I need a new monitor to replace my old external. 24in or thereabouts is fine, 27in if it’s a deal. I don’t want a great quality one, as I use it to test colourways on a “normal” screen: Contrasts between two colours can look high on the iMac, but on a regular screen, that the majority use, the same colours can be almost indistinguishable.
So I don’t want uber cheap, but a super contrasty high quality one is no use either. Something mid-range, but what? I’m clueless with monitors, so need some help!
iMac displays tend to be set for impact, rather than accuracy when they leave the factory, but they also use an odd colour space. For the web you really want an sRGB display and you should check out the options from BenQ that offer good value for money.
I know this is already sorted, but for anyone who stumbles across the tread down the road, I second the suggestion of BenQ. I have a couple of 27" monitors hooked up to my MBP at my home office - and they are every bit as crisp, with accurate colors, as the high-end HP monitors my 9-5 employer purchased.
@ashleykaryl and @dave Thanks for your input. I am considering getting a monitor for my MacBookPro at home. I’m used to the 27" size so that’s what I’d probably go for. But BenQ really seems to have several models. What specific model would you recommend if I wanted to do something like work with RapidWeaver?
Sometimes I find RW too cramped on my MBPro. Very luxurious on my iMac 27" at work.
Where money is no object, Eizo are generally the best option for colour critical work, but for the majority of users BenQ gets you fairly close at a fraction of the price. Certainly for web usage they are fine.
@mitchellm Hey Mathew - I purchased the BenQ GW2765HT 27" monitor on December 8, 2017 from B&H Video (an authorized Apple dealer), and paid $229.00, including shipping (I just pulled my past orders up to confirm the model number). I liked it enough that I immediately purchased a second one (and don’t use the MBP screen at home). I see it’s now running $271 at B&H and $270 from Amazon. Even at the inflated price, I highly recommend it. IMO, the only drawbacks to the monitor are a) the quality of the speakers (but I run my sound through a portable speaker, so I really don’t care about that aspect), and; b) the menu buttons are on the back- which makes clicking the right button a bit difficult (but, I rarely use them, so I really don’t care). The colors are great, no flickering, it includes HDMI and DisplayPort inputs.
18 months of using them - I would buy again. I’m very pleased with them.
You didn’t ask, but if if you’re in the market for a USB-C hub, I recommend this one since it has an Ethernet and a 4k HDMI slot. I bought a couple at the same time I got the monitors, and they’ve worked flawlessly.
Once you have worked on a 32" display a 27" feels a bit constrained and tight for space. From a laptop you could also go for the 4K version and set the text size to larger in system preferences. A larger display also forces you to think about those viewing on larger displays…
While the BenQ 32” QHD looks like a good option at a great price, many people in our world are now using a 27” iMac or equivalent. At 2560 x 1440 px, the BenQ has half that resolution, so it really does not tick the boxes.
I would suggest UHD (3840 x 2160 px) as an absolute minimum, so the BenQ EW3270U would be a far more appropriate option for little more expense…
Do you mean web designers etc.? Or the general internet using population. If the latter I’d say the numbers using a 27 iMac are similar are so small they are almost invisible. If the former, then yes, a few more, but still not enough to refer to them as “many”.
Maybe I’m completely off the mark on this, but I’d say the vast majority are still using shitty sub 24in monitors.
Actually I’d day most of the 1920+ are 24” or above
TBF the last time I checked this was when I had posted a bunch of movie stuff and I was surprised at the (high) specs that were viewing.
Personally I find 2560 x 1440 is the max limit for a 27” monitor, too little res for such a big screen at close distance. I’d rather pay the extra 50 quid or similar for an UHD monitor which compares far more closely to a decent iPad or similar.
If so, they are not reflective, as a website will always get more of one type of visitor than another. For instance, a gaming website will have most users at 2560 plus, etc.
If you are running an external 4K display from a Mac desktop, the system text is tiny and Apple rather annoyingly do not provide an option to make the text larger like they do when connected to a laptop. For comfortable text viewing 2560 is about right on a desktop. On a laptop, yes why not go for the higher resolution.
My point about using a larger display is you immediately see hundreds of websites where the designer never thought about larger displays, so you end up seeing issues like page footers suspended 3 inches above the bottom of the browser window or awkward looking header images. The moment you work on a larger display you ensure that doesn’t happen. All of this comes with the obvious suggestion that you basically design for your target audience.
