hylian_elf wrote:

What do CRT's do so well that LED/OLED cannot?

Low latency?

As close to zero as possible.

Evo still use CRTs for Gamecube Melee. (Well - they did when GC Melee was still a thing).

No scaler boxes in between needed to deal with old 240line outputs of older consoles. Most modern TVs make a dog's dinner of an old console unless you are using something like an OSSC and using RGB SCART into it.

I'll be hanging onto my CRTs for the time being but I'm looking at an OSSC to see if I can clear some space. I certainly wouldn't pay big for one....Mine cost me £40 and £0.

I doubt I'm good enough to notice lag but some comparison videos I've watched of shmup run comparison videos show a marked runtime difference of a minute out of say a 20min run displaying the same replay. So it really will have an effect even if you don't consciously notice it.  An OSSC processes a line at a time instead of a frame at a time so its lag is minimal.

There's something about the colour and glow off a CRT that does it for me too. But again - it's only for older consoles.

I've played retro games on CRT and newer screens and the CRT - despite the geometry and overscan issues one can get, and provided you have RGB SCART, is preferable for me.

New games of course need to be played with HDMI/modern screen. That's a different story entirely.

Traeted myself to a sexy new work monitor.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/BenQ-BL2420PT-Designer-Adjustment-Animation/dp/B00UAMYTR8

Its a bit chunky on the bezel and wont be great for games (not an issue for me) but the picture and colour are fantastic, especially on sRGB mode.

Even better I got it Amazon Warehouse reduced to £167 (it was £237 when I ordered). It didnt have the power cable in the box, which was fine its just a kettle lead so I used my old one. Complained to Amazon mainly because I felt it should have been in the description and could cause a problem for others. They gave me another £20 off.

Yeah, but it’s nowhere near as bad as the sound delay you get on live broadcasts from Sky.  It’s so bad I’m still waiting to hear what Brendan Rogers thought of his sides victory in the FA Cup.

My son has asked for a gaming PC for his birthday this December. 

I haven't owned a windows PC for over 10 years now and I have no idea what to get. We dug out an old PC from my mums house at the weekend so he can get used to keyboard/mouse, i managed to get windows 10 on it (took 4 attempts) but it can only just about turn on and run solitaire. i then found out the on board graphics card is just able to play GTA:SA and similar of that era lol. 

Requirements are it must be reliable, play Fortnite/Minecraft competently, it must be one of them RGB setups, and fuck it, it must be able to play stuff on Gamepass (thats for me more than anything). Any suggestions of websites/setups would be most welcome. Oh and pre built too, I don't think I can cope messing about putting things together.

That's a magnificent diagram. Just the sort of thing I love.

Someone is going to come up with a snappy name for a TV model without that guff and make dollar.
Probably Apple.

I’m wading into the swamp of researching a new monitor. Is there something to make this easier? Some sort of site where you can input your graphics card and it tells you what it can handle?

Gamermike wrote:

My son has asked for a gaming PC for his birthday this December.  I haven't owned a windows PC for over 10 years now and I have no idea what to get. We dug out an old PC from my mums house at the weekend so he can get used to keyboard/mouse, i managed to get windows 10 on it (took 4 attempts) but it can only just about turn on and run solitaire. i then found out the on board graphics card is just able to play GTA:SA and similar of that era lol.  Requirements are it must be reliable, play Fortnite/Minecraft competently, it must be one of them RGB setups, and fuck it, it must be able to play stuff on Gamepass (thats for me more than anything). Any suggestions of websites/setups would be most welcome. Oh and pre built too, I don't think I can cope messing about putting things together.

What's your budget?

This is a decent gaming laptop for a grand: https://outlet.euro.dell.com/Online/SecondaryInventorySearch.aspx?c=uk&cs=ukdfh1&l=en&s=dfh&sign=PXhcOSHtr1T4IOw/PR7UdSjL8XsqVY0nqyDTyjIATCXmo86VB8fGwIdSFMY1Ys26t7WfnhnsLEPVbBKbnRM9DZPv+J9x/8cALy/nHdjTbdADSekwX9sZ/zq9sFK1X5qnjpAoC9JHQW3+VAZST7K8REsh8rTPkoKX0br95l8D1QLVlSnIxypK6PtKbXTcnY8NmCkiHmvTez3N2pIS/XaszUoptC8IqfewSCi6P1IXl0uWpSKKVTIoWB9ib9fVEBOV 

Bang in this code off 12% off: [font=roboto, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]DOGAME12[/font]

I always recommend Scan. They built mine, not had an issue, delivered well packaged and reasonably priced.

They have 3070 builds in stock right now I believe but you're looking at 1500 quid upwards.

Gamermike wrote:

My son has asked for a gaming PC for his birthday this December.  I haven't owned a windows PC for over 10 years now and I have no idea what to get. We dug out an old PC from my mums house at the weekend so he can get used to keyboard/mouse, i managed to get windows 10 on it (took 4 attempts) but it can only just about turn on and run solitaire. i then found out the on board graphics card is just able to play GTA:SA and similar of that era lol.  Requirements are it must be reliable, play Fortnite/Minecraft competently, it must be one of them RGB setups, and fuck it, it must be able to play stuff on Gamepass (thats for me more than anything). Any suggestions of websites/setups would be most welcome. Oh and pre built too, I don't think I can cope messing about putting things together.

Desktop is definitely the way to go, best bang for the buck and easy to maintain and upgrade as needed. And as the GPU market is still dreadfull going for a decent prebuilt is really perhaps the best way to get a good value PC.

This Scan PC has a decent spec, but the only GPUs they have listed as "in stock" are much too expensive for a starter build, and and the two cheaper pre order options are perhaps a little on the weaker side. Also the PSU is el cheapo and not going to to be great for future upgrades.

I haven't used them myself but I often recommend AWD-IT prebuilts, primarily because of the very decent value for the parts they offer, and they offer actually good configurable part selections and don't hide away important things like what PSU they are using.


This may be too expensive for you and if so let me know and I'll find a cheaper compromise - https://www.awd-it.co.uk/awd-observatory-lite-mesh-ryzen-3-3300x-quad-core-4.3ghz-rtx-2060-6gb-desktop-pc-for-gaming.html

(£903.79 after changes to parts)

Changes I would recommend you make to the configuration on that page:

Ryzen CPU - change to the much better Ryzen 5 3600 6 core

CPU Cooler - AMD Prism RGB Cooler - it cools better and has them arrgeebees.

PC Memory Upgrade - get at least 3200MHz, there is is also some silly RGB lit stuff there that might be fun for the lad I guess.

PSU - I strongly recommend picking the Corsair RM750 Gold Rated, cheaping out on the PSU is the number one mistake new builders make, getting a really good one will help with system reliability and quietness, and perhaps most importantly won't hinder your son in making future upgrades to the system. A good PSU can last more than a decade and be carried on through several full rebuilds.

Primary Storage Drive - The Crucial P2 500GB is a decent deal and should perform similarly to an Xbox Series drive I think, but if you wanted to save money then the base SSD is probably fine, it's easy to upgrade later.

Then just unselect the Bullguard nonsense, and if you don't want to install the OS yourself with a USB drive (dead easy really, we could help you with that) then perhaps choose one of the Windows 10 options.

Overall the AWD build is a good spec for that price, a much better balance than the equivalent priced Scan PC, at least for the moment. The case will cool the parts well unlike most of the glass fronted hotboxes out there, and with the above specs will be plenty powerful enough to play anything very nicely for a while, and is plenty upgradable.

But perhaps that's a bit pricier than what you're looking for?

TheBoyRoberts wrote:

drumbeg wrote:

hylian_elf wrote:

My only concern with the Arc is that, as I’m not mounting the TV on the wall, the soundbar may obscure part of the screen.  The C1 screen sits 3cm up or so when sat on desk/table, and the Arc is roughly 9cm high.

I had this issue. Just bought a cheap alternative stand for TV to raise it a bit higher. Surprised at the number of people here not doing the same.

What one did you go for?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B075FN4GH5/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

This is to go with a 49" Sony Bravia. Does the job. I actually have the TV set to a height where the sound bar fits on top of the stand base underneath the TV.

Yes TV's have different names in different countries, which is very annoying.

PPI in this case seems to be picture performance index which from what i can tell is made up marketing bullshit https://en.everybodywiki.com/Picture_Performance_Index. PQI seems to be the Samsung equivalent. Ignore them or at least be aware, PQI is set by Samsung and can only be used to compare Samsung TV's and even then there is no like 'standard' to where they are getting these numbers from.

HZ, Contrast Ratio and Resolution are real measurements that tell you something as does like maximum luminance and probably some others i'm forgetting but do you really want to go down this rabbit hole? What's your budget and what will you use the TV for? Do you need to view from an angle?

You could read what this guy has to say: https://www.avforums.com/threads/my-links-guides.2116485/

Basically everything i say would be trying to translate that I'm not that knowledgeable i just steal this guys thoughts

Hisense 65U8Q seems to tick the boxes but may be just out of budget.