So my monitor is crapping out on me, and it's been so many years since I've purchased one I seem to have forgotten all the things one should know to make an informed purchase. First of all, it's just a new monitor, not a new computer, so buying some fantastic 4K monitor for this computer that would struggle with 4K on many games is not smart. So I kind of want to stick with 1920X1080, but for some reason everywhere I look these days the largest of those is like 30 inches. My old eyes need a big screen, and the one I'm staring at right now is 34 inches, so they sure used to make them bigger. The main thing I want is to keep the ratio (16:9 I guess?) but the other thing I'm noticing is that it seems all the new, especially larger than 30 inch monitors are the whatever the extra wide is these days (21:9 maybe) and that doesn't work for me.

So I want:

1)34 to 36 inch
2)16:9 monitor naturally (don't want a 21:9 monitor and play it at 16:9 with black areas of the screen wasted).
3)preferably curved (I didn't think it would make much of a difference but now that I've been gaming with a curved one it does seem "better" to me, though it's hard to explain why)
4)Preferably under $500.
5) Strictly 100% single player, so no competitive gaming. lol, in fact I've never, in my life, played a game online I don't think, unless it was years ago and I don't recall it). No competitive gaming means things like response time, etc, aren't as important, right?

I found this (albeit not 34 inches, but it's the biggest I've found so far that is 1920X1080. What do you guys think of this one?

My current ASUS monitor has been wonderful. The colors are, err, were vibrant, texts crisp, contrasts nice and I just really have liked it. But now while playing you will suddenly see the screen get "darker" and then return and then darker again and sometimes not returning, almost like it's running out of gas or something lol. I really did love this big, curved monitor as both gaming and watching movies/TV looked amazingly crisp and clear with, again, super vibrant colors that just... well they just looked great. Now it seems like they're, I dunno, it's hard to explain, it's like they're "fading" or something. Maybe it's my old eyes instead? lol I didn't think of that, and wouldn't have any other human who saw it a lot before to verify if it's my eyes instead, but I don't notice the same phenomena IRL. I dunno. Hope it's not my eyes. They're been blurry for years, but with glasses crisp enough, and colors looked plenty good wearing my glasses.

Not wedded to Amazon. Will consider any reputable seller (oh wait.. that rules out Amazon and, oh forget it, I'll just say any established seller). Not going to buy one from some dood with a PO Box as an address.

I'll keep searching myself but it appears things have indeed changed drastically since the last time I purchased a monitor (IIRC I bought this one around 2017 or 18 or so). Not finding any plain HD monitors over 31.5 inches is not something I remember from before and having nearly all of the larger ones being 21:9 versus 16:9 is definitely not something I experienced last time as again, this very monitor I'm staring at now is 16:9 and 34 inches. I'll keep looking and may find something but just wanted to ask here because so many folks here who actually know their shit, you know?

Thanks for any advice, or none at all. You guys are still the best.

Just found this one that looks intriguing, albeit again less than the 34inch I'm using now (this one is 32 inch)

My first one I've found over 32 inches that is 16:9 at Newegg but it is $900. Does look interesting though.

Okay, it seems like I might have hit the wrong filters before, because now I'm seeing many over 32 inches that are 16:9. But they're all 4K, which means they cost more than a 2560X 1440 or a 1920X1080 one would cost. I was beginning to wonder if 4K had gone away when all I kept seeing was the extra wide or ultra wide or whatever they're called lol.

FINAL EDIT: Okay, I think i get it now. This one I've been using was 34 inches, but it is natively the 1440p (still 16:9 so when I play at 1080p it looks "natural") and I'm thinking nowadays 1440p's have been effectively replaced by 4K (or I guess 2160p lol). So my options are to stay below 34 inches (32 best I've found) that is a natural 16:9 ratio that isn't 4k. I say isn't 4k because it appears once you get the 4k designation, the price jumps way up lol. So I can get a 32 inch 16:9 monitor for $200 give or take, but the second you jump to 36 they're all 4k's and the price jumps to $700 or $800 or more. Guess I'm getting a smaller monitor after all. My poor eyes lol.

This one looks interesting but can't say I've heard of that company before lol. I'll muddle through this somehow I guess.

The problem you're going to run into is that once you go beyond about 27" - 32", the "dot-pitch" of a 1080p monitor is going to be too high. The individual pixels will have too much space between them, which makes for a rougher looking image, so monitors usually aren't made at that size because most people just don't find them visually appealing.

Consider a 1440p monitor. 2560 x 1440 is still a 16:9 aspect ratio and they go up to 34" (maybe 36" if you look around). You can set Windows display scaling to 125% - 150% (right-click your desktop, select Display Settings > Display Scaling).

I found 1440p to be a nice upgrade from 1080p without the heavy hit to the GPU performance that 4k causes. There are A LOT of very reasonably priced monitors in that size.

Yeah, that's what I'm noticing but I'm having a hard time finding any 1440p's. (I literally just did an edit to my OP talking about this.)

EDIT: I should say I'm not finding 1440p's larger than 32 inch either. Still looking though.

Yeah, it really does look like 32 inch is the best I'm going to find even at 1440p. So it's get one smaller, or pay the premium for 4k (which I could run at 1440p or even 1080p since I have always run this 1440p monitor at 1080p and it looked great to me).

Guess I'm downsizing. Not going to pay 8 or 9 hundred bucks for a 4k monitor when my current laptop will not run the games I play at 4K very well.

The best answer would be a nice 40 inch 4k monitor with a brand new speedy computer... but that ain't happening lol.

This ASUS model is looking like the winner just because my current one was ASUS and I did always like the way it looked. If anyone actually looks at this and sees something that might be important that I missed on this one, please post here. I readily admit I have no clue what all of those terms they throw at you mean. But this is what I'm leaning at for now. Not going to actually pull the trigger probably until next week though. (3rd of the month is social security check day yay!)

1080p at that size has horrible PPI. Even 27 inches is already pushing it. 1440p is much better suited for those sizes and is currently the perfect middle ground between the low PPI of 1080p and the terrible performance hog that is 4K.

Also, anything curved at the 30+ sizes is bound to be a VA panel, which are generally not the best for gaming. Though it's extremely likely your current display was also a VA, so you're probably used to it.

You also won't really find anything bigger than 32 inches on today's market without going into the 4K territory. So that narrows it down quite a lot. You basically have these options:
https://pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#X=0,93264&F=800100000,889000000&r=256001440&D=60000,240000&C=1

Yeah, can't quite find FHD above 32", and I'm seeing fewer and worse listings on the US sites than on EU ones, but anyway, can see what should be available at 32" by checking manufacturers:
https://www.usa.philips.com/c-m-so/monitors/latest#filters=SV_MONITORS_CA%2CHOME_MONITORS_SU%2CFK_32INCH_WIDE_MONITORS
https://www.samsung.com/us/computing/monitors/all-monitors/?size=30%22+-+39%22&resolution=1080p
https://www.asus.com/us/displays-desktops/monitors/all-series/filter?Category=31-34-9&Spec=464
https://www.acer.com/us-en/monitors?onlineAvailability=available-on-acer-store,available-from-select-retailers&spec=1920_x_1080,32%22
https://www.lg.com/us/monitors?f-ec_monitor_resolution_picture_quality_spec_4=FHD&nf-ec_size_3=32..37
https://us.msi.com/Monitors/Products (can't see direct filter links there, so select the filters yourself)

On the other hand, keep in mind that 4K is exactly 4x FHD, so it can integer scale down to FHD resolution.

Have you considered a big ass tv with hdmi input instead?
(too late here to properly go through your op so throwing a wildcard).

I've got no specific monitor suggestions, but I will second what idbeholdME said earlier: Avoid VA panels if possible. The pixels change colors more slowly, which can cause trails. I haven't noticed that so much on my current VA panel since I tend to play slower-paced single player games exclusively, but I have noticed the far more narrow viewing angle, which only sucks when I'm trying to watch Youtube while I'm away from my desk.

For years I used a 27" Viewsonic IPS 1440p monitor, and that thing has glorious colors and blacks. It struck the perfect balance for me. But I couldn't find a nice IPS monitor at high enough refresh rate when I wanted to go to a larger 43" monitor a couple years ago, so I settled for my current VA panel. I'm still using my 8-year-old Viewsonic IPS monitor with my bedroom PC, and even after 8 years of daily use, the image quality on that old IPS panel still looks far superior to anything I've ever seen.

One other thing to look for: Try to get a monitor with a matte screen finish rather than glossy, as a glossy screen will reflect too much light and drive you nuts.

The fact that they tossed "AI technology" in there with the other jargon is both annoying and hilarious. Other than that, go for it. You could read through the manual to see if there's anything of concern to you. This is outdated info. My VA panel has a decently fast response time without any noticeable trails, and it's not even as fast as the one discussed above. The viewing angle isn't spectacular, but is fine, especially considering it's 21:9. VA still isn't perfect, but none of the existing display technologies are (maybe µLED will be?). Personally I never saw an IPS panel that didn't have some amount of light bleed, which I can't stand. I'd rather have better blacks and no light bleed over slightly better color.

That would have been my suggestion as well.

I monitored all the advice in the thread. Advice is slow but steady. Chances of more advice are good.

I will keep monitoring and will update you later

You're old. You're not going to see 4k, and your computer probably wouldn't be happy with it. Instead, you should aim for higher refresh rates.

UI scaling in Windows was broken eighteen years ago but maybe it works now. The problem back then was how so many programmes did not account for it at all or just told you to set it to 100% like everybody else.

Different panel types (VA, IPS, TN, OLED etc) can affect readability!

If you don't have one of the latest Samsung VA panels, it will be visible. The simplest of tests - open a terminal and fill it with text. Then slowly drag it to the side. Towards the beginning of the movement, you will see the text flicker and dim until the movement stops. This phenomenon will happen also in games, it's just a lot less obviously visible. But depends on the situation/scene.

My secondary display is a Lenovo 240 Hz VA monitor and it does happen. So you can get a high refresh rate "gaming" VA panel only to still suffer from the innate VA flaw of smearing regardless. It is true that the VA panels (same as every other panel type, including TN) did move ahead compared to 5-10 years ago, but this VA issue still persist on the vast majority of panels. My main TN display doesn't have that issue with the white text dimming against a black background. In the famous UFO test, the difference between the VA and TN gets more noticeable the higher scroll speed you pick.
https://testufo.com/

It's high contrast situations combined with movement that give VA trouble. From games, it will mostly affect FPS games or any that have quick camera movements/scene transitions. They are perfect for consuming content like movies/videos (thus it's my secondary panel), but fast paced gaming is not its forte.