Best Monitor purely for CS:GO

[Fr0z]

One question. What is the best monitor for playing counter strike global offensive (csgo) competitively? My comp gets 300+fps consistently so specs shouldn't hold monitor choice back. I think I have narrowed them down to 3, but please tell me which one or if there is another that is best for pure use of csgo competitively.

1. ASUS VG248QE
2. BenQ XL2411Z
3. BenQ XL2420T

Experienced feedback will be much appreciated, thank you.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
...My specs just in case:
CPU: Intel® Core™ i7-4790K 4.0 GHz 8MB Intel Smart Cache LGA1150 (All Venom OC Certified)
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 2GB GDDR5 PCIe 3.0 x16 Video Card (EVGA Superclocked ACX Cooling)
RAM: 8GB (4GBx2) DDR3/1866MHz Dual Channel Memory (Corsair Vengeance)
HDD: 256GB ADATA SP610 SATA-III 6.0Gb/s SSD - 560MB/s Read & 290MB/s Write
HDD2: 1TB Western Digital Caviar Blue SATA-III 6.0Gb/s 7200 RPM HDD
PSU: 750 Watts - Corsair CSM Series CS750M 80 Plus Gold Certified Modular Ultra Quiet Power Supply
MOBO: GIGABYTE Z97X-SLI ATX w/ Intel GbLAN, 2 PCIe x16, 3 PCIe x1, 2 PCI, 1 x M.2, 1 x SATA Express, or 6x SATA 6Gb/s (Extreme OC Certified)

[Falkentyne]

There's absolutely NO reason to get the 2420T over the VG248QE. They're the same panel by AU Optomerics, and Asus tracefree's RTC of lightboost is -much- better than Benq's AMA version of it. Both may have a chance to have the "lottery" scanlines" problem at high refresh rates or in lightboost mode (panel lottery), but vs those two, always choose the Asus.

The 2411Z can not have lightboost unlocked by strobelight , but you can use the INF override combined with "3d vision emulator" (you'll have to find it), but again, the asus does LB better cuz of tracefree. But the Z has benq blur reduction which allows full range color and contrast and gamma tweaking (which basically gives you the same image quality as non lightboost/BR mode), in exchange for more ghosting and inverse artifacts that you won't have on the VG248QE. you also get a PWM free backlight (in non strobed mode)

So your choice should only be the VG248QE vs the 2411Z.
If you want the best almost clean ghosting free motion, but can deal with lightboost's muted colors, a pink/purplelish tint and bad contrast ratio in lightboost mode, get the VG248. If you want the best colors and contrast and image quality while also getting motion blur reduction, but can handle the worse ghosting, get the 2411Z.

[Fr0z]

I heard the v2 version of the 2411z makes the ghosting not as bad as it was in the v1 making it much closer ghosting wise to the asus lightboost. Almost close enough that its not a noticeable difference. (true?) And with the motion blur reduction and better color quality at around the same price (both around 270 $USD I found) I might be leaning towards the BenQ.

I've just been in the middle of reading all these reviews for both so I'm not fully educated on the subject yet (but trying!).

Thank you for the Feedback!... it definitely helps me narrow down the pros and cons. I appreciate it.

[Strangerbob]

If you can wait 1.5months, i would personally wait for http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showprodu ... &catid=948

Not just for gsync, although that should be a main reason, but also because its a real 8bit TN, just like the super expensive asus one comming next month.

[Falkentyne]

I heard the v2 version of the 2411z makes the ghosting not as bad as it was in the v1 making it much closer ghosting wise to the asus lightboost. Almost close enough that its not a noticeable difference. (true?) And with the motion blur reduction and better color quality at around the same price (both around 270 $USD I found) I might be leaning towards the BenQ.

I've just been in the middle of reading all these reviews for both so I'm not fully educated on the subject yet (but trying!).

Thank you for the Feedback!... it definitely helps me narrow down the pros and cons. I appreciate it.

You're referring to "crosstalk artifacts" from strobing. That's different from RTC (response time compensation)/overdrive artifacts. There's a very bad crosstalk band that occurs at the top and bottom of the screen, that can be adjusted (widened to make it less visable) with the vertical total (1502) tweak and then moved up/down (strobe phase) to have almost all of it off screen. As to WHY this occurs, well, it's very similar in a way, to that huge horizontal black bar you saw on uncalibrated old analog TV's. With the VT 1502 tweak and persistence and crosstalk at 00 and 0.5ms (far left) in V2 firmware, the crosstalk band is almost as good as lightboost, so much that its basically a non factor.

The problem is the RTA artifacts (overdrive), which is the issue people are complaining about. Simply because benq's AMA is inferior (by far) to Asus' tracefree. This leads to inverse ghosting on certain color transitions that quite blatant in Benq's BR mode, but are much fainter in lightboost mode (but STILL there on Benq's LB) but are almost completely invisible on Asus's tracefree version of lightboost (but again is the muted colors and bad contrast and the lack of 60 hz strobing worth it for the great non ghosting clarity? (for 60 fps games (dark souls, anyone?) and arcade emulators (Super street fighter 4:AE, ultra street fighter 4, etc, benefit HIGHLY from 60 hz Benq's BR, although you CAN force these games to run at 100hz by removing the 60 hz resolutiosn in CRU).

P.S. you can lower the RTC inverse ghosting by almost half (mostly towards the lower part of the screen) by setting contrast from 50 to 40. Of course, the VG248 (and 278HE) benefit also, although this is more needed on the 27" panels

[flood]

a decent used CRT would be the best

though probably you wouldn't want that

[ericl]

At the moment you're going to want the BenQ XL2411Z as the best monitor for CS:GO because it will make aiming the easiest for you.

It provides one of the fastest & blur-free experiences available, it's 24" (which is what you want for competitive gaming these days) and the fact that the colors are better (compared to the only other competitor, the Asus), it will help you in CS.

You want the best color/light/response for CS:GO because of the dark areas of counter-strike. In gaming terms, this means that it will be more difficult to see opponents hidden in dark areas of the map... and even when you do see them, it's useful to see them bright and clearly so you can pin-point their head!

The best gaming monitor is not exclusively the one that provides the less ghosting, but instead, the one that provides the best balance of ghost-free and image quality.

[flood]

It provides one of the fastest & blur-free experiences available, it's 24" (which is what you want for competitive gaming these days) and the fact that the colors are better (compared to the only other competitor, the Asus), it will help you in CS.

You want the best color/light/response for CS:GO because of the dark areas of counter-strike. In gaming terms, this means that it will be more difficult to see opponents hidden in dark areas of the map... and even when you do see them, it's useful to see them bright and clearly so you can pin-point their head!

I agree but I just change the in-game gamma setting from 2.2 to 1.8 to make dark areas brighter.

I doubt the colors on the benq are much different from the asus vg248qe in default mode (don't they use the same lcd panel or something?). Though the benq's colors are better in strobed mode. vg238qe in lightboost mode is quite unpleasantly pink

The benq doesn't have pwm backlighting, which may or may not be something you're concerned about.

Honestly you'd be happy with either. just remember that cs is a very tactical game and that upgrading your equipment won't necessarily allow you to suddenly perform better, as some companies would like you to believe.