First off its aspect ratio
15" - 1024x768 = 4:3
17" , 19" - 1280x1024 = 5:4
20+" - 1600x1200 = 4:3

I'll be honest, I don't notice the difference between my 15 or 17" screens, Maybe if I compared the 2 side by side but how often are you going to do that?
Apart from that I think its the same as finding a good currant LCD, response times, colour, etc, its just your options are seriously more limited.

How about 18"?

Tetrium wrote:

How about 18"?

5:4 it seems
http://www.prismo.ch/comparisons/desktop.php

Where are they commonly used, I've never seen one?

chinny22 wrote:

5:4 it seems http://www.prismo.ch/comparisons/desktop.php […]
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Tetrium wrote:

How about 18"?

5:4 it seems
http://www.prismo.ch/comparisons/desktop.php

Where are they commonly used, I've never seen one?

I have a sample size of 1, but it's a Dell 1801FP which is a 1280x1024 IPS. So I'm just guessing that maybe 18" was a common size for IPS panels.
I've never tried it with any weird video modes in DOS or anything.

4:3 1600x1200 monitors are big and might be best for 320x200, 320x240, and 800x600.
800x600 would use exact 2x scaling so it would look good. This could be handy for Win9x with early 3D cards.
They can also perfectly scale 320x240, though most VGA DOS games use 320x200.
For 320x200, a 1600x1200 might be the closest you can get to ideal. No LCD will be perfect for that mode because it doesn't use square pixels and LCDs do. At least horizontal is integer 5x scaling.
On the vertical axis of 320x200, it's not going to scale perfectly but with such a high pixel count on the monitor, the distortion may be less noticeable (assuming the monitor is well programmed to handle the mode).

If it's for DOS, DOS as I experienced it was 320x200, occasionally 320x240, rarely 640x400 or 640x480. I never used 800x600 in DOS.
If optimizing for those resolutions, then maybe 1280x1024 could be better since it's more suitable for scaling the 640x modes (but it will be bad at 800x600).
For 320x modes, the 1280x1024 should be basically just as suitable as the 1600x1200 monitors are, but the inherently imperfect scaling of 320x200 (due to non-square pixels) might be a bit more noticeable.

All this assumes that the given monitors are correctly programmed to handle these old video modes in the best way possible, including letterboxing on the 1280x1024 monitors. Not all monitors actually handle old video modes well. Somewhere there's a thread where people posted test results with various monitors.

The biggest problem with LCDs is that some of these old modes typically run at 70Hz, and LCDs don't do 70Hz natively. I don't have much practical experience with using DOS on LCDs though.

shamino wrote:

For 320x200, a 1600x1200 might be the closest you can get to ideal. No LCD will be perfect for that mode because it doesn't use square pixels and LCDs do. At least horizontal is integer 5x scaling.
On the vertical axis of 320x200, it's not going to scale perfectly...

Where is the problem in scaling 200 (or rather, 400) up to 1200 using an integer factor?

VileRancour wrote:

shamino wrote:

For 320x200, a 1600x1200 might be the closest you can get to ideal. No LCD will be perfect for that mode because it doesn't use square pixels and LCDs do. At least horizontal is integer 5x scaling.
On the vertical axis of 320x200, it's not going to scale perfectly...

Where is the problem in scaling 200 (or rather, 400) up to 1200 using an integer factor?

I was thinking that the non-square pixels of 320x200 would be problematic to reproduce for an LCD. However, now that you mention it I think you're right - a 1600x1200 monitor could just use separate scales for each axis - horizontally by 5x and vertically by 6x, which then would be perfect.
Or maybe the vertical is actually 400x3.. I guess I've seen comments before about 320x200 really being a 400 line mode. Either way, yeah I agree 1600x1200 monitors should be able to do 320x200 mode perfectly, assuming they're well programmed for it.

I've been using a 15" LCD from about 2004/05 (Compaq Fp 5315). It has about the same viewing area as the monitors I used in the mid to late 90's, but without the bulk. Also, i fidn these early generation LCDs to a great job upscaling lower resolutions (thia monitor runs 1024x768 natively, but 800x600 looks amazing on it, and in DOS the text is nice and smooth.

Plus it has some decent sounding built in speakers (with a proper volume control, not buttons) and looks pretty decent too.

Since we're talking old monitors, there is something important to mention:
Backlight. All of these were lit with cold cathode, which doesn't last anywhere near as long as LCD and dims over time before it dies. So, make sure you plug it in, test it with preferably a white screen before you buy it. You might get lucky and find one of those old 15 inch Dell 4:3 monitors that are everywhere that is basically NOS, or you could end up with something that was on 24/7 in a server room.

I got a question that supplements the thread: anyone have a lot of experience with different brands? I'm looking at a 17" Sony monitor with a thick, white plastic bezel. I gravitated towards that because I think Sony still makes/made panels, and the local thrift has one for $10. Same price for the aformentioned 15" Dell, which will be my little wall-mounted workbench monitor.
I want compatibility but I also want bang for the buck. I do a lot of photography so I've become really sensitive to color accuracy. I know old panels suck as far as that goes, but I don't have access to decent CRT monitors at the moment; if I did, I'd be using one for my photo stuff.

What about this little guy?

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?I … =9SIA57F3V75711

Vibob 15" Cctv TFT LCD Monitor - Bnc/hdmi/vga/usb Input, Display Computer Screen(Black)

Screen size:15inch,4:3
Display:BNC/HDMI/VGA/USB Input
Brightness:450cd/m²
Contrast: 500:1
Response time: <=5ms
Viewing angle: 175
Best resolution: 1024*768
Format: PAL, NTSC ,SECAM
Display Color: Black
For power supply: 12V/3A
Monitor size: 35 x 27.5 x4cm

llamaboy wrote:

Since we're talking old monitors, there is something important to mention:
Backlight. All of these were lit with cold cathode, which doesn't last anywhere near as long as LCD and dims over time before it dies. So, make sure you plug it in, test it with preferably a white screen before you buy it. You might get lucky and find one of those old 15 inch Dell 4:3 monitors that are everywhere that is basically NOS, or you could end up with something that was on 24/7 in a server room.

The brightness setting is a major factor in how long CFL backlights last. Unfortunately most monitors come out of the box with brightness set excessively high, and people usually don't turn it down much or at all.
I have an old Samsung from ~2004 that I set down to 0-10 brightness a long time ago. In very little time I got used to that setting and had no desire to turn it back up.
Capacitors had to be replaced at about 15K hours, but the backlight continued to be good. The service menu now shows it at 49,990 hours. It was my daily desktop monitor for about 12 years but now it's just for secondary stuff. It still looks fine at 0 brightness.

I now have 3 of these monitors. They have given an opportunity to see the difference in backlight aging.
The 2nd was bought on eBay. It arrived with bad caps and brightness set much higher than my first. At the time, both monitors were in the mid-16K hour range (not a huge coincidence since both had just been recapped). I still have pictures from that day showing the service menus on both.

Despite similar hours, monitor #2 was noticeably dimmer and needed to be set brighter to match (I think I used 30 or so). A few years ago it's backlight died. I don't know what it's final hours were, but it was not used as much as monitor #1, yet aged much more quickly. I blame it's first 16K hours of life at a high brightness setting.

Monitor #3 was a lucky find at a Goodwill. It only had 5K hours on it and had not been in the store long enough to get scratched up. I've turned down it's brightness and it's now my best of the 3. It looks better than #1, which demonstrates that age has indeed taken some toll on #1, but #2 was the worst (when working) and is now dead.

probnot wrote:

I've been using a 15" LCD from about 2004/05 (Compaq Fp 5315). It has about the same viewing area as the monitors I used in the mid to late 90's, but without the bulk. Also, i fidn these early generation LCDs to a great job upscaling lower resolutions (thia monitor runs 1024x768 natively, but 800x600 looks amazing on it, and in DOS the text is nice and smooth.

Recently I decided I had too many monitors and tossed out a couple of my oldest ones. They were in bad shape, but I wish I had tried them with the DOS compatibility suite that somebody posted in another thread. It might have been interesting to see if those models had any merit over newer ones.

shamino wrote:

Recently I decided I had too many monitors and tossed out a couple of my oldest ones. They were in bad shape, but I wish I had tried them with the DOS compatibility suite that somebody posted in another thread. It might have been interesting to see if those models had any merit over newer ones.

Here's what it looks like:

Also...that previous post of mine....that is why I don't normally post from my phone 😐