difference between tft lcd and crt brands

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The recent surge in thin-film transistor (TFT) technology, specifically for the TFT LCD display, is making CRT (cathode ray tube) monitors a thing of the past. In fact, TFT display is being used in almost all LCD monitors these days, most notably in computers and televisions.

It owes its popularity to its ability to refresh the screen quicker than a CRT, thanks to the fact that its small transistors require such a tiny charge to engage. Aside from this, TFT displays boast other advantages that give ample reason for manufacturers and businesses to widely use it in their digital products.

Because TFT displays are handy, these can easily be transferred, moved around, and installed. It can also be mounted, freeing up space that can be used for other equipment or tasks. This makes TFT monitors a perfect choice for creating a functional workstation. With this technology, businesses can maximize the use of their workspace by keeping unwieldy monitors out of the way.

If you’re worried about ballooning energy bills, a TFT monitor can help lower them. Since it uses pixels to display images, it uses less energy than CRT monitors. In fact, you can save up to 78% in energy use when you use a TFT monitor.

Say goodbye to blur with a TFT module. It uses a flat matrix display in which all pixels remain active, thus eliminating flickers. There are also no geometric distortions to worry about, unlike a CRT screen that tends to obscure images because it electronically focuses on the image from the inside while displaying it from the rear.

Because it’s flicker-free, you can ensure a sharp visual from a TFT-module monitor, which helps avoid physical symptoms of overexposure to computers or televisions. It does not create strain on the eyes, nausea, or headaches.

Thin-film transistor (TFT) modules are ideal for graphic artists, web designers, photographers, and other media types who require two monitors simultaneously to do their work. Moreover, TFT modules enable dual monitor configurations. All your computer needs is a video card or a couple of monitor connections.

Because of these advantages, the TFT LCD display has gained prominence among many industries. Understanding how it works and how it can help promote your business will help you engage it based on your specific needs.

TFT monitors don"t have refresh rates "as such", a CRT with it"s rate set low would certainly give you a headache because it illuminates and draws line by line at say 65Hz.

The Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) has been the standard for PCs from the start - from the ancient, tiny green screens to today�s high powered 20" + SVGA behemoths. However, while the image quality of CRT"s has continued to improve, there are other areas that are still a concern: mainly power consumption, physical size and radiation emissions. Thanks to standards like TCO"95, the issues of power consumption and emissions are being addressed. These standards are evolving as quickly as the technology. The issue of size, though, has not been as easy to overcome. In fact, as monitor prices continue to fall, users are purchasing larger and larger monitors. The downside of this new purchasing power is that these big monitors consume an immense amount of the space on your desk.

There is a solution that addresses all three of the concerns listed above: Thin Film Transistor Liquid Crystal Display (TFT LCD). These types of computer monitors are compact and yet meet the strictest of standards imposed on today"s VDU�s (Visual Display Units). The only problem is, with these new technologies comes a whole new set of issues and somewhat confusing specifications. This article will attempt to explain the meaning of various technical specifications, their importance when identifying a good display model and how these things affect the gaming experience.

The Austrian botanist Fredreich Rheinizer discovered liquid crystal back in 1888. "Liquid crystal" is neither a liquid nor a solid crystal; instead it remains in a state much like oil. In the mid-1960s, scientists demonstrated that liquid crystals could change the properties of light passing through it when you apply an electric field. Prototype displays were made soon after, but were too unstable for any kind of mass production. However, a British researcher proposed using a stable, liquid crystal type material (biphenyl). LCDs then went on to be featured in things like calculator screens and other gadgets displays.

Instead of making an image by firing a scanning beam of electrons at tiny phosphor dots on the inside of the screen (like CRTs), LCDs use a strong backlight as their light source, and then control how much of this light is allowed to reach the dots (pixels) by selectively blocking the path of that light. If you then place coloured glass over each pixel you can create colour images on the display.

Thin Film Transistors (TFT LCD) are an extension of the older Liquid Crystal Display technology. TFT LCD has a sandwich-like structure with liquid crystal filled between two glass plates. TFT Glass has as many TFTs as the number of pixels displayed, but these transistors are lighter than in previous LCD models. Liquid crystals then move according to the difference in voltage between the Colour Filter Glass and the TFT Glass.

Liquid crystals remain transparent unless a voltage is placed across them. While the voltage is applied, the portion of the display under its influence remains opaque. The speed at which the liquid crystal can be switched on and off is relatively slow (this will be discussed later). But in 1992, Thorn EMI announced a new type of LCD called FLCD (ferroelectric LCDs). This technology switches more quickly and also has the ability for each pixel to remain in whatever state it�s in without the need for the switching voltage to be constantly applied. This greatly increases battery life for portable equipment such as laptops and PDA�s. While FLCDs hold much promise, not much of that technology has been seen on the open market as of yet. The sensitivity of the FLCD screens to shock and vibration, which dislodges the crystals, is believed to have been solved and the contrast ratio is also improving as the elimitation of defects increase.

The future for ferroelectric LCDs is still uncertain, but if a higher contrast and wider viewing angle is achieved, they will compete with current LCDs. What is the response time for the FLCD? The FLCD has the advantage that the on and off switching times are the same, unlike other displays and the response time is a staggering 70�sec!!! at normal projector working temperatures. But I digress :)

For most users, TFT LCD monitors more than meet the requirements of everyday computing; coping adequately with the Windows environment, photos, video, documents, etc. For gamers, however, it"s not quite that straightforward. While CRTs have issues with size, emissions and power consumption, TFT LCD�s have a different set of issues - issues that directly affect aspects of PC gaming. These concerns include native resolution, non-native resolution, response time, dot pitch and a few more.

The Cathode Ray Tube of regular CRT monitors extends from the glass you see in the front of the screen, into a cone shape to the back of the unit and makes up the bulk of the monitor (in size as well as weight). At the very back of the tube is an electron gun. This gun fires a stream of electrons towards the screen. Magnets steer the electrons from the guns. These magnets are what you adjust with your control panel buttons on the monitor, allowing you to fill the viewable area of the screen. On the other side of the glass is a masking layer of three colored phosphers, the stream of electrons hits this layer and shines either red, green or blue. These primary colours combine to make your image.

TFT LCD monitors work on a completely different principle allowing manufacturers to significantly reduce the screen in both size and weight, while keeping the same viewable area. These screens have a fixed amount of pixels built into the display and are therefore designed to operate at a specific resolution; this is termed the native resolution of the display. Native Resolution is not usually a problem with everyday tasks...but can cripple the gaming experience. Why? If the video card does not have enough horsepower to run a game at the native resolution, the game will turn into a dull slideshow. One solution to get the game to run at an acceptable frame rate (at the native resolution) is to reduce various graphical details options. Considering today�s photorealistic games, however, the resultant image quality is rarely satisfying to the people that want to play these games. So one thing to consider when choosing a TFT LCD is whether your system can handle the images at its native resolution.

If the computer does not have enough horsepower to run at the native resolution, another option available is to change the resolution of the display to something less than the native resolution. This may seem to be a simple answer but this usually uncovers another weakness of TFT LCD�s...most do not display acceptable images at anything other than their native resolution. Two things can happen when a screen is not in its native resolution; either the screen size may be reduced and black bars are added or the image is stretched to fill the screen. If you have a screen with a native resolution of 1024x768 and you play a game at 800x600 then there may be nice black bars round the edge of your screen of 306432 pixels that are simply not being used. Much like watching a letterbox format movie (really really widescreen) on a standard size TV. Alternatively, the screen may use pixel doubling or �zooming�. This is where the non-native screen resolution is mapped onto the native resolution. You will not have any black bars round the edge of the screen, but each pixel being output by the video card may be mapped onto several pixels on the actual screen. This gives rise to fuzzy edges on objects, even when the picture is completely static. This situation should be avoided as much as possible. Make sure you look for an TFT LCD monitor that is the right size for your uses and for your computer.

Since their debut, a major black mark against TFT LCD�s in the gaming world is their relatively slow response times, hinted at earlier. The screens simply do not refresh at the same rate as the CRT cousins and this leads to ghosting and jagged pixel effects on you display. Ghosting is when the previous image displayed on the screen can still be seen for moments after the image has changed. For instance, in any first person shooter style game, if you look around quickly, a hazy after image of walls etc will trail the actual image on the screen. The image below shows that effect.

CRT�s have a refresh rate measured in Hz. The higher this number, the faster the screen refreshes the display. A CRT monitor redraws the whole display every pass, picking up even the smallest changes at a much faster rate than the human eye. Having a refresh rate that is too low, the CRT monitor will appear to flicker. In the States, the sine wave used by electric utilities is 60Hz. That"s why CRT monitors will flicker when run at 60Hz. (for more on the effects of Refresh Rate and VSYNC, click here and here) TFT LCD�s are slightly different and are not hindered by the flicker that plagues CRT monitors. Consequently, TFT LCD�s typically operate at 60Hz and when the image on the screen changes, only the affected pixels on the display are altered. The rest remain unchanged. But changing pixels takes time to alter from one state to another, this is commonly called rising and falling. The time the pixels take to rise or fall is then referred to as the response time. The smaller the response time, the faster the pixels can change and this will result in less of the ghosting effect. This is, in my opinion, the greatest issue with TFT LCD�s and gaming. This response time is given in milliseconds on the specifications for the display. However, gray-to-gray response time is much more important for determining if an LCD is the best for gaming, rather than rising and falling response time. Unfortunately, grey-to-grey response time is rarely given on sales specifications.

One continuous criticism of CRT monitors was the screen size. Invariably CRT monitors would be sold according to their tube size. So the �18� monitor� refers to the size of the cathode ray tube in the monitor. The viewable area of the screen may be significantly different from 19�. The viewable area may range from 15� to 17.1� depending on the manufacturer of the CRT in question. When referring to LCD�s and TFT 19� is 19�. The viewable area of an 17� CRT is equivalent to a 15� LCD or TFT screen. So if you are perfectly happy with the size of your screen and just wish for it to take up less space. You should go for the next size down (i.e. if you have a 19" CRT desk hog, look at buying the next size down, a 17" or 15" LCD/TFT)

Although CRT Monitors are better for gaming, TFT/LCD monitors are on the rise. They"re more technologically advanced than CRT ones but they"re worse for gaming. Nevertheless, these are gaining popularity because they"re better for everything else. Smaller, lighter, better to the eyes, great quality and good size makes LCD monitors the number 1 choice.

These days monitor brands have at least one 120hz tft monitor. These are *highly* recommended, in alternative to a big and heavy crt. Some models available today:

If you own one 120hz tft monitor you can ignore the remaining information on this page, since these monitors usually deliver a very smooth experience out-of-the-box.

Under Windows with Nvidia graphic cards you can tweak this settings in Nvidia Control Panel, you got few options in Display -> Adjust desktop size and position. There are two modes recommended:

Do not scale - which will result in black bars around the image. So if you got 1920x1200 and you run 640x480 then you will get vast amout of black borders. It will look bizarre. Example here.

TFT monitors are currently limited to 75Hz. Thats 75 "screen updates" per second. See below for best settings for each monitor. Note that some screens accept diplay at 75Hz rate but in fact interpolate it back to 60Hz so you will get once per 15 frames dropped, wich may have nasty non-smooth side effects.

There is a limitation of bandwidth using DVI especially with higher-res TFTs but this is affected by the monitor"s capability of being single- or dual-linked and it really limits the possible fps. Huge monitors with huge resolutions are basically unable to have anything above 60Hz due to this DVI bandwidth limitation.

The difference between VGA and DVI input varies from monitor to monitor. Basically VGA input adds random noise (or snowing) to the picture, or moving "waves" in the worst case scenario, or reducing the sharpness of the image and/or accuracy of color prodution. Note that using DVI or VGA does NOT affect input lag or the screen processing time at all, so it"s recommended that DVI is being always used.

LCD dont refresh the entire screen, instead they "morph" the image pixel by pixel. CRT refresh the entire screen, so you always get a brand new image, created in one go, rather than 1000s of pixels. The bluriness in LCD and CRT comes from how fast the images or pixels are refreshed. Most people can set their CRT to 60hz and see quite a blurry image. CRT uses an electron gun in a technique which basically "morphs" all the pixels, 60 times a second (during 60hz operation, 120 times a second during 120hz, etc.) This means that LCD will actually be faster than CRT, if they update at the same hertz, because LCD selectively refreshes parts of the screen, while CRT mechanics force it to refresh the entire screen. (This is partly how lossless video compression streams achieve smaller file sizes, by excluding redundant data except for key-frames every couple of seconds.)

One legitimate criticizm of LCD is "ghosting" which is the effect of the physical properties of low quality liquid crystal, which the visible phosphorus layer on CRT does not exhibit.

CRT and LCD can both have true blacks, and true colour, depending on the quality of the manufacturer. Most LCD have "grid resolution", although there are alternatives to CRT such as Plasmas, etc.

I have not found this site useful. I came here looking to find out what a TFT was. Instead there"s just too much jargon on here. this only helps those who have an idea of what computers are and not the everyday person who does not know the difference between a CLI and a GUI.

i have bought a new TFT monitor. My problem is that the screen suddenly disappears and for a moment the screen is blank. But then it comes again and is working properly. When i typed this post it happened twice in the span of just a minute. Please do explain it to me.

What would be the power consumption of a standard TFT monitor and a digital monitor? How much would I be able to save on electricity consumption unit wise?

I love your article. It provided me very good information on TFT Monitors. It is good to know that the TFT Monitors consist of separate transistors for Separate Dot Pixel. Even in my cousin"s home on his LCD he got 2 black dots. I think it is dead transistors. So this is not good if some transistor fail it will corrupt whole display. What is the solution for this?

What would be the power consumption of a standard TFT monitor and a digital monitor? How much would i be able to save on Electricity consumption unit wise?

i have +2.5 power so it becomes very difficult for me to sit in front of computer regularly for seven to nine hours. is there any tft monitor on which i can sit regularly for more than ten hours? due to this reason i resigned three previous jobs.

I have a 17" drop down TFT monitor that I installed in my boat. It starts up fine, but after about two or three minutes, the picture freezes and then the unit turns its self off. Any idea what might be wrong with it?

i have bought new TFT monitor. My problem is that the screen suddenly disappears and for a moment screen is blank. But then it comes again and is working properly. When i typed this post it happened twice in the span of just a minute. Please do explain it to me.

What is the best TV setup for my retro game console? HD and 4K TVs are very nice, but depending on what you want to play, a CRT (tube TV, not flat-panel) may be the better way to run your favorite system. The key considerations are picture and control responsiveness (input & display lag).

This is from the title screen of Bubsy (SNES). It shows 1) connecting SNES composite video (nicer than standard output) to HDTV and allowing native upscaling (left), 2) SNES on a SONY Trinitron CRT (center) and 3) played on the RetroN 5 with native HD output (right). The CRT output is what the games were originally designed for. The true HD from the RetroN is very crisp with blocky pixels. Letting the HDTV do the upscaling creates a grungified look, with blurriness, ghosting, and artifacts that look kind of like an over-compressed JPEG image. NOTE: This SNES is outputting composite video, not RF, so it actually looks cleaner than many retro consoles will. See the Q*bert example below for an NES outputting regular RF (and read the article to understand RF, composite, and video signal types).

Oldschool video games were created during the era of CRT (Cathode Ray Tube) televisions. You know - the big, boxy TVs we had back in the 20th century. Game consoles and games were engineered expecting that kind of screen, so the consoles output a signal (analog, low resolution) designed for those screens.

Additionally, the delay between the signal reaching a CRT TV, and displaying onscreen was so short, that it wasn’t even a consideration. But because of the difference in how modern TVs process input signals, there is a slight delay (it varies between TVs) that can interfere with your ability to coordinate precise moves in some games, making them more difficult or impossible to play.

This exploration requires us to get a bit techy, and look at some history, but I’m going to break it down into bite-sized chunks just so we’re comparing apples-to-apples.

You’ll hear pixels mentioned all the time in discussions about gaming and screens. Pixels are the small dots (often squares, sometimes upright rectangles) that make up a picture onscreen. While various elements on the screen (game characters, environments) are all made of pixels, it’s the total number of pixels that make up the height and width of the full onscreen image that are used to measure detail level - referred to as resolution.

This enlargement of Kirby from Kirby’s Adventure (NES) shows the blocky pixels he’s made out of. The observant will note that he’s split into four sections, and that’s because each is a sprite. See the article about sprites to learn more

We live in a world so saturated with digital, that it’s easy to forget how TVs used to be analog. Today’s setups use HDMI cables to transmit digital video from a newer game console to a contemporary TV, older consoles all output an analog signal. The main difference is that the analog video was continuous waves representing the changing picture information, while the information in digital video is sliced up into chunks called “samples” saved as ones and zeros.

While we have become accustomed to the sharp precision of digital, real life is analog, and analog signals have a quality that is sometimes seen as more aesthetically pleasing than the “hard” or “sharp” way digital defines things. If you doubt this, just talk to an audiophile who loves listening to vinyl.

The main takeaway here is that old video game systems output lower resolution analog signals, and the games themselves were designed for that environment. This issue of “what they were originally designed for” comes into play later, and is often discussed in the the more philosophical portions of this overall debate about screens.

This relationship between width and height is referred to as aspect ratio. Standard HD TVs show a 1080p image. This means they are showing video at 1920 pixels wide, by 1080 pixels tall. Note that the resolution is always referred to by the height (1080 in this case), and the “p” in 1080p refers to “progressive” vs “interlaced” (see the next section). If you take the 1920 X 1080 rectangle and shrink it down while keeping the relative sizes of width-to-height in the same proportion (the aspect ratio), you’ll find that 1920:1080 reduces down to 16:9. So 16:9 is just the boiled down, lowest-common-denominator description of that relationship between width and height.

The display of TV signals was historically interlaced, but these days, the norm is progressive. Interlaced video just meant that the screen would show every other vertical line of the picture, and then faster than you could really see, it would go back and show all of the in-between lines. It would do this twice for each frame (each interlaced “half” referred to as a “field”). With digital HD TV, the progressive (aka “non-interlaced”) method of frame drawing became the norm. This means that all the vertical lines are shown in one pass.

Video Signal Resolution (Number of Pixels) Oldschool video was a lot lower resolution than today’s video. This means it used fewer pixels to show things, and so created a less detailed, softer image overall. As display technology has advanced, we’ve become very used to having sharp, detailed images that would have completely blown people’s minds back in the day. In 1977, when the Atari 2600 was released, people just thought it was amazing that you could move things around and play an actual game on your TV. We were all used to normal broadcast TV having a certain (low, by today’s standards) level of detail, so our expectations were set accordingly.

By the early 2000s, the new HDTV standard (720 or 1080) became the norm, and people’s eyes and expectations reset to find that new look “normal.” Now it’s moving to 4K, and people are adjusting to the even higher resolution.

This is the relative (it will be scaled smaller on your screen, but at least scaled proportionately) size difference between the 240p signal coming out of your retro video game console vs resolution of an HDTV:

Many classic game consoles output a picture at 240p resolution. The size difference between these rectangles shows how much the picture has to be stretched to fit an HD TV. If you let your TV handle this stretching itself, it’s going to look TERRIBLE. You need another way to get your retro games looking good on an HDTV.

Now that you understand the kind of video signal your Atari, NES, or SNES (or similar) console is putting out, what kind of screen are you using to display that signal, and how is it being interpreted?

A CRT (Cathode Ray Tube) TV uses an electron gun to fire a beam of electrons at the inside of its screen, hitting a bunch of tiny red, green, and blue phosphors to make them light up. These can handle a range of different video signal resolutions (up to 480 vertical resolution), and they just fit the image to the screen (as long as it’s a 4:3 signal being shown). An old game console and a DVD had different numbers of pixels (levels of detail) in what they displayed, and your TV happily just scaled what it got to light up the right phosphors and give you your image.

An HD (or 4K) TV has a specific, fixed resolution they want to display everything in, and when they get a lower resolution signal, they upscale it. Upscaling stretches the image to fit the larger number of pixels required to match the vertical resolution of your screen. While it might be considered ideal to gamers for HDTVs to just upscale everything crisply, TV makers opted for upscaling designed more for the look of video, instead of pixel art. Also, the upscaling being used it not the best, due to cost savings, and the fact that non-HD signals are not expected to be that common.

The originalist perspective: Many feel that since the consoles and games were designed to run on CRTs, that is the optimal way to play them. CRTs use illuminated phosphors, and the screens all have a certain degree of blending/softness in the way images look. This was taken into account when game art was created, and so the purest ideal of what looks “right” is what the developers were intending it to look like. That softer feel was the medium they were working in, not just an inferior version of our “perfect” crisp modern display look. Also, that phosphor glow has a special allure you have to get a look at (on a decent CRT, not junk) to appreciate. Phosphors have a glowing, scintillating warmth that is very appealing compared to the much flatter, matter-of-fact “perfect” look of flat panel TVs.

The pixelist perspective: A proper HD signal of a crisply upscaled low-resolution game can be a very inviting look as well. That pixel art look is boldly emphasized, with each onscreen element having a Lego-like chunkiness. It’s an unusual look to the person accustomed to games on CRTs, but it definitely does have its merits. There’s a clean precision that can be very attractive.

This comparison of images rendered on a CRT vs HDTV makes is crystal clear how the literal, blocky pixel rendering of oldschool graphics on a modern TV has a very different feel from the softer shading of the CRT the game was originally designed for. Not every comparison is so stark, but this one makes it obvious. This image is from a fantastic article about the world of creating video game graphics in 1980s Japan over at VGDensetsu.

The exact sort of video signal you get out of your console, and send to your display (potentially through some kind of processor) is a deep and sometimes labyrinthine topic in itself. I will summarize here.

Some consoles give you whatever video signal they give you, and you just make the best of it. Others can be modified to provide a higher quality signal. This also relates to connection (cable) types. Use the highest quality signal output + connection you reasonably can. I say reasonably, because consoles can be modified, and some of these modifications can be expensive.

The jack on the TV is designed for a coaxial (cable TV style) connection. The RF cable shown (black) is from my Atari 2600, and the adapter (silver) changes it to a coaxial connection.

Composite: Video + left/right audio. The next step up. The Super Nintendo lets you do this out of the box. By separating audio and video, you get a higher quality signal. You need to make sure you have a TV that will take this connection type.

SVideo: Y/C or luminance/chrominance. This splits brightness and color signals into separate wires within the cable, increasing the picture quality a bit further. These are much less common these days than they were in the 90s, so it’s more likely to find them on a CRT.

Component: YPbPr, or 3 connector video. This breaks the signal 3 ways, increasing quality further. The breakdown is brightness and synchronization data (Y), the difference between the blue signal and luma (Pb) and the difference between the red signal and luma (Br). The green information, needed to complete the full RGB color, is calculated from the blue and red.

RGB: Red, Green, and Blue signals are broken out separately. These connections are not natively on most consoles, and North American TVs don’t usually have this connection. BUT this has become popular because many consoles can be modded to output RGB, and the RGB signal can be fed into various devices for outputting a very high quality (but still analog) signal.

HDMI: High-Definition and 4K digital. This is the connection that modern TVs use. Upscalers will convert analog output of one of the previous types into digital output coming from one of these.

Of course, if you want to use a modern TV, you can always forget all of this, and just go with a modern reworking of the old consoles via console emulation using something like the RetroN 5. This is a cartridge-playing console that emulates the old game consoles in software, and outputs a razor-sharp HDMI signal.

As discussed, the built-in upscaling on modern TVs is not optimal for video games. The output is grungy-looking. There are cheap options for upsizing to HD that can be found on Amazon, eBay, etc… but their performance is less than optimal. Images often look funky, with visual scaling artifacts, and weird color shifts being common. Also, lag can be a problem, which we now need to talk about.

Modern TVs have input lag, which is a delay between the time an image is received from a video signal, and when it is displayed onscreen. This is created by the signal processing going on inside, doing any necessary conversion of signal type (changing interlaced into progressive) or signal resolution (upscaling a lower resolution signal to the native display resolution), as well as any signal processing like motion interpolation (to be explained in bit).

…You should be able to reduce it down to its absolute minimum input lag. (Keeping in mind that different TVs have different native input lag, and they don’t publish this spec)

Motion interpolation is the nasty “special sauce” (you can tell I have an opinion here) that TV manufacturers have added to their units which takes a perfectly good video signal and “smooths” it out to add extra in-between frames between the video frames so that motion looks more “fluid.” Basically, it takes movies shot on cinema cameras, and gives them a “video” look. Instead of looking epic, that blockbuster looks like a soap opera. It does this to your video games too, but the biggest issue you may notice is that it can add to the input lag as the chips in the TV chew on the signal to create those extra frames. Did I mention it makes movies look like crap as well? (I’m a real film lover, too).

If you head down the road of using a modern TV, at the very minimum, don’t stretch that 4:3 aspect ratio output to span the full width of your 16:9 TV. It may feel strange to you to have black bars on the left and right of your game image, but that’s what happens when you put a squarish picture into a rectangular frame. Don’t stretch it, and make everything look distorted. Circles become ovals, squares become rectangles, characters become short and squat. It’s a sign of the apocalypse.

Compare the proper 4:3 aspect ratio, which is how the game was designed, vs the look of 4:3 stretched out to fill the width of 16:9. Everything starts to look short and squat. (Note that the image doesn’t fill the full width in either screen shot, just because NES Pac Man doesn’t fill the full screen.)

And don’t use the zoom feature either, since that chops portions of the image off in order to make everything fit. Just be OK with the smaller display image inside your larger screen. It really is the best way to see what was intended. Anything else is kind of just the cousin to the old pan-and-scan method of jamming widescreen movies onto 4:3 TVs so that there were no black bars.

I always figured that by now, people understood this, but in my research, it seems this continues to be a real problem among people playing old 4:3 games on new displays. It’s enough of an issue that it has come up in various places as a concern to gaming historians, who lament that screenshots (and video captures on YouTube channels) are showing stretched game images, and people are getting a weirdly distorted view of how these games are supposed to look. Imagine watching your favorite movie, but everything is just kind of squashed. Please don’t do it. Somewhere, a kitten dies each time you do.

Instead of letting your modern TV do its grungy image upsizing (and maybe even adding input lag in the process), feed it a pre-upsized signal using a dedicated piece of hardware. While there are a lot of cheapie options on Amazon and eBay, they are fraught with sub-optimal results, including visual grunge, and color shifting (as well as bad lag in some cases). This being the case, the top two options people go for after studying this out are:

If you are looking to wade in this deep, and get an upscaler, I recommend you do your research very carefully, making sure everything you read is up to date (the OSSC continues to go through revisions that improve it), as well as thinking through the whole process, and all gear you might need. I have not bought one of these yet.

Much of the above has been dedicated to the approach of getting your retro console to work on a modern TV, because they are different technologies from different eras, and are not natively made for one another. However, the CRT IS the display retro consoles were made for - from early Pong consoles, up through the PS2 and XBox. If you want to just plug and play, a CRT is the way to go. If you want to see the games looking like they were originally intended, use a CRT. If you want to ensure no lag… CRT. Another interesting benefit with CRTs, is that you can often pick one up very cheaply, or free. $10 or $20 for an decent 20-something inch screen is not uncommon. (You can easily pay more for nicer ones, but great bargains abound as people dump their “old TVs”)

This isn’t to say that CRTs are the Holy Grail, and you shouldn’t use a modern TV. I use both, and enjoy both. My current modern TV is set up with my RetroN 5. The HD signal the RetroN 5 puts out is crisp, and very good looking. Also, being a purist, or a hardcore player executing precision Mario moves isn’t the only reason to go CRT. The whole point of this writeup is to address a few common, but overlooked issues:

Realizing you need a better solution, it’s easy to go down the rabbit hole of options, starting with cheap devices from Amazon/eBay, and getting the lag, color, and clarity problems those tools create.

After you inherit that Atari, or nab a sweet bargain NES, you can hit up the local thrift shop, nab a serviceable TV on the cheap, and be ready to roll.

CRT TVs can be gotten for a song, if you check the right sources. Since they aren’t being made anymore, you’re going to have to poke around and see what you can find. If your goal is to get something serviceable, that doesn’t have to be amazing, then I highly recommend regular visits to the local thrift shops. One of the nice things about dealing with a thrift shop is that they are likely to let you bring your console in and hook it up to do a test (which I highly recommend). This may may not work with a private seller, so keep that in mind. If you are up for the private seller route, and maybe not as concerned about testing before you buy (assuming the price is cheap), then Craigslist or Facebook Marketplace are good resources.

Not all CRTs are equal, and there are plenty of low-quality ones that you may want to skip, in pursuit of something a little bit nicer. But then again, if you’re just itching to play, a $10 set is very low risk, and you can easily keep your eye out for something better. I was more concerned about the picture quality (and sound) than getting a TV in pristine cosmetic shape, but I didn’t really want an ugly set either (obviously damaged housing). Your priorities may vary. Again, you can always start with something easy to get, then shop around.

When you test, look for sharpness, color, and any picture distortions like top/bottom or side edges on the image that bow in our out. Again, your tolerance of imperfections is up to you, but this is just a heads up on what to look for. Keep in mind that these are older devices now, and many may exhibit some imperfections in picture quality due to age. If you’re willing to shop more, you can start to get a good sense of what you care about, and buy accordingly.

Sonys, and Sony Trinitrons in particular are very popular in the retro gaming community. I have been a longtime Sony fan since the 80s, and they regularly put out pretty solid product. I picked up a Toshiba 20" recently which is pretty nice. I bought a decent Panasonic a little while back as well. Neither is flawless, but then again, neither was over $20, either. I’d stay away from the cheaper brands, but hey, if you find a bargain and like it, go for it. As long as you’re happy with it.

CRTs are both heavy, and awkwardly bulky. If you are going to look at anything 27" or over, there is a good chance you’ll need a second person to help you carry it. Keep that in mind. Also - If you are wanting to buy online and have something shipped, the shipping cost can be quite high due to the weight of these things. A good set at the local shop may be a better idea than a better one on eBay that you need to pay a fat shipping charge on. The best reason to buy something that requires shipping is when you are buying something premium, like a broadcast monitor (see below).

Look at the connections the set has. Composite (video + L/R audio)? S-Video? Component (YPbPr - 3 connectors). Many CRTs have connectors on the front, but the full set is in the back. PRO TIP: If you are looking at an online listing, get the model number, google up the manual with “[TV Model Number] + manual” and look up the connection types.

Does it have a remote? While you may not want a remote for general use (I don’t), many TVs may not let you access picture controls or switch inputs without the remote. It’s not a dealbreaker if there’s no remote, since you can google “[TV Model Number] + manual” and find the original model number for the remote, then eBay that baby. The remotes I have bought were between $10 and $20. Also keep in mind as you look at the picture, that some weirdness (such as over-saturated colors) can be a picture adjustment issue you can solve if you have the remote. I can’t speak to 3rd party aftermarket/universal remotes, but I’m unsure if they will let you access all the settings you may want. I always do the exact model number from the manual.

Avoid HD CRTs. I don’t have personal experience with this, but not all CRTs out there are standard def. There was a period in the early 2000s when manufacturers were creating HD CRTs. So, yes it’s a CRT, but the retro console signal is not what it really wants, since it’s HD. They’re odd birds. Best to avoid.

CRT TVs can make for a great gaming experience. But if you spend a little time marinating in the retro CRT sauce, you’ll pick up on discussion about professional broadcast monitors. Sonys come up again here, with the PVM models getting a lot of recommendations. They sport really high-end tubes that offer fantastically sharp pictures, great color, and were built to withstand constant use at television stations and video production houses.

These CRTs also give you a bunch of additional controls for picture refinement, and offer a profusion of high-end connection as well, including a true RGB signal on some. One caveat is that they usually sport BNC connectors, which are pro-grade, and heavier duty than RCA connectors. You can easily buy RCA-to-BNC adapters, and hook your setup straight in, though. Or alternatively, if you’re doing RGB, you’ll likely be running a SCART cable from a modded console. SCART-to-BNC adapters are also available.

The broadcast monitor thing is a deep rabbit hole, and pricey. I don’t currently own one, but mention it to get it on your conceptual map. They’re absolutely not necessary, and really kind of a special space for people who want to spend real coin and get something very fancy. You can enjoy the heck out of your games on a plain CRT TV. Anyone who tells you you NEED a broadcast monitor is a snob, or a poseur.

Figuring out this whole screen thing is a JOB. That’s why I wrote this guide - to capture what I’ve learned along the way, and hopefully save you having to scour the net, sifting through zillions of posts, discussion threads, and videos. After all, our whole purpose here is to have fun playing games, not become gear nerds. Go have some fun!

In market, LCD means passive matrix LCDs which increase TN (Twisted Nematic), STN (Super Twisted Nematic), or FSTN (Film Compensated STN) LCD Displays. It is a kind of earliest and lowest cost display technology.

LCD screens are still found in the market of low cost watches, calculators, clocks, utility meters etc. because of its advantages of low cost, fast response time (speed), wide temperature range,  low power consumption, sunlight readable with transflective or reflective polarizers etc.  Most of them are monochrome LCD display and belong to passive-matrix LCDs.

TFT LCDs have capacitors and transistors. These are the two elements that play a key part in ensuring that the TFT display monitor functions by using a very small amount of energy without running out of operation.

Normally, we say TFT LCD panels or TFT screens, we mean they are TN (Twisted Nematic) Type TFT displays or TN panels, or TN screen technology. TFT is active-matrix LCDs, it is a kind of LCD technologies.

TFT has wider viewing angles, better contrast ratio than TN displays. TFT display technologies have been widely used for computer monitors, laptops, medical monitors, industrial monitors, ATM, point of sales etc.

Actually, IPS technology is a kind of TFT display with thin film transistors for individual pixels. But IPS displays have superior high contrast, wide viewing angle, color reproduction, image quality etc. IPS screens have been found in high-end applications, like Apple iPhones, iPads, Samsung mobile phones, more expensive LCD monitors etc.

Both TFT LCD displays and IPS LCD displays are active matrix displays, neither of them can produce color, there is a layer of RGB (red, green, blue) color filter in each LCD pixels to make LCD showing colors. If you use a magnifier to see your monitor, you will see RGB color. With switch on/off and different level of brightness RGB, we can get many colors.

Neither of them can’t release color themselves, they have relied on extra light source in order to display. LED backlights are usually be together with them in the display modules as the light sources. Besides, both TFT screens and IPS screens are transmissive, it will need more power or more expensive than passive matrix LCD screens to be seen under sunlight.  IPS screens transmittance is lower than TFT screens, more power is needed for IPS LCD display.

A CRT monitor is similar to older types of televisions. A large glass tube known as a "Cathode Ray Tube" is used as the display. The front of the tube is covered with a type of phosphor. At the back is an "electron gun." This gun shoots electrons at varying intensities, causing the phosphors cells to glow. Each phosphor cell contains three color phosphors, red, green, and blue. When different colors are needed to be displayed, the gun charges up two or more of the colors, as well as dithering with other cells to create even more colors. 13th July 2013 From India

What are the key differences between leading electronic visual displays available in the market? Such are the times that we live in that today most of us cannot possibly imagine a life without an electronic device. In fact, we have managed to surround ourselves and depend on a growing number of electronic appliances. Several of these devices - as it happens - also have an electronic visual display; be it a mobile phone, a tablet, a desktop monitor or the television set. Without a doubt, these electronic screen devices have revolutionised the way we lead our lives now as all of the four devices have become increasingly commonplace to the point of becoming basic necessities. Which brings to our blog topic: what exactly is an electronic screen and which are the leading screen technologies available today? Read on to know more…

An electronic screen or an electronic visual display, informally called a screen, is basically a device used to display / present images, text, or video transmitted electronically, without creating a permanent record. As mentioned earlier, electronic visual displays include television sets, computer monitors, and digital signage in information appliances. As per the definition, an overhead projector (along with screen onto which the text, images, or video is projected) can also be called an electronic visual display.

1. Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) display:A vacuum tube containing one or more electron guns and a phosphorescent screen, the cathode-ray tube (CRT) is used to display images. It modulates, accelerates, and deflects electron beams onto the screen to make the images. The images could be electrical waveforms (oscilloscope), pictures (television, computer monitor) or radar targets. CRTs have also been used as memory devices, wherein the visible light from the fluorescent material (if any) does not really have any significant meaning to a visual observer, but the visible pattern on the tube face could cryptically represent the stored data. In television sets and computer monitors, the front area of the tube is scanned systematically and repetitively in a pattern called a raster. Thanks to the intensity of each of the three electron beams - one for each additive primary color (red, green, and blue) - being controlled with a video signal as a reference, an image is produced. In modern CRT monitors and TVs, magnetic deflection bends the beams; magnetic deflection is essentially a varying magnetic field generated by coils and driven by electronic circuits around the neck of the tube, although electrostatic deflection is often used in oscilloscopes, a type of electronic test instrument. CRT is one of the older screen/ display technologies.

2. Flat-Panel display: Flat-panel displays are electronic viewing technologies that are used to allow people to see content (still images, moving images, text, or other visual material) in a range of entertainment, consumer electronics, personal computer, and mobile devices, and several kinds of medical, transportation and industrial equipment. They are much lighter and thinner than traditional cathode ray tube (CRT) television sets and video displays and are typically less than 10 centimetres (3.9 in) thick. Flat-panel displays can be classified under two display device categories: volatile and static. Volatile displays need pixels to be periodically electronically refreshed to retain their state (say, liquid-crystal displays). A volatile display only shows an image when it has battery or AC mains power. Static flat-panel displays rely on materials whose color states are bistable (say, e-book reader tablets from Sony), and they retain the text or images on the screen even when the power is off. In recent times, flat-panel displays have almost completely replaced old CRT displays. Most flat-panel displays from the 2010s use LCD and/or LED technologies. Majority of the LCD screens are back-lit as color filters are used to display colors. Being thin and lightweight, flat-panel displays offer better linearity and have higher resolution than the average consumer-grade TV from the earlier decades. The highest resolution for consumer-grade CRT TVs was 1080i, whereas many flat-panels can display 1080p or even 4K resolution.

3. Plasma (P) display: A plasma display panel (PDP) is a type of flat panel display that uses small cells containing plasma; ionized gas that responds to electric fields. Earlier, plasma displays were commonly used in larger televisions (30 inches and larger). But since more than a decade now, they have lost almost all market share due to competition from low-cost LCDs and more expensive but high-contrast OLED flat-panel displays. Companies stopped manufacturing plasma displays for the United States retail market in 2014, and for the Chinese market in 2016.

4. Electroluminescent display (ELD):Electroluminescent Displays (ELDs) are screens that make use of electroluminescence. Electroluminescence (EL) is an optical and electrical phenomenon where a material emits light in response to an electric current passed through it, or to a strong electric field.

So ELD then is a kind of flat panel display produced by sandwiching a layer of electroluminescent material between two layers of conductors. When the current flows, the layer of material emits radiation in the form of visible light. Basically, electroluminescence works by exciting atoms by passing an electric current through them, leading them to emit photons. By varying the material being excited, the color of the light being emitted is changed. The actual ELD is built using flat, opaque electrode strips running parallel to each other, covered by a layer of electroluminescent material, followed by another layer of electrodes, running perpendicular to the bottom layer. This top layer has to be transparent so as to allow light to escape. At each intersection, the material lights, creating a pixel.

5. Liquid Crystal Display (LCD): A liquid-crystal display (LCD) is a flat-panel display or other electronically modulated optical device that makes use of the light-modulating properties of liquid crystals. Liquid crystals do not give out light directly; they use a backlight or reflector to create images in color or monochrome. LCDs display arbitrary images like in a general-purpose computer display or fixed images with low information content, that can be displayed or hidden, such as preset words, digits, and seven-segment displays, like in a digital clock. They use the same core technology, apart from the fact that arbitrary images are made up of a large number of small pixels, while other displays have larger elements. LCDs could be on (positive) or off (negative), as per the polarizer arrangement. For instance, a character positive LCD with a backlight has black lettering on a background the same color as the backlight, and a character negative LCD has a black background with the letters matching the backlight color. Blue LCDs typically get their characteristic appearance from optical filters being added to white.

LCD screens are being used in several applications such as LCD televisions, computer monitors, instrument panels, aircraft cockpit displays, and indoor and outdoor signage. Small LCD screens are seen in portable consumer devices such as digital cameras, watches, calculators and mobile telephones, including smartphones. LCDs are also found in consumer electronics products such as DVD players, video game devices and clocks. It is interesting to note that these displays are available in a wide range of screen sizes as compared to CRT and plasma displays. Also, while LCD screens have replaced heavy, bulky cathode ray tube (CRT) displays in almost all applications, they are slowly being replaced by OLEDs, which can be easily made into different shapes, and boast other advantages such as having a lower response time, wider color gamut, virtually infinite color contrast and viewing angles, lower weight for a given display size and a slimmer profile and potentially lower power consumption. OLEDs, however, are more expensive for a given display size and they can suffer from screen burn-in when a static image is displayed on a screen for a long time (for instance, the table frame for an airline flight schedule on an indoor sign), not to mention that there is currently no way to recycle OLED displays. LCD panels, on the other hand, are susceptible to image persistence but they rarely suffer image burn-in as they do not use phosphors, plus they can be recycled, although this technology is not exactly common as yet. Not surprisingly, attempts have been made to increase the lifespan of LCDs in the form of quantum dot displays, which provide performance to that of an OLED display, but the Quantum dot sheet that gives these displays their characteristics can not yet be recycled. LCDs are also more energy-efficient and can be disposed of more safely than a CRT display.

6. Light-Emitting Diode (LED) display:An LED display is a flat panel display that uses an array of light-emitting diodes as pixels for a video display. Their brightness lets them be used outdoors where they are visible in the sun for store signs and billboards. It was in 1962 that LED diodes first came into being; this was when the first practical LED was invented by General Electric’s Nick Holonyak Jr. This was also when they were mainly red in color. While the early models had a monochromatic design, the efficient Blue LED completing the color triad became available in the market only in the late 1980s. Today, large displays use high-brightness diodes to generate a wide spectrum of colors. In fact, recently, LEDs have also become a popular choice among destination signs on public transport vehicles and variable-message signs on highways. LED displays can offer general illumination in addition to visual display, as when used for stage lighting or other decorative (as opposed to informational) purposes. Several big corporations such as Apple, Samsung and LG are currently looking to develop MicroLED displays. These displays are easily scalable, and help with making the production process more streamlined. That said, production costs continue to be quite high and thus remain a limiting factor.

7. Organic Light-Emitting Diode OLED display: An organic light-emitting diode (OLED), also called an organic EL (organic electroluminescent) diode, is a light-emitting diode (LED), where the emissive electroluminescent layer is a film of organic compound that gives out light in response to an electric current. The organic layer is located between two electrodes, at least one of which is transparent. OLEDs are used to build digital displays in devices such as television screens, computer monitors, portable systems such as smartphones, handheld game consoles and digital assistants. Typically, an OLED display works without a backlight because it emits visible light. This means that it can display deep black levels and can be thinner and lighter than a liquid crystal display (LCD). In low ambient light conditions, say in a dark room, an OLED screen can achieve a higher contrast ratio than an LCD, irrespective of whether the LCD uses an LED backlight or cold cathode fluorescent lamps.

Also important to note an OLED display can be driven with a passive-matrix (PMOLED) or active-matrix (AMOLED) control scheme. In the former, each row (and line) in the display is controlled sequentially, one by one, as opposed to in the AMOLED where a thin-film transistor backplane is used to directly control and switch each individual pixel on or off, thus offering higher resolution and larger display sizes.

Lastly, there are two main families of OLED: those based on small molecules and those making use of polymers. A big area of research is the development of white OLED devices for use in solid-state lighting applications.

8. Active-Matrix Organic Light-Emitting Diode (AMOLED) display: AMOLED (Active-Matrix Organic Light-Emitting Diode) is a display device technology being used in smartwatches, mobile devices, laptops, televisions, media players and digital cameras. As mentioned earlier, it is a type of OLED; rather a specific type of thin-film-display technology where organic compounds form the electroluminescent material. What distinguishes it from PMOLED is the active matrix technology behind the addressing of pixels. An AMOLED display basically comprises an active matrix of OLED pixels generating light (luminescence) upon electrical activation that have been positioned or integrated onto a thin-film transistor (TFT) array, which in turn operates as a series of switches to control the current flowing to each individual pixel. AMOLED technology has continued to work towards consuming low power, becoming low-cost and offering scalability (mainly by offering larger sizes.

9. Super AMOLED display: Super AMOLED is essentially an AMOLED display but it is a term coined for marketing purposes by leading device manufacturers. It is used to denote AMOLED displays that come with an integrated digitizer, i.e. the layer that detects touch is integrated into the screen, instead of overlaid on top of it. The display technology however is not an improvement on the AMOLED. For instance, Samsung claims that Super AMOLED displays reflect one-fifth as much sunlight as the first generation AMOLED. In fact, Super AMOLED displays that are part of the Pentile matrix family, are also at times known as SAMOLED. Other variations of this term include Super AMOLED Advanced, Super AMOLED Plus, HD Super AMOLED, HD Super AMOLED Plus and Full HD Super AMOLED.

10. Quantum Dot (QD) display:A quantum dot display is a display device that uses quantum dots (QD), basically semiconductor nanocrystals that can generate pure monochromatic red, green, and blue light. Photo-emissive quantum dot particles are used in a QD layer which converts the backlight to give out pure basic colors that in turn enhance display brightness and color gamut by decreasing light loss and color crosstalk in RGB color filters. This technology is used in LED-backlit LCDs, though it applies to other display technologies as well (such as white or blue/UV OLED).

Among devices employing QD screens, one can find electro-emissive or electroluminescent quantum dot displays, which are currently an experimental type of display based on quantum-dot light-emitting diodes (QD-LED). These displays are similar to active-matrix organic light-emitting diode (AMOLED) and MicroLED displays, as in light is produced directly in each pixel by applying an electric current to inorganic nano-particles. QD-LED displays are supposed to support large, flexible displays and not degrade as readily as OLEDs, making them good bets for flat-panel TV screens, digital cameras, mobile phones and handheld game consoles. As of 2018, all commercial products like LCD TVs that use quantum dots and are called QLED, use photo-emissive particles, whereas electro-emissive QD-LED TVs are only to be found in laboratories today.

Security is changing faster than ever before. With new threats inside the workplace and smaller security teams taking on more tasks, IT and security personnel must automate their processes using new technology. One difficult aspect, however, is choosing the right technology. By analyzing technological trends and assessing your current and future needs, you can preemptively find solutions. Ultimately, in the long run, these solutions will save you time and expense.

But how do you distinguish a momentary trend from a long-term solution? Do you really need to pay extra money for that feature, or will you stop using it in a year? To properly invest in future-proof access control, IT and security teams must look at three different aspects of technology: Flexibility, Scalability, and Efficiency.

It’s not the sexiest thing to talk about, but hardware is crucial to any security system. Readers, locks and controllers are the backbone of any access control system, and choosing the right hardware is essential when it comes to planning for the future.

Broadly speaking, hardware falls into two categories: proprietary and non-proprietary. For those teams considering a new installation, choosing between proprietary access control and non-proprietary access control is a decision that will affect your organization over the long term.

Imagine buying a microwave that only cooked foods produced by the microwave manufacturer. In a booming economy, the manufacturer produces all sorts of tasty treats—popcorn, lasagna, pies. But when the economy takes a dip, the manufacturer scales back its production and announces it will only sell liver and onions. Now maybe you’re a liver and onions fan, but on the off chance you like variety in your diet, this would be a problem. Your microwave has been rendered useless and has essentially become a liver and onions cooking machine.

Like the microwave example, proprietary hardware leaves companies at the mercy of the manufacturer. If the manufacturer goes out of business, the system will cease to function, and customer support will be non-existent. Consequently, your security team will likely have t