Right now I have a 19" CRT monitor, but because of the space it takes up, power it uses, and general ugliness it has, I want to replace it with a 22" widescreen LCD. I'm wondering how easy this transition will be.

I know with my CRT, I can change resolutions for different things (desktop vs. gaming vs. whatever). Can the same thing be done with an LCD?

What about picture quality?

Can both Windows Vista, current games (Company of Heroes), and current applications (iTunes, Firefox) be easily used with a widescreen display without having ANY black bars on the sides. I want to be able to use all the screen space for every application.

Anything else I should also consider?

Yes you will get full widescreen support for most of todays applications.

However you cannot change resolutions like you can with a CRT.You have to run all your games and windows in the native resolution to get the best picture quality.You will notice the native resolution of a LCD to have smaller text in windows than what you are used to on a CRT.

You will also have to upgrade your PC regularly to keep up with the native resolution and playing in non-native through either scaling or windowed just sucks as far as i am concered.

And lastly most any 22" LCD sucks as it is a TN panel and non TN panels have lag problems and they are much more expensive.I think you are better off with your current monitor.If the colours and all that have faded then just get a new one.Viewsonic still makes there graphics series ultrabrite CRT's which has superb picture quality with a dedicated gaming mode which really looks fantastic.You can get a 19" for $200.

Funny you should mention that, the 19" Viewsonic CRT is what I currently have! Maybe it's just me, but it's fuzzy as anything, and text gets hard to read on it. Is there a good program or something I can use to get the best picture quality out of it?

Just about every game made in the last 2 years can take advantage of a widescreen display. As well as anything like Itunes.

Another thing to consider is whether or not your video card is up to running games (at a playable framerate) at the resolution that a 22 in LCD would need. Usually they're native resolution is 1650x1000 or higher. Which can really bring a mid range card to it's knees.

Do you have viewsonic ultrabrite monitor?

As for fuzziness,well completely reduce the miore reduction feature that would be in your monitor settings for both horizontal and vertical.I have not noticed any side effects of doing that.Also if your monitor does not have good refresh rates than gaming is not that enjoyable on a CRT running an uncomfortable refresh rate.

I think it is an ultrabright model. It has an "ultrabright" button that you push to increase brightness during gaming or for videos. Sometimes I just find text to be almost unreadable it's so funny.

As for my vid-card, it's currently a 8600GT (factory overclocked). I'm not a big time gamer, but I do game on occasion. I will most likely upgrade the card in the next year to something in the 9xxx range.

There is no way an 8600GT can power a 22" LCD with options turned on. I'm not sure how many options you'll be able to turn on, but the 8600GT won't power many games. (You'll be fine on desktop apps, movies, etc.)

http://www23.tomshardware.com/grap [...] &chart=297

Play with this, but make sure you use 1600x1200, as thats close to the native res found on 19" monitors. As you can see, unless you consider almost 9FPS playable, using the 8600GT is not a good idea. Another one you should check out is the Doom3 at 1600x1200. There the 7600GT beats the 8600GT, but both are around 30FPS. Not bad, but more modern shooters (Battlefield 2142, Crysis, COD4, etc, will suffer.)

I'm not saying don't get the monitor, I am saying either upgrade your video card first, or do it together. That way you won't have to suffer through games at 15FPS. Speaking of which, current games shouldn't have a problem with wide screen gaming. If you have any older games that you like to play, you might need a patch of some sort to make it work.

I would say it depends how much you really need all the eye candy turned up. While the 8600GT is not a stellar performer, it will be able to run games, assuming you keep things like AA/AF off and other ingame visuals keep to low-med settings. It will all still be playable (except maybe crysis), it just won't be as pretty.

To Thinker_145: Have you personally tried gaming on a recent non TN panel ? I have a 24" Benq fp241vw (M-PVA panel) normal response time is 16ms and with perfect-motion technology it goes down to 5ms. Even then my eyes can't tell the difference between 16ms and 5ms ..... if you can then my friend you must have special bionic eyes or something. But I sure can tell the difference between a TN and a non TN panel !

Yes you can run different resolutions. LCD's have a native resolution like for a 22inch it is usually 1680x1050. Usually you get the best picture at the native resolution, but it will adjust to any size even non-widescreen formats. One thing you won't miss is having to adjust your picture every time you change resolution at least when you use a DVI cable. I just purchased my second widescreen and the 5th LCD it's a LG L227WTG Flatron and it's pretty impressive. The best LCD I have owned, 2ms response, 10,000:1 contrast ratio, and excellent image quality.

Well no i havent to be honest tried a non-TN panel for some time but what can you do even people I know running SLI 8800GTX are playing with a TN panel it's not even funny anymore.

Well the big drawback of a 24" is the native res but if it indeed does not lag and you do have a capable rig for the screen then more power to you.

$200 for a 19" CRT . . . If you get a nice 22" LCD you will not regret it.

What's wrong with that?

That $200 CRT will easily beat any LCD in the same price range.

I think $200 for a 19" CRT is way too much now days, no matter how good the picture is. I got my 19" CRT about 5 years ago for about $70 and it still has a awesome, crystal clear picture. It is an Envision brand.

I think you'll be fine with a 22". I had a ATI x850xtpe (which is an old card) running a 24" monitor before I upgraded to a 8800gt, and it could play Overlord, orange box, and the new Tomb Raider at 1920x1200 at med-low settings. An 8600GT should handle newer games fine as long as you keep in the medium settings. You won't regret moving to a widescreen lcd, there really isn't much reason to stick with crts.

@Thinker: A $200 19" CRT is not going to deliver a better gaming experience. The reduced eye strain alone is a good reason to make the switch. Then there is power, heat and space. Most importantly there is the sexy factor and all which are in favor of LCD's. On paper CRT's show their muscle but to most eyes the advantages of the CRT's are less impressive, many casual observers think the high saturation LCD look better in term of image quality.

In the end it's all about personal preference but it is subjective.

For general use and gaming TN panels are great. All this bashing on them is way out of line in the context of gaming. For professional work with graphics they are lacking but all LCD suffer from that to some extent. I have used PVA's and TN's side by side a Samsung 173P+ and 204b and once calibrated there is very little difference that you can tell with your eyes. Before calibration with my Spyder 3 there was a noticeable difference and more work was required to get the TN dialed in but they are real close.

The fact is responce time lag is far more noticeable than 100% accuracy on colors to most gamers. The viewing angle is not that big of deal unless you have friends off to the sides. Now I'm not saying a PVA's isn't better, some of newer ones are more than fast enough but even side by side most wouldn't even know that there was a difference. Once you factor in the cost, TN's make the best gaming LCD's out there. Just take the time to calibrate it

Completely agree with ByDesign.

I'm not going to get involved in the CRT vs LCD debate until someone actually uses an LCD that can beat this P260 CRT, I'm sitting in front of, for under $1,000.

As for the OP's question, IMO get a 1920x1200 LCD for 3 reasons, A) True HD will let you see all of the 1080P image, B) Larger work space than the 16x10 monitors and lower resolutions, C) when gaming you can drop down to 960x600 and gaming in a 4:1 pixel ratio without interpolation, where the pixel pitch is essentially bigger, but from my experiences it looks better than trying to interpolate a 1024x768 picture onto a 1680x1050 screen.

Anywhoo hope that helps in deciding the LCD to buy, I'm not going to bother defending either CRT or LCD because IMO either you know why you want/need one or you don't.