Always unplug the monitor and take it out to an area with plenty of ventilation for dusting. You’ll surely see lots of vents all over so blow air within them, expect a huge cloud of dust if this is the first time you’ve done this in a couple of years. Repeat as necessary or when you see no more dust particles flying around as you blow into the casing.

Regular cleaning will ensure that components stay cool and heat-sinks do the same, allowing proper operation for may years to come(till the LCD screen dries up that is).

Too much pressure and you get scratches or worse, a fractured LCD module that would mean an expensive replacement. Some manufacturers recommend dry cleaning only, with expensive micro-filer cloths and some recommend cleaning kits that come with solutions that clean and leave them static free. Best advise is to keep fingers away from them to avoid dust, dirt and even grease from hands that leaves them dirty in the first place. Use light even pressure and a lint free cloth would help a lot.

The entry of LED monitors may also be a reason why LCD’s are getting cheaper for beginning with the consumer television market, the same technology goes into monitors. They are comparable in price to CRT’s a few years back and their reliability become next to none in the computing industry. Maybe computer user’s have also taken up the cause of using less power letting LCD’s rule.

LCD monitors also have one significant advantage over CRT monitors, they emit less heat compared to CRTs. This makes it possible to put up a multi-monitor setup in your home office or office without worrying that the accumulated heat will make it uncomfortable in your work area. Of course, the significantly reduced size of LCD monitors makes it easier to set up multiple monitors on a desk.

Some gamers still prefer CRT monitors for the following reasons:

• they cost much less, freeing up money to buy more memory or a high-end video card for the system
• graphics are still usually brighter and deeper on CRTs than on LCD monitors
• the lifespan of a quality CRT monitor is usually decades, so it is a good investment
• if a PC is only used for gaming, space on the desk is not an issue; it is easy nowadays to buy second hand CRT monitors in excellent condition for a very cheap price, since other people who use their computers for work or studying want to switch to LCDs to save space on their desks

However, if space or the heat generated by the monitor is an issue, the CRT obviously loses out to the flat and thin LCD.

The LCD displays are marketed by its actual screen dimensions. The measurement of the displayable area of the screen is from the lower corner to the opposite upper corner of the display. LCD screens can display only a single given resolution which is referred to as the native resolution and this is the physical number of horizontal and vertical pixels that make up the LCD matrix of the display. Setting a computer display to a resolution lower than this resolution will result in fuzzy images.

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