# Why was I so positive 16:10 was the future of gaming? ... 21:9 is king?



## Space Lynx (Nov 9, 2017)

I am trying to understand this phenomena the majority of gamers 5-7 years ago I would say were always saying 2560 x 1600 or 1920 x 1200 16:10 is amazing for gaming, and fast forward to now, and not only has that been abandoned in full by monitor manufacturers we are sitting at 21:9... going further away from vertical increases...

just seems so odd to me.


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## Toothless (Nov 9, 2017)

I have no clue where you're seeing that. I'm seeing 16:9 being the dominant one with 21:9 being used for different reasons like productivity. I can see where 16:10 is "better" for gaming and whatnot but for some reason a ton of manufacturers think 16:9 is more cinematic.

Screw conventional ratios, I'm staying with my 48:9.


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## Disparia (Nov 9, 2017)

I choose for the present 

Bought a 1920x1200 monitor many years ago as it best for me at the time.
- Fullscreen games looked great.
- Windowed games allowed me to keep the task bar visible for easy switching while they ran at ~1920x1080.
- Good 4:3 compatibility (1600x1200)

Last year I moved to 2560x1080 and have been loving it.
- Fullscreen games look great.
- Good 16:9 compatibility (1920x1080).
- Other non-gaming reasons.

Viewing the taskbar isn't as good, but I find it acceptable.


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## eidairaman1 (Nov 9, 2017)

TVs are reason why


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## EarthDog (Nov 9, 2017)

LOL, who said that?


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## ZenZimZaliben (Nov 9, 2017)

16x10 is better...but more expensive. That is where the change happened. Manufactures are setup to make panels in the most widely available because less waste for them and more profit. Basically the Market drove the state we are in now.

If no one bought 16:9 then manufactures wouldn't make it. So through marketing, pricing and purchasing the market conditions are why 16:10 never gained a strong foot hold.

"The primary reason for this move was considered to be production efficiency[3][7] - since display panels for TVs use the 16:9 aspect ratio, it became more efficient for display manufacturers to produce computer display panels in the same aspect ratio as well.[8] A 2008 report by DisplaySearch also cited a number of other reasons, including the ability for PC and monitor manufacturers to expand their product ranges by offering products with wider screens and higher resolutions, helping consumers to adopt such products more easily and "stimulating the growth of the notebook PC and LCD monitor market"."


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## jboydgolfer (Nov 9, 2017)

Jizzler said:


> 2560x1080



 it's highly anecdotal what person raves for what resolution or aspect ratio. Reading your post about loving that resolution is funny to me because 1080x2560 is a joke, a sort of "mutant Resolution" that belongs on the island of misfit Monitors. I ordered a brand new LG IPS "2K" (imo its not really 2k although I understand it is technically) monitor and returned it within days ,because in my opinion anything that narrow & that wide is ridiculous.   I literally laughed that monitor back into the box,

IMO,For productivity I would say that a different set of guidelines applies (and it could find a place in the proper resolutions) but for gaming and daily use,that resolution is a joke , a throw away

 But then again to some of my old resolution of 1920 x 1200 would be a joke or "low DEF" it's all really what the user prefers


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## JATownes (Nov 9, 2017)

I'm at 3440x1440 21:9 and will not go back.  Even at the office I went with 21:9 1080p instead of dual monitors.  It is much more efficient from a productivity standpoint, and I love gaming in 21:9...it just seems more immersive.

JAT


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## jboydgolfer (Nov 9, 2017)

JATownes said:


> I'm at 3440x1440 21:9 and will not go back.  Even at the office I went with 21:9 1080p instead of dual monitors.  It is much more efficient from a productivity standpoint, and I love gaming in 21:9...it just seems more immersive.
> 
> JAT



 For the productivity, I 110% agree.  I wouldn't take anyone seriously ,who would say that a wider screen is not more productive.  But for gaming, I'm elite ,so my tastes are towards the more MLGeesier  Yup.....im a "big deal" in the solitare & mojang/minsweeper community


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## dirtyferret (Nov 9, 2017)

lynx29 said:


> I am trying to understand this phenomena the majority of gamers 5-7 years ago I would say were always saying 2560 x 1600 or 1920 x 1200 16:10 is amazing for gaming, and fast forward to now, and not only has that been abandoned in full by monitor manufacturers we are sitting at 21:9... going further away from vertical increases...
> 
> just seems so odd to me.



Earlier this year I switched from my Samsung 1680x1050 (16:10) TF panel to an Acer IPS 1920x1080p (16:9).  I think price and customer demand has more to do with what is selling and what is cheaper to manufacturer in order to keep customer pricing down.


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## INSTG8R (Nov 9, 2017)

EarthDog said:


> LOL, who said that?


My thoughts exactly. 16:10 was always niche.


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## FordGT90Concept (Nov 9, 2017)

eidairaman1 said:


> TVs are reason why


This.  8:5 was the VESA standard for widescreen monitors and it was growing in popularity until ATSC and PAL mandated the mass production of HDTVs with 720p and 1080i broadcasts.  Suddenly there was like 5:1 demand for 16:9 over 8:5 and because your average household tends to have more TVs than computers, that demand persisted.  8:5 is still popular in business/professional environments but the volumes are small and the quality is high so they come with a huge premium (often double the cost of the slightly smaller 16:9 equivalent).

If you retro game, 8:5 is still worth the cost because 4:3 VESA resolutions can directly letterbox into them.  That's about the only reason to justify the premium price anymore, sadly. 


Fun fact: I actually have a 8:5 TV that stretches 16:9 content vertically.  Just over a decade ago, 16:9 panels were near nonexistent.  Oh how the tables have turned.


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## xrror (Nov 10, 2017)

Because 16:10 really was supposed to be the true successor from 4:3. We went from 1600x1200 to 1920x1200. 1920x1080 was a downgrade, but 16:9 panels became dirt cheap because they were being pumped out for TV's.

added: I just belatedly remembered, the other entire point of 16:10, and the transition to widescreen AT ALL in computing was that 1920x1200 allowed you to have two A4/Letter pages on screen at once - book style - without needing to scroll around and be legible WYSIWYG style (What You See Is What You Get). So every time you need to scroll a bit on a 16:9 screen to actually do anything on a menu or taskbar get angry that 16:10 got kicked to the curb...

2560x1600 would have been the next resolution if we had stayed 16:10. Instead we got stuck with 2560x1440 because market forces.

Yes, I wish we had stayed 16:10 or at least come back to it, but that battle is lost sadly. I also miss 5:4 (1280x1024) - before you mock that, consider that the most common resolution is still 1366x768 and weep =(

EDIT ADD: omg - I just read that there is a 5:4 rez QSXGA that's 2560x2048. I bet that's glorious in person - also probably stupid expensive since the only thing I can think that would have that are medical displays which can't be cheap.

argh last edit: forgot the wikipedia chart: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Display_resolution#/media/File:Vector_Video_Standards8.svg


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## Deleted member 67555 (Nov 10, 2017)

Going from 16x10 to 16x9 sucked imo...
Harder for the gfx for no real graphical gain...
I honestly can't tell the difference from 1680x1050 and 1920x1080 when I'm staring at the center of the screen.

21x9 just annoys the shit out of me...
Like when the only choice of movies was 16x9 we had 4x3 TV's and as soon as we have 16x9 TV'S movies are in 21x9...
I would hate to see what happens if we all go to 21x9...77x9 maybe.. It'll just be a thin line across the wall... Lol


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## Toothless (Nov 10, 2017)

jmcslob said:


> Going from 16x10 to 16x9 sucked imo...
> Harder for the gfx for no real graphical gain...
> I honestly can't tell the difference from 1680x1050 and 1920x1080 when I'm staring at the center of the screen.
> 
> ...


If I win the lotto I'll get three 21:9 curved monitors and show you the 5fps in racing game glory.


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## Frick (Nov 10, 2017)

The thing about resolutions that is almost bugging me is that  3840x2160 is cheaper than 1440p at this point. I was hoping 1440p would replace 1080p.


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## johnspack (Nov 10, 2017)

1920x1200 was amazing.  Loved that monitor.  Died on me,  and now I'm forced to do 1920x cutoff 1080 stupid res.....


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## Red_Machine (Nov 10, 2017)

I have a 16:10 monitor for backwards compatibility reasons, and something I've noticed is that a lot of the time modern games will cut off the sides and zoom the image in instead of giving you the extra height.  It sucks.


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## johnspack (Nov 10, 2017)

I still would take a 16:10 monitor if I could find one.  Of course I'm weird.....


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## FordGT90Concept (Nov 10, 2017)

Frick said:


> The thing about resolutions that is almost bugging me is that  3840x2160 is cheaper than 1440p at this point. I was hoping 1440p would replace 1080p.


Again, TVs.  ATSC 3.0 will deploy 4K UHD content.  2560x1440 is kind of a mystery why it exists.  It's an exclusively computer resolution and it's clearly caped by DVI dual-link (2560x1600).  The only reason I can think of is that manufacturers took advantage of the TV craze that they used it as an excuse to remove hundreds of thousands of pixels.  Your average consumer really doesn't know the difference...or if they do, doesn't adequately inform their buying decision.  Hell, the 1440 variant may have won out because it is cheaper to produce and therefore slightly cheaper retail.


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## cucker tarlson (Nov 10, 2017)

I'd rather have either a 4K 16:9 monitor to get better pixel density and sharper image in the center where I look or 1440p 16:9 144Hz to push more frames. 3440x1440 34" is nice, just not for gaming, why waste so much GPU resources on latifundia of unnecessary wide space. 2560x1080 shouldn't even exist, people are lured by the low price of those 29" LG 75Hz panels but really they'd be better off with 1920x1080 144Hz or 1440p. I saw that LG 29" 2560x1080 in person in a shop, didn't like it at all. The ultrawide aspect ratio looks weird on a 23,8" display with such huge inner bezels, it looks very narrow vertically but too wide horizontally. Thin bezels might make that more acceptable, but with those thick ones it just looks bad. The image clarity wasn't very good and the colors were very unimpressive for an IPS.


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## Readlight (Nov 10, 2017)

I all the time use Asus 16:10 and Del 5:4 works even after 10 years sadly i cannot move monitor for portrait mode. LG phone was showing great picture quality but that get water and i smashed it.


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## Vayra86 (Nov 10, 2017)

lynx29 said:


> I am trying to understand this phenomena the majority of gamers 5-7 years ago I would say were always saying 2560 x 1600 or 1920 x 1200 16:10 is amazing for gaming, and fast forward to now, and not only has that been abandoned in full by monitor manufacturers we are sitting at 21:9... going further away from vertical increases...
> 
> just seems so odd to me.



Its simple:
- 16:10 was different from the dominance of 16:9
- Productivity work is better with more height
- Ultrawide didn't exist
- Curved didn't exist
- We came from 4:3, so were used to more height everywhere (TV as well)

The demographics of gamers have changed, with an influx of younger gamers that consider 'work' to be a Twitch of tube stream. Who needs height for that. You need cinematic properties, so wider. And it says Ultra so it has to be better.

Honestly, 90% of these preferences are like fashion, the vast majority has no clue and no way to compare one to the other in their own situation, and follows the 'norm' depending on what people around you do and say. Look at these forums and how some individuals are misguided into thinking 4K for gaming is 'the norm' or 144hz is 'the norm' or the 'thing to have'. Its complete and utter BS and it sounds different depending on where you read or listen. Its just preference


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## StrayKAT (Nov 10, 2017)

Only time I ever used 16:10 was a Mac 10 years ago.


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## Komshija (Nov 10, 2017)

There are two or maybe three manufacturers who dictate trends - most notably Samsung and LG. If they decide that 16:9 is the current standard, the rest will basically follow this practice.


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## EarthDog (Nov 10, 2017)

Were they even major players in the game when the transition happened a decade and change ago?


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## Komshija (Nov 10, 2017)

I think they were. Besides them, who else could be considered as major LCD manufacturer? Sharp? NEC? Funai? The rest are below the radar.


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## ShurikN (Nov 10, 2017)

EarthDog said:


> Were they even major players in the game when the transition happened a decade and change ago?


Yes, for example almost all the Japanese makers had their own panels back in the day of 4:3. Now you have two behemoths, LG and Samsung, and a a bunch of noname Chinese who may or may not create something good from time to time.
Hell even Samsung uses LG panels in some devices (mostly tvs, not sure about monitors)


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## StrayKAT (Nov 10, 2017)

Unconsciously, I just think of it as a cinematic thing, I guess (16:9 that is). Monitors and productivity come only second. And I'm OK with that.


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## EarthDog (Nov 10, 2017)

No idea who made panels back 15+ years ago when 1920x1080 was becoming popular. I dont recall samsung being a major player way back then... nor LG. But i also dont know that market well. I just bought tvs in the late 90s and early 2k when the trend was starting.

I beleieve your statement to be true now, kom,  just not back then...but again, i dont know who made panels inside other, more popular brands at the time.


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## RCoon (Nov 10, 2017)

TV decides the ratio of displays. Consumers like continuity throughout their experience. We had 4:3 TV's for decades, and thus monitors followed the same suit/similar. When TVs switched to 16:9, we followed suit.

I actually know a lady who did an extensive scientific study on shapes. Her whole study was based around rectangles of varying sizes, and she'd sampled hundreds of thousands of people to ask which version of the rectangle people preferred. Of the 6 rectangular shapes provided, the top two rectangles were 4:3 and 16:9.


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## StrayKAT (Nov 10, 2017)

Funny that the first iphones were like 1024x768, I think. So this wasn't even a concern for them either.


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## EarthDog (Nov 10, 2017)

Its a phone though... the fringe imo and not a market driver for pc and tv monitors. Especially 10 years ago when iphone was released.


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## StrayKAT (Nov 10, 2017)

EarthDog said:


> Its a phone though... the fringe imo and not a market driver for pc and tv monitors. Especially 10 years ago when iphone was released.



Yeah, I'm just forgetting when even phones went widescreen., since you guys started mentioning Samsung years ago. It wasn't the early iphones at least.


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## BarbaricSoul (Nov 10, 2017)

I've been on 16*10 ever since the C2D E8400 was new (about 9-10 years ago). My first LED monitor was a 24" 1920*1200 Soyo Topaz S. For the price, I have to say I really enjoyed that monitor. From there I went to my current 30" 2560*1600 HP ZR30w. Great all around monitor IMHO. Great picture quality for gaming while also being able to basically split the 30" screen into 4 sections, each being equal to my laptop's 15" 1366x768 screen. I loved that for my online college assignments (one section for the assignment, one for the instructions, and two for research). I was also great for when I tried working at home for the same reasons (I tried doing tech support for Frontier FIOS, I'm not a customer service type of person.) I still have the Soyo and use it as a back-up in case something happens to my HP.


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## l3nderb (Nov 10, 2017)

Have been using a Dell 3008WPF (30", 16:10) at home and a HP ZR30W (30", 16:10) at work for a number of years and cannot think of using something else, although I also use a 17" laptop (HP ZBook 17, 16:9) and switching between the ratios is very annoying.

On the other hand gaming on a 16:10 monitor can be less then perfect due to lots of games nowadays not supporting 16:10, instead just showing a black bar on the bottom and top of the screen (even though the resolution is set to 2560*1600). I truly hope my Dell will keep working for a couple more years (already about 8 years old) because replacing that will be a very expensive affair I'm afraid...


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## Bill_Bright (Nov 10, 2017)

It's all about the golden ratio. The problem is, however, 1080P was the standard for TVs and most households have more TVs than computer monitors and they spend more for those TVs too. And the majority of consumers are more discerning TV image viewers than they are computer image viewers. Flesh tones, for example, must look natural on TV but because flesh tones are not viewed on computer screens near as often, they are not as important on computer monitors. 

So the money for R&D goes into TVs first. And, for the most part, TV makers are the same as monitor makers. So TVs drive the display industry. 

It costs a lot more (in terms of logistics, design, inventory and more) to support two very similar technologies so when possible, one falls to the wayside. This is exactly why HDMI pushed out DVI even though (at the time) no computer monitors had built in speakers. It just did not make sense to build TVs and monitors that support both DVI and HDMI. So DVI is going away.


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## Vayra86 (Nov 11, 2017)

EarthDog said:


> No idea who made panels back 15+ years ago when 1920x1080 was becoming popular. I dont recall samsung being a major player way back then... nor LG. But i also dont know that market well. I just bought tvs in the late 90s and early 2k when the trend was starting.
> 
> I beleieve your statement to be true now, kom,  just not back then...but again, i dont know who made panels inside other, more popular brands at the time.



Sharp, Sony, Panasonic


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## Thefumigator (Nov 11, 2017)

I own an 21:9 AOC ultra wide and sometimes I feel I need more vertical space, but I'm on "productivity" not a gamer.


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## jaggerwild (Nov 11, 2017)

1080 monitors are a dime a dozen, if you pay more then $100 you get took.


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## repman244 (Nov 11, 2017)

BarbaricSoul said:


> I've been on 16*10 ever since the C2D E8400 was new (about 9-10 years ago). My first LED monitor was a 24" 1920*1200 Soyo Topaz S. For the price, I have to say I really enjoyed that monitor. From there I went to my current 30" 2560*1600 HP ZR30w. Great all around monitor IMHO. Great picture quality for gaming while also being able to basically split the 30" screen into 4 sections, each being equal to my laptop's 15" 1366x768 screen. I loved that for my online college assignments (one section for the assignment, one for the instructions, and two for research). I was also great for when I tried working at home for the same reasons (I tried doing tech support for Frontier FIOS, I'm not a customer service type of person.) I still have the Soyo and use it as a back-up in case something happens to my HP.



 I'm looking for a ZR30w as well, however I think I won't be able to part with the ZR24w I'm currently running (the only direct replacement would be the new Z24x which is still 16:10, all others are 16:9 AFAIK).


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## Frag_Maniac (Nov 11, 2017)

After 16:10 was pretty much abandoned by most manufacturers and devs, I don't see how anyone could expect long term support for anything other than a 16:9 display. The sad fact is game development for the most part hinges on console game sales, and most console gamers use 16:9 TVs.


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