GADGET GURU

Will more pixels make you more productive? Our tech expert knows the secrets of a super screen setup

When things start getting that complex and you start dealing with that many pixels, you need extra hardware to drive it

AThe progressive ease at which Korea, Japan, and China can manufacture LCD panels means great things for the desktop market, and good news for fans of odd aspect ratios and absurd pixel density. Though selecting the right one boils down to a personal cost/benefit analysis.

You could plump for a 16:9 screen, which suits most applications, most online video formats, and most games, or you could go mad with a more exotic oblong: the Cinemascope-shaped 21:9 is making big inroads, while Samsung and others are pushing a rather silly 32:9 ultrawide ratio.

When things start getting that complex, and you start dealing with that many pixels, you need extra hardware to drive it; 1080p has you wrangling two million pixels, while a 4K screen pushes that over eight million. Not that GaGu would recommend going for anything less than QHD (2560x1440), because it really does make a difference.

There’s the question of curves (that’s really an each to their own sort of thing) and HDR (you don’t need it, but it’s nice to have, if what the manufacturer claims is HDR actually is). There’s the question of refresh rates (don’t trust science –you’ll notice the difference between 60Hz and 144Hz) and sync (look for something in conjunction with your graphics card for tear-free images).

GaGu cop-out answer time, then: buy the best thing you can afford, and what works with your desk. Don’t get something gigantic if you’re going to be a foot away from it; don’t spend on gaming features if you’re never going to use them.