Q: My system: nForce 790i Ultra SLI 775 ATX Motherboard e-GeForce GTX 280 1GB GDDR3 PCIe 2.0 Intel Core 2 Extreme Processor QX9650 3.0GHz Vista Ultimate 64 Bit I am about to buy a monitor for my computer but I'm confused about the size of the monitor, should I get a 20" Monitor or 22" Monitor? which one will look better? I play these games on my super old 19" Monitor Call of Duty 4 Crysis Unreal 3 Fifa 08 Need for Speed here's what I want: I want to play all the above games on Very High Settings on 1680 x 1050 so which one would you recommend? 20" or 22" and do you think that I won't get a good FPS if i get a 22" monitor?
A: A 20" or 22" monitor will get the same FPS at 1680x1050. The logic needed to render/shade/light the pixels is what takes the time and that's a job for the GTX280. Displaying the actual image on the monitor is dependent on other variables. All things being equal, I'd go with the 22". Look at the specs for both monitors and see if anything stands out to you. I won't go into the specs in great detail (let me know if you want detail), but look for a rise/fall response time of 12ms or less , brightness of 300 or better, and contrast of 700 or better (which is very common in 22"). As I mentioned earlier, the video card (and CPU to some degree) is what makes or breaks your FPS. Your monitor needs to be as fast as your video card or you get trails/blurring, image artifacts, etc. That's a function of the LCD's response time. 12.5ms allows for a theoretical FPS of ~80. 5ms is very common in new LCDs and would allow for a theoretical 200FPS. The faster you go, the less you have to worry about. It's a function of (1/response*1000): (1/12)*1000 83.3333333000 (83FPS max @ 12ms) (1/5)*1000 200.0000000000 (200FPS max @ 5ms) Read the reviews on the specific monitor you're looking at. I use newegg for that. Your system is top-notch for 2008. You'd get away with 1920x1200 (w/ a 24" or larger LCD) running at full quality settings and many games would run at 2560x1600 (w/ a 30" or larger LCD). Maybe not all games would run full-quality at 2560x1600, but some games would. You have hardcore gear. I use a 24" at 1920x1200 with a 8800GTS (overclocked) and a Q6600. I can play many games at high quality (not Crysis, haha), so you'll be able to run 1680x1050 with no problem.