BAD HARDWARE WEEK

Amazing.

Here we go. My guide for another friend who queried on the same topic. Decided to add so that it didn't seem incomplete and therefore leading to wrong conclusions.

Screen Size and Resolution:
LCDs are measured from one edge of the screen to the other. CRTs are measured from the it's physical edge to the other. As a result, while LCDs are smaller, its screen size is a few notches higher.
17" CRT - 15" LCD
19" CRT - 17 to 18.1" LCD
21" CRT - 19 to 20" LCD

Do remember a 19" CRT with viewable size of 18" is of course larger than a 17" LCD.
15" LCD 1024X768
17-18.1" LCD 1280X1024
19" 1280X1024 - 1600X1200
20" 1600X1200

Take into consideration the screensize and ratio if you intend to game. The lower you get from the native resolution, the worst the game will look, even if you do have a hardware calibration unit. Even worst is when the aspect ratios are different.
If your videocard plays at 1024X768 and no more, you'll be seriously dissapointed when you game on a 18.1" monitor. Or it can be a excuse to upgrade once again.

Contrast Ratio:
Light intensity from the brightest white to the darkest black. Higher contrast ratio means better colour reproduction. The better the colours will look and be displayed, the more detail and saturation. LCD range is from 150:1 to 600:1. They average around 350:1 and 450:1. 350:1 should be the minimum.
Contrary to popular belief, while CRTs are capable of displaying more colours than a LCD, many do not. You get what you pay for.

Colour Depth:
Most LCDs can display 15.2 million colours. That's 8 bits per primary. Remember, the alpha channel doesn't really exist. Merely a blend of the 3 primaries. To decrease the response rates, some manufactors start at 262K colours then use varying voltages to output 14.9 million colours.
As far as that goes, it's not much different from what most CRTs actually display. Again, even so, it is still preferred that you stick with a high-end CRT if you demand 100% colour accuracy. Tried and true.

Response Rate:
Mostly been covered by original poster. Just to add that some manufactors will usually state their tr time. You have to add tr and tf together to get the full response time.

In addition, they will commonly state those response time given several conditions. Say 80% contrast and 50% brightness. If you want full colours, you will bring those up and response will suffer. This varies upon monitors.
Being that there are so many ways mislead, a 30ms spec'd monitor may very well ghost LESS than a 20ms spec'd monitor. When contrast et brightness are turned up, same applies.

Refresh Rate:
Ignore this. LCDs don't flicker at 60Hz. Most glass screens only do 60Hz. Few will do 75Hz. Models that state they do 75+ are 90% of the time limited by the glass screen and circuitry anyways. Either way, you won't see any flicker.

Analogue or Digital:
Digital is clearly better to the keen. On LCDs will hardware calibration, it's subtle but still there. There are problems with using analogue connection to a LCD and those are usually sync problems. This leads to "shimmering" lines and irregular sized text. You can adjust it by eye or have hardware calibration do it for you.

All LCDs have adjustments by hand. If you don't know what it is, it's fustrating and usually leads to no gain.
Hardware is harder to come by in that they come on $1000+ models generally. But you get other features that are well worth it. Most are passable. EIZO's hardware unit is a whole in a league of its own.
As far as quality.

Cables:
Not all cables are created equal. There is no such thing as a high quality bundled cable. While most of us would say it's very well good enough, it never hurts to get a new one if you experience excessive ghosting blurriness or dull colours. Do not mix and match cables as some meet the requirements for their monitor only. In that I mean, bandwidth. Higher resolution monitors require higher bandwidth. Using a cable from a 15" unit will be far from great on a 18" unit. Leads to horrid picture quality, shimmering, shaking, ghosting, et-c.

Brightness:
LCDs are all bloody bright. If you look at a unit over 250cdm^2 for too long, you're asking for trouble. Since LCDs do depend on the backlight for colour, take this into consideration. There are always gamma adjustments to make if dark areas are too dark. No different from a CRT.

Backlight:
While many manufactors use the same screen in their display, they will use different backlights. Quality will vary. Which is why, for example, NEC and Hitachi, even though they use the same panel in their 16ms monitors, the NEC has better colour.

Backlight are of very high quality nowadays. Many have a life of >40,000 hours. That's 4.5 years of 24/7/356. 9 years at 12/7/356. How many of you even do 12 hours a day?

Burn-in & Screen Fade:
Unlike CRTs, the LCD screen never degrades over time. It will be just as crisp 4 years from the day you opened it up for the first time. This makes it a very good long term investment. You can keep it att 100% contrast and brightness and it will never degrade. Do that on a CRT, and you've cut its life in half.

It is still possible to burn in an image on a LCD screen. Say, you left your desktop on for 12 hours. To rid of that, just run a screen saver the next time. If you actually did get a burn in image, again run something with motion for the same amount of time and the image will soon disapear.

Dead Pixels:
CHECK to see what the manufactor policy is on this. Some will let you return after 3 dead pixels. Some will be 7-8 sub pixels. Some will be 5 but only if they're noticable spot and/or in a cluster. If this bothers you, check before you buy.

Technology on dead pixels have improved by quite a bit from even last year. It's rare to have a fully dead pixel now. A dead sub-pixel is one that displays one colour and only that one no matter what the others are doing.
Not to be confused with a lazy pixel. These change a bit slower than the others. Usually, this is normal on a new or display that hasn't been used in a while. Use the screen for 5-10 minutes in some fast movement game and you'll find it has vanished.

Keep the screen clear of dust particles as those may block a pixel and you may see it as being dead till you wipe it.
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