$400 Monitors Through the Ages

This afternoon's project was swapping computer accessories between my room and the basement of my parents' house. I recently purchased a 24" Samsung LCD for my primary desktop system. I found this Online for about $400. When I think back to all of the monitors I've used through the years, I realized that I've always spent $400 on them.

MAG 17" CRT (1994 - 1998)
I had this one for most of my college years. It's hard to believe, but this was the best model at the time. I researched only the 17" models because there was a huge price jump at 19", the next size up. The 17" monitors were also sufficient for my 3-D and multimedia work. We often needed the 1280x1024 resolution for application interfaces, but the animations and interactive projects often had final dimensions of 720x480 or lower. This was one of the most durable monitors I've owned. After college, it was moved to my dad's office where it served another 5 or 6 years.

CTX 21" Flat CRT (1998 - 2008)
As systems and graphics cards got more powerful for the consumer, I had to upgrade to a larger monitor. With the rise of the Internet, it also became more common to have multiple windows open. A 1600x1200 resolution made multitasking more efficient. Th hi-res was also useful for my new duties... hi-res still graphics, photos, long pages of code, etc. The flat CRT also made a difference because there was no distortion. My research actually led me to a Sony model, but further searching revealed that CTX made one of the same specs as Sony for much less and it also had an integrated 4-port USB hub.

Samsung LCD (2008)
The CTX didn't actually die out yet, but it was starting to get blurry at 1600x1200 and the Samsung 24" was on sale for a limited time. Many time when I research monitors and LCD TVs, it leads me to Samsung. The best LCD monitors are probably the Dell Ultrasharp and Apple, but those are both very overpriced. The Samsungs have pretty good quality. I've been using a 17" one at work for about 3 years now. I needed a 24" model because I couldn't go lower than 1600x1200 if it was to replace the CTX 21" CRT. The new one goes up to 1920x1200. The wide format allows me to have 2 browser windows side-by-side + a side bar for my messenger applications. It also looks great for those 16:9 movies.

Note: Although I removed the CTX from my main system, it's not ready for the trash bin quite yet. I moved it to the basement system and have it set at 1280x1024, a resolution where the text is still readable.