Compare monitor and TV | What is best for a computer

A few years ago, the dif­fer­ence between a mon­i­tor and a TV was sig­nif­i­cant. The lat­ter were equipped with a plas­ma (some­times LCD) matrix, while the mon­i­tors boast­ed Full HD res­o­lu­tion with mod­est dimen­sions. Today, both devices are quite com­pet­i­tive and the choice of the right one depends main­ly on per­son­al pref­er­ences. What is bet­ter to choose for a com­put­er: a mon­i­tor or a TV? Our experts know the answer.

Features of a monitor for a computer when working with graphics, games

Mon­i­tors are often used as a prac­ti­cal and func­tion­al addi­tion to both desk­top and lap­top com­put­ers. Their main task is to accu­rate­ly trans­mit the sig­nal and respond prop­er­ly when the user inter­acts with the result­ing image. This kind of ele­ment is ide­al for close work: it accu­rate­ly con­veys the small­est details.

Since the mon­i­tor res­o­lu­tion is high­er than that of TVs, they are con­sid­ered uni­ver­sal because they sup­port var­i­ous video for­mats. It is the mon­i­tor that will more accu­rate­ly con­vey the pic­ture of the game, regard­less of the year of its release, but on TV the dif­fer­ence in qual­i­ty will imme­di­ate­ly be notice­able.

Well, if we talk about the neg­a­tive specifics, we can’t help but note the high cost of mon­i­tors, which will pro­vide high qual­i­ty pic­tures when using col­or­ful and “heavy” games. So con­nois­seurs and pro­fes­sion­al gamers will have to spend mon­ey. In addi­tion, the pur­chase of an expen­sive mon­i­tor will have to be sup­ple­ment­ed by the pur­chase of qual­i­ty speak­ers to pro­vide a good sound sys­tem in accor­dance with the image.

If we talk about work­ing with graph­ics, then mon­i­tors, due to the abil­i­ty to trans­mit a sig­nal clear­ly and with­out inter­fer­ence, are suit­able for per­form­ing any graph­ic oper­a­tions: they cor­rect­ly trans­mit fonts and the small­est pic­tures.

ON A NOTE. Regard­less of the cost of the mod­el, the mon­i­tor allows not only to opti­mize the image, but also to increase it with­out loss of qual­i­ty, with the abil­i­ty to care­ful­ly exam­ine the pix­els. The mon­i­tor is suit­able for work­ing with any graph­ic edi­tors. Even an impres­sive size diag­o­nal is ide­al for work­ing with graph­ics, it is eas­i­ly locat­ed on the table and does not cre­ate dis­com­fort dur­ing oper­a­tion even for a picky spe­cial­ist.

Features of a TV for a computer when working with graphics, games

Like mon­i­tors, TVs are suit­able for trans­mit­ting audio and video sig­nals in com­put­er games. Such devices are a great option for those gamers who want to feel the real­ism of the pic­ture, to see com­put­er char­ac­ters almost in full growth. This is an undoubt­ed plus of TV devices, because at a rea­son­able price you can pur­chase a diag­o­nal of more than 32 inch­es and get a real­is­tic, juicy image.

Remark­ably, the TV auto­mat­i­cal­ly improves the image qual­i­ty and increas­es it, if nec­es­sary, in case of a change in res­o­lu­tion. You can deter­mine the speed of the “reac­tion” of the device when con­duct­ing a test in the store or when ana­lyz­ing its char­ac­ter­is­tics. The undoubt­ed plus of the TV is the pos­si­bil­i­ty of using it not only for games, but also for high-qual­i­ty movie view­ing. An unpleas­ant fea­ture can be called the bulk­i­ness of the prod­uct. In addi­tion, its com­fort­able oper­a­tion is pos­si­ble only at a dis­tance of at least 1 m from the eyes.

In order for the TV to be used to per­form graph­ic tasks, you will need high-qual­i­ty LED-type back­light­ing, as well as the pres­ence of an IPS matrix. It is these two con­di­tions that will ensure a high-qual­i­ty pic­ture, nat­ur­al col­or repro­duc­tion and max­i­mum detail.

If we are talk­ing about the most advanced mod­els, they pro­vide soft col­ors with­out blur­ring the pic­ture and with­out cre­at­ing harsh, unre­al­is­ti­cal­ly bright col­ors. This tech­nique is ide­al for view­ing pho­to data, videos, edit­ing infor­ma­tion at a con­sid­er­able dis­tance with­out los­ing qual­i­ty.

As for the neg­a­tive fea­tures, then again, the bulk­i­ness of the design imme­di­ate­ly stands out, because most TV mod­els can­not fit on an ordi­nary desk. Cre­at­ing a col­lage or any oth­er graph­ic unit using TV is not easy, since not every oper­at­ing sys­tem will sup­port it.

Comparative characteristics of a monitor and a TV for a computer

After con­sid­er­ing the fea­tures of each device, our experts have com­piled a detailed com­par­i­son of the two devices on a num­ber of key char­ac­ter­is­tics.

Dimensions

TVs can boast a wide vari­ety of sizes, from tiny ones with a diag­o­nal of less than 20″ to “giants” with a diag­o­nal of more than 100″. Mon­i­tors in this regard are much more “mod­est”: the lim­it val­ue of the screen diag­o­nal does not exceed 32”. In prin­ci­ple, prod­ucts of such a large size are not par­tic­u­lar­ly con­ve­nient for use at close range. If you need an option that can be used both at the table and sit­ting in a com­fort­able chair, both prod­ucts in ques­tion are per­fect here.

The only, per­haps, the case when the mon­i­tor real­ly out­per­forms the TV can be called a widescreen matrix. If you need to view two win­dows at once or make the most of the side areas of the screen, TV devices with their tra­di­tion­al 16:9 ratio clear­ly lose out com­pared to mon­i­tors (21:9).

Matrix quality

Mod­ern mod­els of TVs and mon­i­tors are cre­at­ed using iden­ti­cal tech­nol­o­gy. But if we are talk­ing about bud­get options, then the lat­ter, no doubt, win. For exam­ple, at a price not high­er than $ 150, you can pick up a high-qual­i­ty copy with an IPS Full HD pan­el. But it’s already more dif­fi­cult to find a TV of this qual­i­ty in this price cat­e­go­ry: you can usu­al­ly find prod­ucts with a TN pan­el, less often with HD.

When it comes to high def­i­n­i­tion, there is not much dif­fer­ence between a 4K TV and a mon­i­tor. But, again, the UHD option on the TV means its con­sid­er­able dimen­sions. In this case, the diag­o­nal plays a role: if 32 ”or more is required, it is bet­ter to give pref­er­ence to a TV, if not, a mon­i­tor would be the best choice.

Input Output

This inter­face is con­sid­ered one of the key dif­fer­ences between a mon­i­tor and a TV. The lat­ter are usu­al­ly equipped with a large num­ber of HDMI inputs, have tuners for receiv­ing high-qual­i­ty images received by an anten­na or cable. Often, TVs also have old vari­eties of ports like RCA (“tulip”). Also, slots for CI cards are con­sid­ered exclu­sive­ly orig­i­nal chips of TVs, allow­ing you to open a cod­ed chan­nel.

The mon­i­tor, devoid of a tuner, does not have the above func­tion­al­i­ty. In fact, the TV can per­form the func­tions of a mon­i­tor bet­ter than the lat­ter func­tions of the TV.

ON A NOTE. When con­nect­ing sev­er­al sources to the TV at once, you can eas­i­ly switch between them using the remote con­trol. In the case of a mon­i­tor, you will have to con­stant­ly use the but­ton on its body, which is not very con­ve­nient.

Delay amount

Input lag or delay is an equal­ly impor­tant com­par­a­tive indi­ca­tor. It is its val­ue that indi­cates the peri­od of time required to dis­play infor­ma­tion after it has been received. The main task of the mon­i­tor is to quick­ly and accu­rate­ly dis­play the pic­ture, the task of the TV is to make it beau­ti­ful. That is why the lat­ter often per­forms com­plex post-pro­cess­ing, which is why the lag is high­er (some­times this inter­feres, espe­cial­ly for gamers). For com­par­i­son: the nor­mal indi­ca­tor of input lag for the mon­i­tor is about 10 ms, for the TV — 15.

Sound output

Many peo­ple for­get about this para­me­ter. If for a TV sound out­put is a stan­dard phe­nom­e­non, for a mon­i­tor such an option is a rar­i­ty. A sep­a­rate top­ic is game con­soles. They do not pro­vide any way to out­put sound to a stan­dard 3.5 mm jack: the same con­nec­tor is used for this as for pic­ture out­put — HDMI.

If you con­nect, for exam­ple, a PlaySta­tion 4 to a mon­i­tor with­out sound out­put, even when using HDMI, you will not be able to play with sound. The best option in this case is to use head­phones by con­nect­ing them direct­ly to the con­nec­tor on the gamepad.

Upgrade

Although the mon­i­tor is infe­ri­or to the TV in a num­ber of ways, the lat­ter also has some unpleas­ant fea­tures. In par­tic­u­lar, we are talk­ing about the impos­si­bil­i­ty of upgrad­ing the device. In addi­tion, it is almost impos­si­ble to find a high-qual­i­ty matrix in inex­pen­sive mod­els, so you will have to pay for a beau­ti­ful pic­ture. If we are talk­ing about a mon­i­tor, then it is easy to improve it by adding a media box with a tuner. Thus, you can con­stant­ly upgrade the device, sim­ply by chang­ing the media box to a more pow­er­ful one.