[fi-girl]

I **love** widescreen. For work I always need to have several screens and programs open at the same time and widescreen makes life soooo much better. Definitely worth it if you can swing it.

 

[plaidplatypus]

I've had both normal and widescreen monitors.

The main area the widecreen monitors have an advantage with is widescreen movies or panoramic pictures that have an aspect ratio closer to a widescreen monitor. Old games and programs will look stretched out when run fullscreen. Most cameras take pictures at a 3:2 or 4:3 ratio so they will be streched out wide when made as a wallpaper.

Games, presumably, will have support for normal monitors for many years. If a game has widescreen support you usually see a bit more left to right but less from top to bottom. I actually prefer seeing more from top to bottom as I usually move my mouse mostly left to right in a game that has a first person perspective.

Widescreen monitors also take up more deskspace from left to right than a normal monitor. Mine really dominates the little desk I have it on.

Given that you are looking at a 19" normal and a 22" WS the question to be asking yourself is do you want taller or wider?

 

[SemiAudiophile]

Quote:

Originally Posted by plaidplatypus /img/forum/go_quote.gif Old games and programs will look stretched out when run fullscreen. Most cameras take pictures at a 3:2 or 4:3 ratio so they will be streched out wide when made as a wallpaper.

i refused to go widescreen for that very reason. i can't stand it when things are stretched out. it's like watching SD on a HDTV. I watch regular cable on my computer sometimes so it's perfect.

i use a standard 4:3 20.1" SyncMaster 403b. the size for me is just perfect for desktop use; web surfing, documents, pics, gaming, etc. i also have a extra 15" LCD that i use to extend my desktop for additional applications such as documents, TV, etc.

wide screen is overrated and uses up more desk space IMO. i can see how it might be better for games, movies, and graphic design/editing, but for everything else...meh.

the screens are usually measured diagonally. so getting a 20" widescreen doesn't actually seem as big as a 20" standard. i think widescreens are only worth it if you go at least 26" or higher.

 

[Patu]

After using a widescreen TFT for a few years now, there's no going back. It works so much better in every single way. Watching videos and movies, gaming, desktop use etc. Everything is better. You can fit two word documents on 1680x1050 desktop with ease. Pretty much all the video material is 16:9 or 2.35:1 nowadays. You can have 1920x1080/1200 screen for so little money that I've been considering upgrading my current 22" 1680x1050 to 24" FullHD in near future.

Go for widescreen.

 

[Lou Erickson]

Go widescreen.

First, they're generally cheaper, so you'll get more bang for your buck.

There are two possible complaints:

1> Old games/video/etc are stretched and funny looking.

This can be addressed in the video card settings for most video cards. If you're using a DVI connection, NVIDIA cards will allow you to center the image with black bars on either side to prevent the stretching.

2> Working on a single document is too wide.

There are two solutions to this... don't do it any more being the harder one to get in the habit of. Stop running maximzed windows and let them scatter about and be next to each other.

The other solution, presuming you're using Windows, is to grab the task bar and drag it over to the right or left edges of the screen and make it kind of wide. Your desktop is squared back to the older shape, and you gain a little vertical space back from the task bar. I also usually have too many windows open to fit in a horizontal task bar, and can get may more in the vertical.

Widescreen has been good, and today I wouldn't hesitate to go any other way.

 

[Shark50521]

I was a staunch supporter of normal square, I had two 19's in dual monitor, now I have one 23 inch widescreen Samsung and boy o boy I don't know how I ever lived without this thing. Widescreen is definitely the way to go. Also, if you are working on a word document like Lou was talking about, on my screen if you go to the second page, it just moves it over to the right in the expanded screen when I have it maximized so I can actually see both pages at once, incredibly cool.

 

[Stitch]

I just received my new Iiyama 22" Thursday and oh my, i love it. My old screen was faded at the left and started to fade on the right. Its nice and clear and wide screen is great! And the old stuff isnt that bad. Final Fantasy 7 didnt apear stretched.
Just need to find a thingy to raise it a bit since its feet is lower than my old screen.

 

[SirDrexl]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lou Erickson /img/forum/go_quote.gif Go widescreen. First, they're generally cheaper, so you'll get more bang for your buck. There are two possible complaints: 1> Old games/video/etc are stretched and funny looking. This can be addressed in the video card settings for most video cards. If you're using a DVI connection, NVIDIA cards will allow you to center the image with black bars on either side to prevent the stretching.

True, and if you're playing a movie in a media player of some sort like PowerDVD, it's going to preserve the aspect ratio anyway (unless you tell it not to do so). It's really only a problem when you're dealing with a true fullscreen source, like a non-windowed game or a connected external device like a game console.

Unfortunately, GPU scaling doesn't appear to be in the Windows 7 ATI drivers yet. Grrr... However, many monitors can do their own aspect scaling anyway.

While I use a two page view for things like PDFs, I actually use a web browser across the whole screen. While sometimes there's dead space on the sides of the web pages, I really appreciate that I can have about 10 tabs open and readable at once.