As a PC Authority reader you probably spend an inordinate amount of time in front of a computer. For many of you it's not only a tool for working but also a source of endless hours of entertainment. But basking in the warmth of a monitor's glow will eventually lead to tired and sore eyes, not to mention the possibility of a host of other problems.
If you're going to stare at a monitor for hours on end then you might as well make sure it's optimally configured, not just to display a sharp and beautiful image but for comfort as well.
So pull up your chair, look at your monitor and follow this guide – we're going to show you how to visually and ergonomically make the most of your monitor, and yourself.
Personable Postures
Let's start by taking a leaf out of the ergonomics handbook. Ergonomically setting up your desk and monitor isn't just about looking after the muscles in your upper body and neck, it is also about having a display in front of you that is comfortable to use. If it is easy on your eyes and neck muscles, you will be able to use it for a lot longer before fatigue sets in (at which stage you should always take – at the very least – a short break).
There are a surprisingly large number of problems related to bad posture while sitting at desks – aside from the possibility of repetitive strain injuries (RSI) due to poor keyboard and mouse placement (perhaps a topic for another time), there are the problems of eye strain and sometimes headaches due to cramped neck and shoulder muscles. The placement of your monitor is a major factor in determining how much work your eyes and muscles need to do.
Ergonomics dictates that the upper edge of your monitor should never be above eye level. Our line of vision is, naturally, directly forward or looking down.
Focusing the eyes above eye level requires the eye muscles to do more work, which ultimately leads to eyestrain.
Despite well-ingrained intentions to place the monitor on top of the desktop PC or on a stand to be directly in front of the user, this is actually not the healthiest position. Ideally the monitor should be placed below eye level and titled back slightly so that it sits in your natural field of vision without requiring you to tilt your head much or angle your eyes to view it. You shouldn't need to angle your head more than fifteen degrees or move your eyes more than thirty degrees in order to comfortably view your monitor. In terms of distance, it depends on personal preference but it's recommended to place the monitor between 50cm and 100cm away from you.
Size is Important
If you've never explored your monitor's controls then chances are the full-screen desktop in front of you probably isn't quite as full-screen as it could be.
All monitors have the ability to adjust various aspects of the picture – everything from the temperature of the colour through to the geometry of the image, and, of course, the size and placement of the picture itself. CRT monitors generally lose sharpness and intensity in the far corners of the screen, and it's not surprising that the default configuration on many monitors doesn't provide a fully expanded image filling all available space.
If you have a black border between your screen image and the edge of the monitor, chances are you can expand the image to fill this space and make better use of the screen real estate you paid for! What about LCD monitors? They don't suffer this degradation in quality towards the corners of the screen due to the uniform nature of LCD. They do, however, suffer other problems (such as dying pixels).
Check your monitor's controls: you should be able to find an option for size and placement (called 'centre' or something similar). Expand the image as far as it will go without either a) making it disappearing off the edge or b) distorting it too much, as some older monitors will surely do this as you approach the edge. Find a setting that works for you. As you're resizing you'll quickly find a need for the centring features of your monitor as well.
Take note that modern monitors store size and placement settings for a variety of resolutions, so you might want to change the desktop to each resolution you use (if you use a higher or lower resolution than your desktop when playing games for example) and expand the image to fill the screen in these settings also.
Once you're happy with your newfound larger desktop image, adjust the brightness and contrast levels to suit. Generally a moderate brightness level and high contrast can make text easier to read as well as being comfortable on the eyes. Too bright or too dark will only cause your eyes to do more work.
The lighting around your desk is also important: if light is being reflected on your monitor try moving the light source or desk and monitor to a new location. Darkness is bad as well (for all you coders and hackers!) as this also strains the eyes. As always it is the balance that's important – ambient, not direct light, will provide the most beneficial.
Lastly, a handy tip that can make a startling difference with a minimal of effort – cleaning the monitor. No matter how great your picture looks, if you haven't cleaned the screen in a while you can be sure dust and dirt is affecting the picture in front of you. Give it a quick wipe with a damp cloth followed by a dry cloth, and marvel at the newfound clarity before you. Be sure to use just water and not a cleaning solution as many monitors are shipped with a special anti-glare/anti-static layer on the glass, which could be dissolved by cleaning agents. This would be a bad thing.
Need for Speed
Now we come to the software side of the story. It's all well and good to have an ergonomically positioned, sparkly clean, full screen image in front of you, but if it's running at a low refresh rate you won't be able to appreciate it for long periods of time – sustained low refresh rates cause eye strain and ultimately, headaches.
Thankfully, tweaking the refresh rate is one of the easiest and most beneficial changes you can make to your system, and it is a fact that surprisingly few people seem to be aware of it.
The refresh rate is the frequency, measured in hertz, at which the screen updates per second. A refresh rate of 60Hz, the universal lowest common denominator for monitors, means the screen is being refreshed sixty times a second. The human eye, being the remarkable piece of engineering that it is, isn't quite fooled by this and sees the updates as a repetitive flicker (the effect is more pronounced if you turn your head to the side and look at the monitor out of the corner of your eye). A low refresh rate is one of the major causes of eye strain – the subtle flicker takes its toll on both eyes and the brain – it's not a matter of if you get sore eyes, only a matter of when.
The solution (aside from taking breaks) is to set a higher refresh rate and thus display a more solid image that's easier on the eyes.
While even old video cards can pump out very fast refresh rates, monitors are limited in their capability to display them. Different manufacturers and different models are capable of different refresh rates at any given resolution. The higher the resolution, the harder it is for the monitor to keep up. All monitors can handle 60Hz at any resolution, of course, and even old ones should also be able to do at least 75Hz. Modern monitors have no problem doing 100Hz or over at common resolutions like 1,024 x 768 and 150Hz or higher at 800 x 600. One of the features that sets high quality monitors apart is the ability to do very high resolutions with high refresh ra