Composite Monitors
A composite monitor is any analog video display that receives input in the form of an analog composite video signal through a single cable — in contrast to multiple-cable or multiple-wire video sources such as VGA cable. Anybody old enough to have used an Apple 11 or a Commodore 64 will be familiar with these small black and white CRT displays.
VGA CRT Monitor
Video Graphics Array (VGA) is an analog computer display standard first marketed by IBM in 1987. These are analog monitors using a cathode ray tube to display the image, first available in black and white, then in color, still prefered by some graphic professionals for color work. VGA is also used to describe the type of connector these displays use.
LCD Displays
Liquid Crystal Displays are the latest type of computer displays, offering large viewing areas with small footprints. Available with both analog or digital connections, in 4:3 standard and 16:9 or 16:10 widescreen aspect ratios.
The type of connection on your video card and the size of the video ram on the card will determine which display your computer can run. To further complicate this not all computers have an actual video card, some borrow a bit of the motherboard ram to run the display.
What connection have you got?
The type of connection on your computer will give you an indication of the type of display you can use. A VGA connection will limit you to an analog display. With some form of DVI connection you will be able to use either an analog or digital display, an adapter may be necessary.
Older Apple computers have had several other types of connections so adapters may be necessary to connect some displays.
The amount of video ram on your video card will determine how large of a display you can run. To use a newer display on an older computer it may be necessary to upgrade the video card.
This is the number of distinct pixels that can be displayed both horizontally and vertically on the viewing screen, on analog VGA monitors this could be adjusted in accordance to the amount of video ram on the graphics card. You could run anything from 640 X 480 up to 1600 X 1200 or more and still have a clear image, type just got smaller and smaller as the resolution was increased.
LCD displays will only run at their native resolution, if the resolution is changed the image deteriorates. For example most 17" and 19" displays with a 4:3 format both run at 1280 X 1024. What this means is that both displays show the same image, but on the 19" model it will be larger.
Check Your Screen Resolution
Response time is the amount of time a pixel in an LCD monitor takes to go from active (black) to inactive (white) and back to active (black) again, measured in milliseconds (ms). Lower numbers mean faster transitions and therefore fewer visible image artifacts. A maximum of 12 ms. is required to play fast paced computer games or for watching videos.
Brightness of the display, a measure of how much light a panel can produce. Luminance is expressed either in nits or candelas per square meter (cd/m?). A measurement of 200 to 250 nits is OK for most productivity tasks; 500 nits is better for TV and movies.
| Portrait / Landscape Modes |
Some LCDs pivot so that the longer edge can go horizontal (Landscape mode) or vertical (Portrait mode). This feature can be useful for desktop publishing, Web surfing, and viewing large spreadsheets. Before paying extra for this feature make sure your graphics card is capable of this.
Adding an additional graphics card will allow more than one display to be connected to your computer, there are two options, mirror image or extended mode. This feature is also built into many laptops to connect to an external display
Mirror image displays the same image on both monitors, this might be used to present a slide show to a group on a large display, or when a laptop is connected to a external display.
Extended view acts as an extension to your original display, as you move your mouse cursor past the edge of the original display it appears on the screen of the second display. This is very convenient when working with programs where it is necesssary to have several pallets or pages open at the same time.
