Ideal TV for tournament set up (on a budget)?

[KeithTheGeek]

One thing that Smash Bros for Wii U has over its predecessors is native support for HD resolutions and HDMI connection to monitors. Now, I'm well aware there are monitors out there with incredibly low to basically no screen delay, however, I have to consider a few things for a set up I plan to be bringing with me to a weekly. Ideally, it needs:

• Easy to transport- can't be too large, easy to move around.
• Have sufficient screen real estate for matches- By what I mean is that players should be able to easily make out visual details
• Cheap- remember, I (and likely other people) are on a budget and might not be able to afford top of the line monitors.

Now I suppose the real reason I made this thread is to ask about how people feel about playing this game on a CRT? There are a ton of thrift stores in and around the Richmond area here in Virginia, and I've seen CRTs practically everywhere for nearly nothing. Aside from the higher resolution, is there some sort of advantage to wanting to play on an HD monitor for Smash 4? Or, rather, is the loss in visual fidelity significant enough to where it may hamper the gameplay experience?

What do tournaments usually tend to run? I know Apex used proper monitors, but that's a very large national. What about local events? At the end of the day I don't want to harm the player's experience, so these are the main reasons I haven't already gone out and purchased a CRT.

 

[AnchorTea]

One thing that Smash Bros for Wii U has over its predecessors is native support for HD resolutions and HDMI connection to monitors. Now, I'm well aware there are monitors out there with incredibly low to basically no screen delay, however, I have to consider a few things for a set up I plan to be bringing with me to a weekly. Ideally, it needs:

• Easy to transport- can't be too large, easy to move around.
• Have sufficient screen real estate for matches- By what I mean is that players should be able to easily make out visual details
• Cheap- remember, I (and likely other people) are on a budget and might not be able to afford top of the line monitors.

Now I suppose the real reason I made this thread is to ask about how people feel about playing this game on a CRT? There are a ton of thrift stores in and around the Richmond area here in Virginia, and I've seen CRTs practically everywhere for nearly nothing. Aside from the higher resolution, is there some sort of advantage to wanting to play on an HD monitor for Smash 4? Or, rather, is the loss in visual fidelity significant enough to where it may hamper the gameplay experience?

What do tournaments usually tend to run? I know Apex used proper monitors, but that's a very large national. What about local events? At the end of the day I don't want to harm the player's experience, so these are the main reasons I haven't already gone out and purchased a CRT.

You don't really need something HD for smash bros. You can actually set the tv resolution type to non-HDMI in the Wii U settings menu. Of course though, you need that Wii plug-in that has those 3 colors at the end.

 

[Jaxas]

One thing that Smash Bros for Wii U has over its predecessors is native support for HD resolutions and HDMI connection to monitors. Now, I'm well aware there are monitors out there with incredibly low to basically no screen delay, however, I have to consider a few things for a set up I plan to be bringing with me to a weekly. Ideally, it needs:

• Easy to transport- can't be too large, easy to move around.
• Have sufficient screen real estate for matches- By what I mean is that players should be able to easily make out visual details
• Cheap- remember, I (and likely other people) are on a budget and might not be able to afford top of the line monitors.

Now I suppose the real reason I made this thread is to ask about how people feel about playing this game on a CRT? There are a ton of thrift stores in and around the Richmond area here in Virginia, and I've seen CRTs practically everywhere for nearly nothing. Aside from the higher resolution, is there some sort of advantage to wanting to play on an HD monitor for Smash 4? Or, rather, is the loss in visual fidelity significant enough to where it may hamper the gameplay experience?

What do tournaments usually tend to run? I know Apex used proper monitors, but that's a very large national. What about local events? At the end of the day I don't want to harm the player's experience, so these are the main reasons I haven't already gone out and purchased a CRT.

We use CRTs at our events for Smash 4, and they work well enough. An HDTV would obviously be preferred (as long as there is 0 frames of lag!), however that's just not an option on our budget.

Also, be sure to actually set the settings to 4:3 for (most) CRTs, as otherwise it'll take the widescreen image and stretch it out of proportion to fill the screen!

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Somehow I feel drawn to this thread...

I got myself the LQ 22MP55HQ-P. It's just over a hundred bucks, virtually lagless, and very, very lightweight. Hell, the box it comes in even has handles for easier transport. Note: no built-in speakers, you'll have to get those extra, but you can get cheapo speakers for 10 bucks that are definitely good enough for the purpose.

 

[UnicornSlaya]

Get the Asus VX238H. It's the successor to the evo monitor, and a lot of people use it for fighting games with 1 frame links. You could get one for cheap used.

 

[Pazx]

The general consensus is that HD TVs are preferred, but CRTs aren't a major issue provided 1. all matches are played on the same type of TV and 2. nobody goes to Final Destination. If your scene has CRTs lying around from Melee/Brawl/PM, it's okay to use those. If you can rustle up a HD TV yourself and there are people willing to bring monitors to tourneys, I highly suggest you do so.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

I strongly recommend getting an HD monitor. CRTs often have severe image distortion, and they always stretch the display in an odd way that makes the game "feel" slow. CRTs are also ridiculously bulky and obnoxious to transport unless you get one with an incredibly tiny display (which of course is a problem in itself). It's a simple fact of life in the community that we'll still have to deal with old CRTs for a while more as they're phased out from the old stockpiles of TOs, but definitely don't go buying new CRTs!

HD lag is a big concern (the delay between when things happen in-game and when they show up on screen, obviously can never be zero due to basic physics but can be significantly less than a frame), and the general rule of thumb is "monitors are good and TVs are bad". This isn't really a hard rule; some TVs are okay and there are a few monitors that suck. If you have to deal with an HDTV, newer is far better (old HDTVs are crazy laggy) and you want to set it to "game mode" or, failing at that, whatever mode you can find that minimizes the amount of image processing the display does since whatever garbage it's doing to the picture will take time. The following website has a list of quality displays if you want to look through it, but unfortunately the webmaster is missing a whole lot of displays that are well worth considering so this shouldn't be a bible just a reference:

http://www.displaylag.com/display-database/

One other concern is in-built speakers. A lot of monitors don't have them, and while that can be just fine, carrying around external speakers is a bit of a pain (and acquiring them an additional cost). Definitely look into the in-built sound options on any monitor you purchase.

HD monitors also tend to be really light and easy to carry. I can carry my 27" HD monitor under one arm and use my other arm to carry a bag containing my Wii U and all of the other stuff I need to run my set-up. There's just no possible way you can carry a full set-up (display device, console, etc.) in your arms by yourself if you use a CRT, and I'm very close to "done" with helping anyone move 100 lb CRTs...

In terms of cost, you shouldn't have to spend over $300 per display even if you don't shop around much at all, but you can find good deals for sure (BPC's recommended display seems to be $130 online). In general monitors tend to be a lot cheaper than TVs which is kinda ironic since they're also superior (so an actual HDTV, as opposed to an HD monitor, is paying additional money for an inferior device). As with most electronics, you should be doing your shopping online; brick and mortar stores overcharge to an insane degree. I hope some other users can give good recommendations to give you a nice set of discount options; I haven't done any shopping for years so I'm not keen on what the deals are now. Just do remember that this is a device you'll be using for many years; a good HD monitor won't become outdated for probably the next 20 years so even if you really do pay $300 your cost per year of service is going to be very, very low assuming you take care of it properly...

In short, please don't buy CRTs. They're just barely good enough that we can tolerate dealing with them when we have to, but really, they suck. Laggy HDTVs obviously suck even more, but in 2015, we should be seeking out actual quality display devices in HD monitors.

 

[KeithTheGeek]

Wow, got a few more replies than I thought I'd get. I guess more people are interested in this than I thought.

Unfortunately being a poor college kid means that an HD monitor is not a purchase I'll be able to make in the immediate future, but it's definitely something I'd like to get once I have a bit of money saved. I'll look around and see what I can find that has as close to no lag as I can get, with speakers, and see if I can find any good deals online.

Until then I still need a temporary solution. I can probably ask around if anybody showing up to the venue will be able to bring an extra monitor, as right now all I have are a practically ancient HDTV that is almost as tall as I am and a big chunky CRT that's missing the necessary ports for even composite cable. Thankfully, last week's event wasn't as much of an issue as Smash 4 was just set up for some friendlies (the main tournament was Melee/PM), but this week we're going to be doing a small Smash 4 side event. I'll check with my local community to see what they think on the matter and if they can provide any help, I definitely don't want to let the only Smash 4 event I've found die down!

 

[cree318]

I got a Dell 22 Monitor - P2214H for a bit over $100 and it seems to be working pretty well. Doesn't come with speakers and no hdmi port, but some small external speakers and a hdmi to dvi cable works fine. Also the responce time is great (or atleast I have yet to notice any input issues). Looking to bring it to some tournaments now that I finally have a easy to move setup.

 

[DavemanCozy]

Any monitor advertised as 5ms or less input lag should be fine. For reference, I find that ~16ms = 1 frame lag. The reason why I say 5ms though is because actual input lag (the image processing from the top of the screen to the bottom) is more than what they advertised as.

You'd be surprised at the deals you can find in sites like Kijiji. I got a used Samsung Synchmaster 27" monitor (2ms lag, which is about .035 frame delay) for $90. Keep looking there.

The locals we have at my scene and in the GTA use 5ms BenQ monitors. They work perfectly fine too.

 

[Big-Cat]

Get the Asus VX238H. It's the successor to the evo monitor, and a lot of people use it for fighting games with 1 frame links. You could get one for cheap used.

I use the EVO monitor myself. It's still reliable for me since 2010.