by **humanflyz** » Thu Aug 29, 2002 8:44 pm

Thanks for the answers guys!

Now I just have to save more money to buy both the video card and the new monitor.