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Through the Looking Glass -- 8 Widescreen Monitors Reviewed

Michael Brown — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 09:30:00 -0600

Trying to choose an LCD monitor from the ever-growing, ever-affordable selection available can be maddening. Our reviews of eight new panels help make sense of it all

Imagine a Wonderland where the most powerful components in existence are free for the asking. You’d have the speediest CPU on the market; two or three of the newest, most outrageous videocards; the fastest, most capacious drive available; as much top-drawer memory as your operating system of choice could address; and, of course, multiple 30-inch flat-panel displays.

Now, grow up and face life, Alice. The state of the economy is no fantasy, so you’ll probably need to make more realistic component choices. The good news on the display front is that manufacturers haven’t been sitting on their mushrooms smoking hookahs; they’ve been innovating and driving down costs to the point where 23- and 24-inch widescreen LCDs are the new sweet spot.

Before you set out on your next monitor-shopping adventure, however, make sure you have a firm understanding of the most important specifications, features, and quality and performance criteria, lest you fall prey to the industry’s Jabberwocky. Rest assured, we’ll guide you through the thicket. We’ve also dug up a number of specifications that manufacturers have taken to omitting from their published data sheets.

Even the most thorough checklist can’t reveal how a monitor will perform in the real world, so we gathered eight of the top manufacturer’s latest models and put them through a benchmark wringer. Our test bed consisted of an Intel Core 2 Duo E8600 running at 3.33GHz, an Asus P5Q3 Deluxe motherboard, and an Nvidia GeForce GTX 285 videocard. We relied on DisplayMate Multimedia with Test Photos Edition (www.displaymate.com) for diagnostic testing and analysis. And since we use our monitors for entertainment as much as anything else, we also used Fallout 3 to test gaming performance and the Blu-ray edition of Watchmen for movie performance.

Let’s head down the rabbit hole.

Spec Speak

It pays to understand the features manufacturers tout as well as the ones most don't disclose in their spec charts

Backlight

All LCD monitors require a source of illumination, with cold-cathode fluorescent lamps (CCFL) being the most common (every display in this roundup uses one). White LED backlights are one alternative solution, found most commonly in mobile displays. Some high-end displays use RGB LEDs, which enable them to deliver a wider color gamut. CCFL and both types of LED backlights have drawbacks: CCFL backlights deliver a narrower color gamut, while LEDs can age at different rates, causing color and white-point shifts over time.

Color Depth

Color depth indicates the number of bits the panel uses to represent the color of one pixel. A display that uses eight bits each for the red, green, and blue channels (28) can produce 256 shades of each color for a total of 16,777,216 colors (256x256x256). Most LCD monitors based on twisted nematic (TN) technology, however, cannot transition eight bits per pixel quickly enough to compensate for fast motion, resulting in unacceptable blurring and smearing while displaying movies and games. To get around this problem, mass-market LCD panels use six bits per pixel (26) to represent the RGB color space. Since this reduces the total number of displayable colors to just 262,144 (64x64x64), many panels use frame-rate control (a dithering method) to have each pixel display a slightly different shade with each successive screen refresh. Frame-rate control can enable a six-bit panel to simulate 16,194,277 colors.

Color Gamut

Color gamut describes a subset of a defined color space that a display is capable of producing. For the purposes of this comparison, we asked each manufacturer to report its display’s color gamut as a percentage of the NTSC color space. Most of the manufacturers claimed their displays delivered 72 percent of the NTSC color space.

The triangle in the center of this chromacity diagram represents the NTSC color gamut, used to measure the color output of LCDs.

Contrast Ratio

Contrast ratio is supposed to measure the relative magnitude between the brightest (white) and darkest (black) colors the display can produce. Unfortunately, the manufacturers’ propensity for using different methodologies and unstated variables in their measurements has effectively rendered this specification meaningless. The industry has further muddied the waters by introducing entirely new variations of this measurement, such as dynamic contrast ratio. We recommend you ignore this spec when comparing LCD monitors.

Inputs

Nearly all the monitors in this roundup support the two most common digital video interfaces, DVI and HDMI (with HDCP copy protection, so you can watch Blu-ray movies at full resolution using either one). None of them, however, use the DisplayPort digital interface. In terms of analog display interfaces, every monitor has an old-school VGA port, but the Samsung P2370HD is the only monitor to also feature composite and component video inputs (useful for connecting such analog sources as VCRs and older set-top boxes and DVD players). None has an S-Video input.

Panel Type

Virtually every consumer LCD monitor uses thin-film transistor (TFT) technology these days, but it’s important to consider the subsets of that classification. Twisted nematic (TN) is the most common because it’s the easiest and least expensive to produce (all the displays in this roundup are TN panels). TN panels boast very fast response times, but are typically limited to six-bit color depth. The next two most common subsets are super in-plane switching (S-IPS, developed by Hitachi, although LG also uses it) and super patterned vertical alignment (S-PVA, jointly developed by Samsung and Sony). Both S-IPS and S-IPA panels support eight-bit color, but have much slower response times than TN panels.

Response Time

Response time measures how long it takes an LCD monitor’s pixels to transition from one state to another and is measured in milliseconds. A monitor with a low response time will display fewer motion artifacts with movies and games. In order to make apples-to-apples comparisons, we asked each manufacturer to report its display’s gray-to-gray response time, because that is the most common real-world transition.

Stand Functions

The LCD monitor manufacturers in this roundup have all but abandoned ergonomic considerations. Each display in this roundup has a stand that tilts, but only three of the eight swivel left to right and only two offer a height adjustment. NEC’s EA241WM is the only monitor we reviewed that pivots to enable you to switch between landscape and portrait modes.

Calibrating Your Monitor

Even the best screens can use a little help in achieving peak performance

Calibrating your monitor will make certain your photographic prints match what you see on your display. It will also ensure that the games you play and the movies you watch will look as their creators intended. The most foolproof means of calibrating your monitor is to use a colorimeter, an instrument you attach to the front of the display and control with related software running on the host PC. The software sends various colors, shades of gray, and brightness levels, to the display, and the sensor analyzes and evaluates them. These devices used to be quite costly, but we’ve achieved terrific results with Pantone’s inexpensive HueyPro. This colorimeter/software combo is currently street-priced at less than $100.

Free Alternatives

If only a free solution will do, there are several excellent options. Tom Niemann, of ePaperPress.com, has produced an online application that can step you through the monitor-calibration process by making adjustments to your display’s brightness and contrast settings. He’s also developed a tool for determining your monitor’s gamma setting. Niemann has also developed a free tool for calibrating your printer. You can find his tools at http://epaperpress.com/monitorcal/index.html.

Torben Rasmussen, of Flatpanelshd.com, has developed a larger collection of test images for evaluating backlight contamination, defective pixels, color uniformity, banding problems, text reproduction, and lots more. You’ll find his online monitor tests, including a downloadable executable version, at http://tft.vanity.dk.

Calibration Preparations

Whether you calibrate your monitor using a hardware colorimeter or one of the free alternatives we’ve described above, it is essential that you first prepare your display and your work area to achieve the best results.

1. Set the monitor to its native resolution, and make sure your videocard is operating in either 24- or 32-bit mode.

2. Clean your monitor thoroughly. If the manufacturer doesn’t provide cleaning instructions, try this: Turn it off and let it cool. Remove any surface dust and loose contaminants with a can of compressed air, and then wipe the surface with a soft, clean cloth. Now, mix a little isopropyl alcohol with tap water (the alcohol will help dissolve grease and fingerprints), sprinkle a little onto the cloth, and wipe the screen. Never spray liquids directly onto the display.

3. Turn the display back on and let it warm up for 15 to 30 minutes, but turn off any screensaver or energy-management utilities you might be running, so that the calibration process won’t be interrupted.

4. Remove any color profiles you might have previously created for the display. In Vista, right-click on the desktop, select Personalize, choose Display Settings, and then Advanced Settings. Click the Color Management tab and then the Color Management button, select any color profile listed, and click Remove. Restart the computer.

Flatpanelshd.com has a very useful online collection of test images for calibrating and measuring the performance of your display for free.

5. Set up your ambient lighting so that it’s consistent with the environment you typically work in. Make sure the display is not reflecting light from a window or other strong source of illumination. Close any drapes or angle the monitor to eliminate reflections.

Move any brightly patterned, shiny, or colorful objects off your work surface, or at least out of your direct line of sight, so they won’t compete with the display for your attention.

6. Launch your calibration tool of choice and follow its instructions.

7. Primarily interested in calibrating your display so that the colors in your digital photos match those you print out? Here’s one quick-and-dirty solution: Find a photo you really like, print it out as an 8x10, and place it next to your display. Tweak your monitor’s brightness, contrast, and color values until the image on your screen looks as close to the print as you can make it.

Winging it this way won’t produce results as accurate as you’d achieve with a colorimeter, but it’s certainly better than nothing. You should also be aware that your monitor’s performance will change over time and decline as it ages, so you can’t just set it and forget it. A good rule of thumb is to recalibrate your display once each month.

Next, on to the reviews!

The Reviews

Acer H235H

Asus VH242HL-P

Gateway FHX2300

LG W2353V-PF

NEC MultiSync EA241WM

Samsung P2370HD

ViewSonic VX2433

HP 2709m

LG Predicts OLED Panels Will Cost Less than LCD by 2016

Paul Lilly — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 12:45:57 -0500

During the FPD show in Japan, LG laid out its future plans for OLED displays with a roadmap that extends into 2016. And according to Wom Kim, LG's sales and marketing VP, that's the year OLED panels will cost less than LCD displays, providing it can leap over a handful of technological hurdles.

"We will be able to use a lwo-temperature polycrystal silicon with the sixth-generation size glass substrate," Kim said. "However, for 40-inch and larger panels, we have to use the eight-generation size glass substrate.Therefore, we have to develop equipment that can deal with an SPC process at a temperature of more than 700C."

Despite the challenges facing low-cost OLED displays, Kim believes his company will be able to transition from 50 percent higher material costs and 30 percent lower yields compared to LCDs in 2012, to a 20-30 percent lower material cost and equivalent yield in 2016.

Up until then, don't look for too many deals when it comes to OLED.

"Forty-inch and larger OLED panels will be fairly expensive in 2012, but they will be available in the market," Kim added.

Image Credit: LG via Engadget

Meet the World's Thinnest Display

Paul Lilly — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 14:00:12 -0500

There's slender, and then there's Samsung's disgustingly thin 40-inch LED TV panel measuring just 3.9mm thick, or a third the size of the company's previous panel. We say "disgusting" only because some of us are still bitter over dropping a couple grand on a bulky rear-projection earlier in the decade.

The super-slim backlit LED display boasts a 120Hz refresh rate, full HD resolution support, and a 5000:1 contrast ratio. It's also the world's thinnest LCD panel, measuring 7mm slimmer than Samsung's full production LED TV panel and about 45mm thinner than conventional LCD displays. Prior to today, LG held the title with its 5.9mm LED TV.

So when and where can you buy one? Good question - Samsung hasn't released the 3.9mm panel yet, but according to Akihabaranews.com, the company hopes to do so very soon.

Image Credit: akihabaranews.com

AT&T Accuses LCD Makers of Price Fixing, Sues Samsung and Others

Paul Lilly — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 20:13:17 -0500

AT&T has a bone to pick with several big-name LCD makers, and it will do it in court. The telco has sued a number of display manufacturers over allegedly fixing the price of more than 300 million mobile LCD screens.

Those on the receiving end of the lawsuit include Samsung, LG Display, Optronics, Sharp, and Chungwa. According to the lawsuit, the display makers "formed an international cartel illegally to restrict competition in the United States in the market for LCD panels."

AT&T called the whole situation a "conspiracy," accusing the defendants of agreeing to eliminate competition and fix LCD panel prices that they knew would be incorporated in LCD products and sold in the U.S.

This isn't the first price fixing scandal to hit the LCD industry, nor is it the first time LG, Chunghwa, and Sharp have been tied to price fixing allegations. All three agreed to plead guilty to similar charges in November 2008 and to pay $585 million in criminal fines.

Image Credit: Gizmodo

HP Nonchalantly Announces Compaq L2105tm Multitouch Monitor, First Windows 7 Certified Display

:Paul Lilly — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 08:24:21 -0500

Almost as a side note, HP today announced its new Compaq L2105tm touchscreen monitor, dedicating just a few lines to promoting the display in a press release which covered several items.

The 21.5-inch, 1080p display sports a multitouch panel with one finger scrolling and two finger mousing capabilities.. But if you prefer to roll with a stylus, you'll find one jammed conveniently into the side of the monitor. You can even use a gloved finger, says DisplayBlog.com, who points out that the two cameras, infrared light, sensor, and reflective film create a rugged light field capable of detecting just about any type of object.

There was a little bit of marketing glitz on HP's part. According to the OEM, this is the world's first Windows 7 certified monitor, which you means you can plug it in groove to your newly acquired copy of the just-released OS.

HP says the L2105tm is available now for $299.

Blu-Ray on TV by Way of Laptop

The Maximum PC Staff — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 13:45:47 -0500

I have a Gateway P-7811FX gaming laptop. I was looking at getting a 37-inch 1080p LCD TV to hook up through the HDMI port to extend the monitor/play games/watch movies on. I found an external Blu-ray disc drive that hooks up through the USB port on the laptop. Will this setup give me good quality video to watch on the large TV? If not, any other suggestions?

—Peter DiGiorgio

Peter, as long as your laptop and LCD are HDCP-compliant, you should be fine. The P-7811FX comes with an Nvidia GeForce 9800M GTS GPU. Nvidia’s product page for that GPU touts its Blu-ray performance, and it should be able to output 1080p video via your laptop’s HDMI port. You should double-check, of course, but the Doctor doesn’t see anything wrong with it, in theory.

SUBMIT YOUR QUESTION Are flames shooting out of the back of your rig? First, grab a fire extinguisher and douse the flames. Once the pyrotechnic display has fizzled, email the doctor at doctor@maximumpc.com for advice on how to solve your technological woes.

Seeing Double: Samsung DualView Digicam Comes with Two LCDs

Paul Lilly — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 21:03:13 -0500

Samsung this week announced two new point-and-shoot digital cameras -- the TL225 and TL220 -- both of which sport two LCD screens, a 3.5-inch one on the back (slightly smaller on the TL220) and a less traditional placement on the front with a 2.5-inch display. So what's the point of a front-mounted LCD?

"With one LCD located on the front of the camera and other one on the back of the camera, photographers can now step out from behind the camera and join their subjects in the photo," Samsung wrote in a blog post.

Samsung also says the front-mounted display will come in handy for taking profile pics for social networking sites. We think it's the perfect feature who can't stop looking at themselves.

Both cameras also boast a 12.2MP, 1/2.33-inch CCD sensor, 27- to 124.2mm, f/3.5-5.9 8.6x zoom lens, and the ability to shoot 720p HD videos at 30fps.

The TL225 and TL220 will be available in September for $350 and $300 respectively.

Image Credit: Samsung via ZDNet

Netflix to Invade Sony Bravia TVs

Paul Lilly — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 19:45:22 -0500

Pretty soon, even your toaster will come with Netflix streaming built in. In the meantime, Netflix's newest target is Sony's line of online-enabled Bravia LCD televisions.

Enabled via a software update expected to launch this fall, those with compatible Bravia sets will gain access to the same growing catalog of movies and television shows that are available on an also growing list of Netflix-streaming devices, including the Xbox 360 console, Roku player, some TiVo sets, and a few Samsung and LG Blu-ray players.

Supported Sony TV sets so far include the XBR9 series, Z5100 series, and the W5100 series, while other Sony sets can add support via a $200 Bravia Internet Video Link. In addition to Netflix streaming, Bravia Internet Video-enabled devices also support content from Amazon's Video-On-Demand, YouTube, CBS, and others.