LCD monitors, Display settings, video cards

Okay, I decided to splurg and get myself an LCD monitor for my computer finally.  I'm going from a regular DELL 17"(?) CRT to an HP 19" LCD.  I've got serveral questions here.

1.) Was this a justifiable purchase for $280?  Like, anything particularly wrong with LCD screen quality-wise compared to the ol' CRT (which I've gotten quite used to.)  Does HP suck when it comes to their LCD monitors?

2.) The recommended screen resolution for this thing is 1280x1024 (I've always used 1024x768.)  My video card (an nVidia Gainward 5950 Ultra)'s max resolution is also 1280x1024.  I'm worried that with this setting, my video card will be pushed to its limits.  Should I be worried about such a thing?

I know these are stupid questions, but I just wanna make sure, guys.

Thanks!

The only downsides to LCDs really are that they have a native resolution, their color representation is not as true as what is found on a CRT, and there's the off-chance you will be stuck with a dead pixel. Can't say I know much about re branded HP displays, but in general LG, Viewsonic, Samsung, and BenQ are all top quality. If you live in the US I could recommend some specific models from NewEgg well below you budget that would probably out-pace any HP offers at that price point.

>>1
1) possibly a good purchase, possibly not.  lcd monitors, especially if they have a poor response rate, will tend to give you blurrier animations than crt monitors.  often not an issue unless used for heavy gaming.  lcd monitors also tend to give you a much more regular image (straight lines are actually straight, dpi is constant) than crt monitors.  often not an issue unless used for graphics editing.

2) don't worry about that.  using recommended screen resolution eliminates the need for scaling.  results in cleaner image and improved performance.  this is a good thing.

>>3
I can understand that.  When I first installed it, my screen was still 1024x768 and thus the quality wasn't that good.  Once I switced the computer over to 1280x1024, the view is actually quite crisp (things like artifacts in jpeg images are way more noticable).  I'm just worried that I'm pushing the video card itself to its limits being that it's on the very highest setting.  Shed some light on that for me?  I don't think I should be worried, but honestly, what do I know?

>>1
http//forums.anandtech./...
plenty of tasty information here about what to look for when buying an lcd.

>>4
unless your system actually slows down significantly while refreshing the display, you're not pushing your video card to it's limits.  the display resolution is a very minor factor compared to how many hi resolution polygons the gpu may be crunching in the latest greatest 3d shooter.

>>6
>>5
Wow, thanks a lot you guys!  That's really all I needed to know!