A The answer really depends on how badly you want a larger screen. If you're doing ordinary office work ù writing letters, running spreadsheets, crunching a little data ù you can definitely find a flat-panel display to meet your needs. But there are a couple of strong reasons to wait before you buy.

The first of these is price. Thanks to high demand and low production capacity, an 18in flat-panel display today could set you back over $7000. For that princely sum, you could buy a great 19in monitor, a big new desk to put it on, and a couple of days on a tropical beach to avoid going near either one. But that situation should change. As you read this, suppliers are building more factories in Asia to handle the rising demand; when they start manufacturing in volume, you can bet prices will fall substantially. But that state of affairs is still six months to a year away.

The second big reason to wait is, as you suggest, the unfinished state of the technology. Flat-panel displays are inherently digital, but they can be modified to accept the analog signal traditional CRT monitors use. Flat-panel displays that accept an analog signal can plug directly into your existing graphics card. Fully digital displays, on the other hand, require a new graphics card capable of transmitting a digital signal. Both types have drawbacks.

Timing difficulties with the analog-to-digital conversion cause some analog displays to distort images. You may be able to correct this aberration by tweaking the display's on-board settings. But before you buy, make sure you can return the unit if it doesn't work well with your system.

The alternative is to buy a display that accepts a digital signal. Of course, you'll need a new graphics card that outputs a digital signal, and current card selection is limited. As a result, high-end gamers and graphics professionals may not find a card that delivers the performance they need. In addition, no standard connector type yet exists, though the three most common technologies ù DFP, DVI, and PND ù should converge within a year. And finally, not every graphics card works well with every display. So if you do decide to buy a graphics card in the near term, make sure you choose one that the display's manufacturer recommends.