1440p vs 144hz monitor

[McWaffles]

Hello folks, I'm looking to replace both of my older 21.5" monitors with newer 24" monitors. I'm limited to the 24" due to desk space availability and needing two monitors for work. Since my older ones have a decent amount of edge around them, the newer 24" monitors really only add about 1/2" each (horizontally).

So my real question. I'm finding that for my budget I'm trying to keep myself under $200 per monitor and wanting to go with 24" IPS monitors (I think). In order to keep it under $200, it looks like I'm really needing to choose 1440p with 75hz Freesync or 1080 with 144hz. For reference, the games I play are typically RPGs, single player, or co-op style games (or WoW). I don't really ever play competitive shooters.

In most of my research, most sites list the best "gaming" monitors under $200 as 1080 and 144hz but is this due to them assuming we need the 144hz for those competitive games? Obviously, I'd love to have both 1440 and 144hz but for now it's looking like I'll have to choose and wanted to get some feedback on what folks thought would be best for me?

Thanks in advance for any feedback

[UserNotFound]

Since your focus is on RPG where fast framerate isn't all that matters, I'd think a 1440P 75Hz monitor would be more befitting of your gaming preference. I have a 3440x1440 75Hz Freesync monitor and I play FPS games with it (with Freesync enabled with my Vega64 Red Devil) and I don't have any issue with tearing and such.

Games I play on this rig (i7 3960X, 16GB RAM) are Gears of War 4/5, Strange Brigade, Doom Eternal, Serious Sam 3/4, UT3, etc, absolutely no issue. So for RPG or WoW, 75Hz should be fine at higher res of 1440P vs 1080P.

Edit - What is your system specs? You'd need a decent CPU and a relatively powerful GPU run run 1440P/75Hz or 1080P/144Hz.

[Illusion of Progress]

Preference.

I'd personally go with 1440p 75 Hz over 1080p 144 Hz myself, but that's because I haven't been on less than 1200 vertical for a decade and a half, so less seems incredibly low to me, as this 1200p (16:10) display I have doesn't feel like a high resolution anymore.

But if you're okay with 1080p, more frames is better. Having a better CPU and GPU will let you get more out of it, but it's not useless if you can't push as many.

One thing to be aware of is that at 24", you may find 1440p results in smaller things than you may like. My current display IS 24" but it's 16:10 (so it's about as tall as a 27" 16:9 but not as wide) and imagining 1440p in THIS vertical spacing would already be something I think I'd personally find results in smaller things than I'd like, let alone in LESS vertical space that a 16:9 24" would have. But, some people are fine with that. It's more DPI but results in smaller things unless you use scaling. So make sure you take this into consideration, but if you're using 1080p at 21.5" now, it shouldn't be much smaller than you're already used to.

[McWaffles]

Thanks, I realized I probably should have posted those specs:

Ryzen 5 3400G
32 GB RAM
RX 580 (Had to settle when building this PC, will eventually upgrade)

Going by played time to give you a metric of what type of games call me:
WoW
Heroes of the Storm (almost all vs AI with friends)
Pathfinder Kingmaker
Borderlands 2/3
Tom Clancy Wildlands (campaign only)
Warhammer 40k Space Marine
Warhammer Dawn of War 2

Honestly, just had to look up what screen tearing looks like since I don't know that I've ever noticed it before when playing games. That may be because with my time playing WoW, when I take a break from it I'm able to play older games I never got around to and my PC is just massive overkill for them?

It sounds like maybe from what you're saying though, I'll get more "bang" for my buck on the pretties by going with 1440 vs worrying about the Hz?

[Illusion of Progress]

Цитата допису McWaffles:

Honestly, just had to look up what screen tearing looks like since I don't know that I've ever noticed it before when playing games. That may be because with my time playing WoW, when I take a break from it I'm able to play older games I never got around to and my PC is just massive overkill for them?

Screen tearing can happen if your frame rate isn't synced to your display update (refresh) rate, and is typically MORE noticeable on overkill systems that get frame rates well over your refresh rate. But how noticeable it is is down to many variables.

Цитата допису McWaffles:

It sounds like maybe from what you're saying though, I'll get more "bang" for my buck on the pretties by going with 1440 vs worrying about the Hz?

1440p is "more pretty", no doubt. It's a higher resolution. Outside games, you'll have more screen real estate.

But 144 Hz is "more pretties" so to speak. Lower resolution, but more smooth. Again, this will extend outside games; even the desktop may seem vastly smoother.

It's also worth giving credit to lower resolution in one other department; as your graphics card becomes less capable (less an issue if you're more focused on the same games), with a lower resolution, you just... get less frames. This happens exactly the same at a higher resolution, but the difference is your frame rate is lower to begin with, so you MAY drop to a point performance is actually bothering you and/or leaving you wanting to lower the resolution (and 1080p on a 1440p display won't look as good as 1080p natively will).

I'd personally go with 1440p between the two, and I'm not saying 144 Hz doesn't matter. When I moved from a CRT to an LCD, the lesser smoothness on the DESKTOP was noticeable, so higher than 60 Hz definitely has benefits. I'm aiming for both when I upgrade, but if I HAD to choose, I'd probably go with 1440p. Again though, ENTIRELY preference. You know what 1080p looks like, so decide if you want smoother, or sharper detail.

[Baker]

24" Its a little small for me and I would go for the 1080p for that reason.
Personally for me 1440p on a 24 inch is unnecessary

[Andrius227]

60hz for me feels just a bit too choppy. But if you can get 75hz i think it should be good enough. Dont see a lot of 75hz monitors myself.

[Autumn_]

Цитата допису Baker:

24" Its a little small for me and I would go for the 1080p for that reason.
Personally for me 1440p on a 24 inch is unnecessary

1440p at 24 inches is brilliant, almost never seeing pixels as opposed go seeing them near constantly at 1080p.

Цитата допису Miss Ann Thrope:

On a 24" display, 1080p would probably suffice. I know a lot of people tend to prefer 1440p on 27" monitors, but the difference may not be as noticeable on that smaller screen.

It's more noticable -- I've got both 24 and 27 inch 1440p displays, and half a dozen 1080p displays in various sizes.

Цитата допису McWaffles:

Hello folks, I'm looking to replace both of my older 21.5" monitors with newer 24" monitors. I'm limited to the 24" due to desk space availability and needing two monitors for work. Since my older ones have a decent amount of edge around them, the newer 24" monitors really only add about 1/2" each (horizontally).

So my real question. I'm finding that for my budget I'm trying to keep myself under $200 per monitor and wanting to go with 24" IPS monitors (I think). In order to keep it under $200, it looks like I'm really needing to choose 1440p with 75hz Freesync or 1080 with 144hz. For reference, the games I play are typically RPGs, single player, or co-op style games (or WoW). I don't really ever play competitive shooters.

In most of my research, most sites list the best "gaming" monitors under $200 as 1080 and 144hz but is this due to them assuming we need the 144hz for those competitive games? Obviously, I'd love to have both 1440 and 144hz but for now it's looking like I'll have to choose and wanted to get some feedback on what folks thought would be best for me?

Thanks in advance for any feedback

If you're not accustomed to 144hz, you won't miss it.
And while I will recommend you get a 144hz, because it's pretty magical, I think you would get a better experience from the 1440p display.
It would serve you so much better, even with an aging GPU like the 580. You won't max things out and maintain 60fps, but you can get respectable settings.
And the fact that you basically never need AA with that pixel density, it should give a nice boost to FPS.

And 75hz, while lower, will still feel much nicer.


If you have doubts about getting a monitor with either, save more money and get one with both.

[Guydodge]

personally id break the bank on 1 good 27inch ips 144+ w/gsync/fsync and use one of your older ones if youve never used 1440 @ 144hz+ its another level.you'll never go back.JMO

[Autumn_]

Цитата допису Miss Ann Thrope:

Цитата допису Autumn_:

It's more noticable -- I've got both 24 and 27 inch 1440p displays, and half a dozen 1080p displays in various sizes.

More noticeable on a 24" than a 27"?

Wouldn't it be less, due to the smaller screen giving a higher pixel density?

I'm sorry, I misunderstood what you originally said.
Even though the pixels are smaller with both 1440p 24 and 27 inch displays, the 24 inch still provides a difference over 27 inches.
You see less pixels, so you do notice even more of a difference from 1080p24 inch.

[Monk]

Why not just replace your main monitor for now and get a single 1440p 144 panel?

Seems your existing screens are still working after all.

You could then mount the old screens on a monitor arm abd stack them giving you 3 screens to work with.

If it was me, I'd also try abd push the main screen upto 27 inch, the added real estate is nice.

[Pocahawtness]

Personally I would go for the 144Hz every time.

The increase resolution is great but it is too much for 24" monitors. The pixels are too small and you will find yourself squinting to see the tiny text.

Freesync is well worth the money. It's excellent. No more worrying about frame-rate.

Anything above 90Hz is excellent for any game. It's just so much smoother. You will really notice how nasty 60Hz is when you go back! Just make sure that your graphics card can manage over 90fps most of the time or of course it's pointless.

Don't forget you only need one monitor to be 144hz. There is no reason why you couldn't have two different monitors. A standard 60Hz second monitor would save you money you could spend on your primary monitor.

[nullable]

I'd vote for 144hz. Although I love my 1440p (144hz). But anything over 60hz does help. And that first first extra 15hz over 60hz probably has the biggest impact. I firmly believe the law of diminishing returns applies here. As your refresh goes up it takes more and more increases to get noticeable improvement.

I like my 144hz, but using Gsync and running at 80-100hz looks fine too. Side by side I might be able to see a difference. But that first 15-40 extra hz is the biggest improvement anyway. I'd go so far as to say the amount of improvement between 60 to 100hz is twice as noticeable as 100 to 144hz.

While I like 1440p, if I really had to choose one or the other I could sell myself on 1080p and jack some more settings up and/or run my hardware for that much longer as 1440p will certainly demand a GPU upgrade before 1080p will need it.

[Autumn_]

Цитата допису ｢C❤️A｣ Pocahawtness:

Personally I would go for the 144Hz every time.

The increase resolution is great but it is too much for 24" monitors. The pixels are too small and you will find yourself squinting to see the tiny text.

Freesync is well worth the money. It's excellent. No more worrying about frame-rate.

Anything above 90Hz is excellent for any game. It's just so much smoother. You will really notice how nasty 60Hz is when you go back! Just make sure that your graphics card can manage over 90fps most of the time or of course it's pointless.

Don't forget you only need one monitor to be 144hz. There is no reason why you couldn't have two different monitors. A standard 60Hz second monitor would save you money you could spend on your primary monitor.

You won't squint at text on a 24 inch 1440p monitor -- there is windows scaling which makes all text and UI elements larger.

I have no issue with 100% scaling (default) and 70-80% scaling in browsers or other programs.

You still have to manage settings and cap FPS to benefit from Freesync, just like G-sync.

[UserNotFound]

I'd missed the part about space restricted to only 24" monitor, in that case, a 1080P 144Hz monitor oughta do the trick. Pity there isn't space for a 27" 1440P monitor, but a 24" 1080P high refresh rate monitor would do just as well.

OP's game preference seems more suited to a lower refresh rate monitor but higher resolution, but given the space shortage, a good compromise would be a 24" 1080P 144Hz monitor.

[76561198433734644]

1440p is such a difference for gaming in singleplayer games. If you dont play competitive shooters they are so much better.