Best Monitor?

I got a ViewSonic VA2448, $179 at Amazon, seems to have plenty of viewing angle... and it works on my old KVM switch just fine, so XP _and_ 2K machines are happy talking to it... as well as the ThinkPad. Only thing I have to tweak... out of the box it's a wee bit too bright, but the colors are good... and I can get a schematic _and_ Probe up there side-by-side that even my old eyes can enjoy.

No time, I "blue-canned" it :-) ...Jim Thompson

The problem with Radio Shack parts is that, past generic specs, you don't really know what you're getting and you're better off going to Mouser where a proper data sheet is readily available.

In particular, for this application you should look for low ESR, unless you don't mind replacing them again relatively soon.

The backlight inverter runs large ripple currents so high ESR will cause excessive heating and premature failure, which is the original problem.

That was probably a TN panel. You'll be surprised at the difference between TN and IPS, especially in view angle and color rendition. However, for the type of work you do, TN works quite well. For images, TN is not good. All monitors come out of the box with the brightness set too high for an office environment. Most people don't know they can turn the brightness down thus suffer from headaches.

If you don't mind spending $400,

BIG.

I prefer the Panasonic FM series from Digikey to any thing Mouser carries.

BIG.

You mean these?

The nice thing about the upper end NEC displays is they have a field flattening option. They call it "uniformity". Basically the upper end NEC displays are what goes into the LaCie products. Eizo has a similar field flattening feature in their top of the line monitors. Basically these monitors electronically adjust the brightness to compensate for variation in the backlight illumination.

Some of the HP monitors are SPVA.

Note going beyond 1920x1200 usually requires dual link. You need to see if you card and KVM (if used) can do dual link. Personally, at some point, the monitor is simply too big. I wouldn't go past 27 inches.

Note that with windows, too much resolution can be a bad thing. The OS at present isn't really set up for 2560x1400 on a 27 inch display.

The nice thing about the upper end NEC displays is they have a field flattening option. They call it "uniformity". Basically the upper end NEC displays are what goes into the LaCie products. Eizo has a similar field flattening feature in their top of the line monitors. Basically these monitors electronically adjust the brightness to compensate for variation in the backlight illumination.

Some of the HP monitors are SPVA.

Note going beyond 1920x1200 usually requires dual link. You need to see if you card and KVM (if used) can do dual link. Personally, at some point, the monitor is simply too big. I wouldn't go past 27 inches.

Note that with windows, too much resolution can be a bad thing. The OS at present isn't really set up for 2560x1400 on a 27 inch display.

I just bought an LG IPS236V.

I've got a couple of them in front of me right now. Even on deep discount, they weren't all that cheap. Absolutely beautiful display- especially for editing photos etc. Not the kind of harsh narrow-angle display on the cheap-ass 24" 1920 x 1080 units (which I also have a couple of for other applications).

The USB ports are a bit silly, and they run pretty hot, and it would have been nice if they pivoted, but other that that, a great monitor. Oh, and my vintage FX1500 $$$ CAD-certified video card isn't perfect on them (no screen caps, but everything else works okay).

If you don't care about color quality (eg. for CAD work), a 30" 2560 x

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

How so? I have no problems with Win7 on two 2560 x 1600 displays- the computer is a couple of years old now. Lots of two head dual link cards available- quite cheap if a gaming card will do.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

BIG.

They didn't list the FM line when I needed them a while back, and Digikey was out of stock for over six months.

The VA2448 is TFT, I believe. For his use I doubt there would be much difference at all, particularly between a TFT and IPS.

TFT isn't all that bad. I have a cheap-ass ($250 four years ago) 24"

Colour rendition and wide viewing angle are where IPS screens excel.

Anyway the OP asked for "best" and did not specify his criteria. I took it to mean gold plated. If he doesn't do serious photography then it would be a serious waste of good kit.

He might find something helpful at (and reviews):

And some people do find the wider colour gamut hard on the eyes - it was one of things I agonised about for a while before buying one.

That's a bit sad. How do they fail? I guess the new LED backlit ones should be less inlcined to croak.

Regards, Martin Brown

Intermittent strobing bands across the screen- presumably the drivers or connections to them.

Perhaps, if only because they should run a bit cooler.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

Total bullshit. My display operates at 2048 x 1152 native. No such graphics adapter is required and my current adapter is three years old.

The display size has nothing to do with it. It is tied to array size only.

A total retard like you, thinking you have all the answers when you are really absolutely clueless, is a very bad thing.

Display adapters feed rendered array sizes, they do not know a damned thing about the display size that array is inside of.

I currently use a 40" display, and it works on both a new W7 machine and my atom fed XP machine. The array size, however, is standard, and has been fed by vid cards for years.

Essentially, you have failed at making s*it up as you go along... again.

You're a goddamned idiot. It has nothing to do with the OS. It has everything to do with the video card in the system.

Fixed that irritant.. it was actually a Photoshop/Nvidia issue. Had to enable OpenGL rendering under "Edit/Preferences/Performance" and PrtScn/Alt-PrtScn work 100% now.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

I use Greenshot for screen captures. ...Jim Thompson

In Windows 7 a full screen, full resolution capture is a simple keypress.

Not bad- the lightweight editor loads almost instantly.

It would be nice if it supported hotkey (Ctrl+/Ctrl-) or mousewheel zoom, and maybe inserting images such as logos- it might be possible to avoid loading a full-featured image editing program entirely in most cases.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany