27-28 inch monitor - Can you tell difference in 4K over 1440P for gaming

[Wolverine2349]

Would like to know people's thoughts. I sit about 1.5 to 3 feet from monitor

 

Would 4K at that size be noticeably better image quality over 1440P.

 

I have a GeForce RTX 4090 with a Core i9 13900K and 32GB DDR5 RAM I am about to put to work. Would it be able to keep up easily at 4K put out 90 to 120 FPS with all settings maxed out including using MSAA or SMAA 2X, 4X or even 8X in latest AAA games?

 

Would 1440P it be way overkill and give me 150 to 200 FPS or even more which is unnecessary unless you play like the most ESPorts competitive games which I generally do not?

 

I already have a 1440P but wondering if it is worth at that screen size of 27-28 inch upgrading to 4K 144Hz monitor to put to use with an RTX 4090 like is the image quality going to be noticeably better at 27-28 inch screen size?

 

https://www.thetechtoys.com/best-monitor-for-rtx-4090/#:~:text=If you want the smoothest,but comparatively gives low FPS.

 

They seem to suggest even with RTX 4090 which many feel is overkill for anything but 4K (Heck some even say 3090/3090 Ti were, but we all know it was not for 1440P unless you were ok with like 50-60 FPS maxed out in games or did not turn all setting to ultra in games)

 

Though it doe seem 90 to 120 FPS is clearly smoother and much so even for non super competitive online player games over 50 to 70 FPS, is 150 to 200 FPS or more going to give better experience in games like Read Dead Redemption, Cyber Punk and such single player? 

 

Not concerned about small font at 100% display in Windows desktop and word as I will just make it bigger using Windows display settings anyways.

[Stahlmann]

First off, your PC is completely overkill for 1440p, imo 4K is the only thing that makes sense.

 

I had 27" 1440p and 4K monitors in the past and imo the 4K monitor was noticeably sharper and delivered a better gaming experience.

 

But i'd go 32" to really get the benefit of 4K. You don't have to use as much scaling so you're working with more screen real estate, plus the resolution is high enough that you'll still not have any screen door effect.

 

At the kind of distance you're sitting at you can also easily make a 42" screen work. Here you have the option to go OLED and get a completely different experience. OLED really is in a league of it's own when it comes to picture quality and motion performance. That's what i did and i don't regret it.

[Wolverine2349]

11 minutes ago, Stahlmann said:

First off, your PC is completely overkill for 1440p, imo 4K is the only thing that makes sense.

 

I had 27" 1440p and 4K monitors in the past and imo the 4K monitor was noticeably sharper and delivered a better gaming experience.

 

But i'd go 32" to really get the benefit of 4K. You don't have to use as much scaling so you're working with more screen real estate, plus the resolution is high enough that you'll still not have any screen door effect.

 

At the kind of distance you're sitting at you can also easily make a 42" screen work. Here you have the option to go OLED and get a completely different experience. OLED really is in a league of it's own when it comes to picture quality and motion performance. That's what i did and i don't regret it.

 

Thanks for the advice.

 

Well I kind of do not want to go bigger than 27-28 inch sitting 1.5 to 3 feet away as it just seems to not make sense to sit that close to a screen bigger.

 

So I will go with that for sitting close for mouse games and may use a 42 inch TV/monitor combo as an extra for sitting 5-6 or more feet away controller gaming.

[jaslion]

7 minutes ago, Wolverine2349 said:

 

Thanks for the advice.

 

Well I kind of do not want to go bigger than 27-28 inch sitting 1.5 to 3 feet away as it just seems to not make sense to sit that close to a screen bigger.

 

So I will go with that for sitting close for mouse games and may use a 42 inch TV/monitor combo as an extra for sitting 5-6 or more feet away controller gaming.

27 inch 1440p at your distance is plenty good.

 

I say 1440p because thatll basically mean you have an overkill 1440p card for the next 5 years or so :p. That and the visual difference is minimal. Also 4k at 27 inches can introduce too small icons which then means you need to use scaling and scaling in windows is well not great.

 

I have both rn. A 1440p 27 inch cintiq to draw on a 27 inch 4k pro art and the 1440p proart (wont the 4k wouldnt buy it otherwise) and honestly I wouldnt miss the 4k at all. Even in games difference is minimal but the performance impact is ridiculous. That and im scaling on the 4k anyway so like whats the point for productivity (yes I know it has better colors).

 

Also if using 4k dont bother with msaa its a performance dump for nearly no visual increase.

 

So yeah all of this id get a 1440p screen so you can max out gamds for the next 5 years no sweat.

 

 tldr just get a good 1440p screen. Dont even bother with going for the 200hz+ ones apart from esports games that are made to go that high almost no game gets their due to engine limits.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Wolverine2349]

5 minutes ago, jaslion said:

27 inch 1440p at your distance is plenty good.

 

I say 1440p because thatll basically mean you have an overkill 1440p card for the next 5 years or so :p. That and the visual difference is minimal. Also 4k at 27 inches can introduce too small icons which then means you need to use scaling and scaling in windows is well not great.

 

I have both rn. A 1440p 27 inch cintiq to draw on a 27 inch 4k pro art and the 1440p proart (wont the 4k wouldnt buy it otherwise) and honestly I wouldnt miss the 4k at all. Even in games difference is minimal but the performance impact is ridiculous. That and im scaling on the 4k anyway so like whats the point for productivity (yes I know it has better colors).

 

Also if using 4k dont bother with msaa its a performance dump for nearly no visual increase.

 

So yeah all of this id get a 1440p screen so you can max out gamds for the next 5 years no sweat.

 

 tldr just get a good 1440p screen. Dont even bother with going for the 200hz+ ones apart from esports games that are made to go that high almost no game gets their due to engine limits.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yeah I have an overkill 1440P card? Is that a bad thing? Or does it mean should work much better for future games at good frame rates as opposed to choking a 4090 in future more demanding games?

[jaslion]

3 minutes ago, Wolverine2349 said:

Yeah I have an overkill 1440P card? Is that a bad thing? Or does it mean should work much better for future games at good frame rates as opposed to choking a 4090 in future more demanding games?

Not at all a bad thing.

 

Means you have headroom. So instead of having to drop the settings in newer games a couple years from now you'll just see your 4090 go from (random numbers) 60% utilization to 80% and not notice a difference in experience as its still having headroom

[Wolverine2349]

5 minutes ago, jaslion said:

Not at all a bad thing.

 

Means you have headroom. So instead of having to drop the settings in newer games a couple years from now you'll just see your 4090 go from (random numbers) 60% utilization to 80% and not notice a difference in experience as its still having headroom

 

Yeah thats what I thought. Though how is 4K maxed out uktra settings in games on an RTX 4090 compared to 1440P maxed out ultra settings in games on a 3090 Ti?? Which would have better FPS and a higher load. I know the RTX 4090 is 59% faster than 3090 Ti per User Bench Mark. Is 4K 59% more demanding than 1440P or more so than that?

 

Like could FPS get too high and cause problems with some game engines? 

[jaslion]

6 minutes ago, Wolverine2349 said:

 

Yeah thats what I thought. Though how is 4K maxed out uktra settings in games on an RTX 4090 compared to 1440P maxed out ultra settings in games on a 3090 Ti?? Which would have better FPS and a higher load. I know the RTX 4090 is 59% faster than 3090 Ti per User Bench Mark. Is 4K 59% more demanding than 1440P or more so than that?

 

Like could FPS get too high and cause problems with some game engines? 

Most likely the 3090ti.

 

1440p is only 44% the pixels of 4k so it checks out and yeah it usually is between 50-60%.

 

Dont worry about fps getting too high games have built in caps or you can enable those yourself. Besides most games cant even push much beyond 144fps. They arent optimized for it because its such a small piece of the userbase. All that happens is that the game will just chill at its max capable framerate or whatever you set it at within its range.

 

Really id just get a 1440p display. Just because you have a 4090 DOESNT MEAN YOU NEED A 4K SCREEN.

 

Like I see people worry they made a mistake buying like a 3080 for their 1080p screen here all the time. They are happy with their display but feel pressured to change it. I basically always say dont.

 

 

All this means is that you have HEAPS of performance to spare and you can enjoy your same pc at the same quality settings for many years without worry.

 

So just get a solid 1440p screen, enjoy your hardware for years and call it quits.

[GuiltySpark_]

With that card given what we know about how it operates in the many benchmarks its been through, 4K is the only resolution that makes sense. 

Now, displays.. 27" 4K is somewhat popular for gaming specifically due to the increased sharpness you achieve with a high PPI. However personally I find 27" 4K to be a bit of a waste if you use the PC for anything other than gaming even a little. With so many pixels @ only 27" you're almost forced to use something higher than 100% (native) display scaling just to be able to see things on the screen outside of games which at that point, if you're a fan of desktop real estate for non-gaming tasks, its a bit of a waste. 

 

There are a handful of 32" 4K gaming panels that would make the most sense here IMO. 

[Wolverine2349]

Most likely the 3090ti.

 

You mean the 3090 Ti most likely would give better FPS including 1% and 0.1% lows and smoother experience at 1440P than the 4090 would at 4K??

[Wolverine2349]

1 hour ago, GuiltySpark_ said:

With that card given what we know about how it operates in the many benchmarks its been through, 4K is the only resolution that makes sense. 

Now, displays.. 27" 4K is somewhat popular for gaming specifically due to the increased sharpness you achieve with a high PPI. However personally I find 27" 4K to be a bit of a waste if you use the PC for anything other than gaming even a little. With so many pixels @ only 27" you're almost forced to use something higher than 100% (native) display scaling just to be able to see things on the screen outside of games which at that point, if you're a fan of desktop real estate for non-gaming tasks, its a bit of a waste. 

 

There are a handful of 32" 4K gaming panels that would make the most sense here IMO. 

 

 

Yeah makes sense. Though I mostly use it for gaming. SO you find 27 inch absolutely worth it for extra sharpness gaming.

 

Though you say a waste because screen real estate is too small to see anything without using something higher than 100% outside of gaming. That I am not concerned about as I am ok wasting some of it and making it bigger as even 1440P while I can see ok on Windows desktop and word and Internet browser with default 100% things are smaller than I am used to on a 1080P work monitors, so I use 125%. So I am totally ok making it bigger to waste screen real estate of 4K 27 inch for better quality gaming pictures.

 

 

[Doobeedoo]

Sure can tell a difference and with high end PC definitely 4K. Be it 27" or 32".

[xg32]

On 12/7/2022 at 10:07 AM, Wolverine2349 said:

.

 

 

i went from a 27inch or 32inch 4k monitor (forced to, broken fan), and i keep wishing the 32inch model was 27inch, the extra sharpness is noticeable, if nothing else changes and i could make my 32inch monitor smaller at 27inch, i would.

 

try looking at the GP27Q vs GP27U

[Andrewtst]

Definitely can tell, even the Windows text also obvious different.

 

For gaming is even obvious. But for anyone plan upgrade to 4K display, make sure have RTX 3080 and above or equivalent GPU.

But I still recommended get at least 32" if you want 4K and gaming at 32" v/s 27" is night and day differences. 27" still best in 1440p.

[Wolverine2349]

Thanks for all the input everyone.

It does seem even at 27 inches, 4K resolution is a better quality visuals for gaming

Though I have heard higher resolutions especially above 1080P and even 1440P are helpful to things that are CGI and computer generated like video games especially to make image look better and people with normal or better eyesight can tell difference across so many screen sizes.

Why is it though that real life film events like football, basketball, hockey or baseball games look super realistic at even 720P or 1080P?? And going up to 4K would be almost impossible to tell the difference unless the screen is like gigantic almost like 80-100 inches or maybe more.

But for things that are close to real life but not quite there in visuals like AAA games (well of course they look very closer and closer to real life now compared to years ago) it seems a higher resolution would make them look even closer to reality by being better??

But for movies and sporting events that are just films of real life events, how come upping the resolution does not make them look anymore real??

Or is that not how it works?

[Andrewtst]

57 minutes ago, Wolverine2349 said:

Why is it though that real life film events like football, basketball, hockey or baseball games look super realistic at even 720P or 1080P?? And going up to 4K would be almost impossible to tell the difference unless the screen is like gigantic.

Because that is movie file. If you record your games in movie file, it will behave same as well where it looks not much differences to human eye using 1080p / 4k resolution movie in smaller screen.

 

3D Render is another story and higher resolution make everything sharpen and make the render less aliasing.

[Mihle]

On 12/7/2022 at 5:54 PM, GuiltySpark_ said:

With that card given what we know about how it operates in the many benchmarks its been through, 4K is the only resolution that makes sense. 

Now, displays.. 27" 4K is somewhat popular for gaming specifically due to the increased sharpness you achieve with a high PPI. However personally I find 27" 4K to be a bit of a waste if you use the PC for anything other than gaming even a little. With so many pixels @ only 27" you're almost forced to use something higher than 100% (native) display scaling just to be able to see things on the screen outside of games which at that point, if you're a fan of desktop real estate for non-gaming tasks, its a bit of a waste. 

 

There are a handful of 32" 4K gaming panels that would make the most sense here IMO. 

4k outside of gaming does still improve text clarity for example even tho it doesn't give you more desktop real estate because you just change scaling accordingly.

[GuiltySpark_]

19 minutes ago, Mihle said:

4k outside of gaming does still improve text clarity for example even tho it doesn't give you more desktop real estate because you just change scaling accordingly.

4K does indeed give you more desktop real estate given there is just more pixels. I agree that text clarity is improved with so many pixels at only 27" but that's not a tradeoff I'm personally willing to accept. Text clarity hasn't been a problem for me at any resolution in the last decade but what I have appreciated is the raw increase is pixels so I want a display large enough to make use of all that room.