My 27 in Hanns-G recently hit the grave and now I need a new monitor to play Skyrim on.

A couple of questions first.

One of the things I really enjoyed about my 27 in was that I felt like it took up all of my vision. This helped immerse me deeper into games. Do you feel like a 23-24 in monitor is large enough to give me this same feeling?

Is LED backlight worth the couple of extra bucks?

I was looking at http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824236174, but am now wondering if I should go with a samsung or viewsonic. Any suggestions?

23-24" is the size a monitor should be for 1920x1080. If you want it to take up more of your vision, sit closer.

Also, LED backlighting isn't inherently any better or worse than CCFL.

I am using 3 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824236079. Very nice monitors. Well worth the price. 23" is a very good size for a PC monitor.

"Edge-lit" LED backlights aren't inherently better than CCFL backlights except that they use a lot less electricity, have a longer lifespan, and allow for the monitor to be thinner. "Local dimming" LED backlights produce a superior contrast ratio to CCFL backlights, but tend to be on the expensive side.

Which is irrelevant since any monitor he's going to look at is going to be edge-lit.

If you somehow manage to get an extra $100, I use http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824009302 as my primary monitor, and I love it. The speakers aren't the best, though I use a headset and am mostly unaffected by it, and the default settings are VERY bright, but you can just dim it, obviously. I love it, at least. ^_^

Edit: Derp, after re-reading the OP, you're looking for a 23-or-so inch monitor, not a 27'. My bad. :blush:

ASUS ML239H 23" monitor, it's an IPS panel and was recommended to my by some guys on this forum. It's been good to me so far, cheap and still amazing colors.

Do IPS panels have better colors when looking straight on, or just better colors when viewing at angles?

And what's all this talk I've seen lately about response time? When I bought my monitor in 08, the rule of thumb was 8 ms or less is good. Now I'm seeing people saying they are seeing ghosting and having issues in FPS games with 5ms? Did something change?

IPS panels have better colors period...it's rather noticeable.

Everyone is going to have a say on whether they see ghosting or not. It all depends on the eyes of the users. I personally don't see much ghosting at all on most 5ms screens these days, let alone panels that are 2ms. Depends on the panel quality and the accuracy of that response time measurement.... there are still vendors that report bogus response times based on the lowest denominator. For example, you may see specs rated at 2ms (GTG, or gray-to-gray), which is one color transition. However, the other color transitions could be way up in the teens like 16ms for black-to-white...this can surely lead to ghosting for many. Lots of research and user reviews can go along way in getting the right panel.

Excellent site to get yourself caught up with LCD/LED technology:
http://tftcentral.co.uk/