How are flat panel PC monitors and flat panel TVs so different?

I too have always wondered about this.

Fixed pixel monitors are very similar to TVs. Sometimes a monitor makes use of a different type of panel that trades off wide angle viewing for lower gray-to-gray cell response time. Sometimes not.

Monitors typically come with a resolution scaler pre-loaded with scaling factors for all the common PC and Apple resolutions plus HDTV resolutions. Frequently HDTVs do not have such flexibility.

HDTVs come with remote controls, Monitors typically do not. Nor do monitors accept a universal remote control.

.

The difference is blurry nowadays but essentially monitors mean to produce AS IT IS. Same thing for audio or video monitors.

TV signals correspond to certain specs and usually pre recorded or determined, whereas PC signal spec are more versatile depending on the graphics card capability, and the image is rendered on the fly.

You can hardly get >60 Hz native source or >1080p TVs but they are getting more common for PC monitors.

They're not different. Apparently people's needs for computers are now the same as their needs for televisions. My 15 year old crt monitor can display higher resolution than any lcd computer monitor less than 30" but oh well.

Bottom line is it's cheaper to make them all the same.

By law any unit sold as a "TV" must contain a tuner.
It used to be that monitors contained better display's and circuit technology to insure that no pc applicatiion's text would be blurred or distorted and for this reason they used to cost more then TVs.

PC Monitors generally have only one input (may have a couple different types such as HDMI, DVI or VGA) from a single source where as a TV will typically have multiple inputs to get signals from several sources that can be switched internally by the TV. There may be some exceptions but generally speaking inputs and internal tuners are the main differences.

Convergence. We've achieved it. PC monitors can do anything TV sets can do, other than directly tune TV channels. And TV sets generally have a VGA or RGB mode that allows them to operate as well as any PC monitor.

About the only real differences are that TV sets are more versatile and have more inputs and adjustment parameters, while PC monitors seem to have more choices for matching existing arcane display rates and pixel map sizes common to the PC world.

PC monitors used to be either the older 4:3 versions, or newer 16:10 versions (at work I actually have a Magnavox HDTV [I did not choose it] that has a 16:10 PC display, making everyone look like they've been on the Atkins diet). Anything other than the 4:3 version will stretch whatever is on your PC, but this is not really problematic the way 16:9 HDTVs can make every hot chick look like she needs to drop 30.

Until a year or so ago all wide-screen PC monitors were 16:10. Now, most of them are 16:9. I would like to think that PC makers have given over to HD aspect ratios as a nod to convergence, but I think it is probably due to the realities of the marketplace, where 16:9 displays have become much cheaper and commoner than 16:10 displays, and so they go the cheap route. OK, no harm, no foul.

But I will never buy a PC monitor again. In fact, my current PC monitor is actually a 22" Vizio TV in RGB mode handed down when I upgraded a bedroom TV. Works like a champ.

Monitors for some reason are much much more reliable. My LED-LCD Mac has a perfect picture, but my LCD TV blurs and ghosts. I guess it's because of the size, and TVs sometimes use S-PVA panels or something like that which are awful.

Your Apple monitor probably uses an IPS-S panel. Most computer monitors use TN panels that trade viewing angles for response time.

Most tv's below 32" use tn panels as well. The only difference is they don't have to please a bunch of pc fps enthusiasts so response times generally aren't as low on cheap small tv's as they are on cheap tn monitors. Va panels are what is used on most higher end tv's expecially when black level is a consideration, some tv's also use ips panels to get better viewing angles than va and tn. It's mainly a question of what you want and what you want to pay for it. If you want a bigger screen with deeper blacks and decent color but don't care as much about resolution and response time then get a 32" tv cause a 27" 1920x1200 ips or va monitor will cost about the same and a 30" panel with a 2560 x1600 resolution will cost a heck of alot more.
Alot of cheaper tv's don't support 1:1 pixel mapping as well so you end up with slightly less resolution.

"My 15 year old crt monitor can display higher resolution than any lcd computer monitor less than 30" but oh well."
Not quite the way it works sopclod, i was pretty shocked when i found out my hires 2000x1500 crt can only actually display a resolution of around 1600x1200 in the center of the screen, crt's work a bit differently than lcds in the way they display an image.
Edited by Mik James - 6/27/12 at 5:42pm

Usually higher gamut, lower input lag, higher resolution, little to no make up to hide the uglies (they call it post-processing, I call it wearing makeups).

Your definetly referring to the higher end displays though, the cheap monitors with the tn panels usually have about 70% of the standard color range.
I'm not sure if cheap tn's are any better in tv's I'll have to read a couple reviews.

Just to add a major difference one has to be aware of: All HD monitors are prepared for the 4:4:4 RGB signals, not every TV has support for it some have only 4:2:2.