LCD for colour work?

[vizx]

You have several options, depending on how much you want to spend and where you stand on the debate between LCD technology vs. CRT for graphics work...I know 2 graphic artists who use apple LCD displays (the 23'' apple cinema display and the 30'' apple cinema display), but THEY know people who don't think the color reproduction, calibration options, and contrast ratios of LCDs are good enough, so they stick with CRTs...

In terms of LCDs, you have apple cinema displays, which are aging but still very decent LCD displays IMO (although the specs probably won't impress you much)...they're S-IPS panels, so the pixel response time is decent for gaming, but accordingly, they're expensive...

NEC and Eizo (their 24'' CE240W is a favorite of some) make expensive LCD monitors that professionals use, and Viewsonic has a pro line in addition to their "budget" offerings...

Hell, I even know of a graphic artist who uses a Dell 3007 (which is the same S-IPS panel being utilized by the Apple 30'' Cinema Display) and an S-PVA Dell 2405! The latter is not a monitor you'd associate with hardcore graphics work IMO...

so, the point is, you DO have options, depending on where your standards are...Apple, Eizo, NEC, Viewsonic and perhaps even Dell...

[vizx]

btw, i forgot to mention sony, as you did in your initial post...the only sony LCD monitor I'm somewhat familiar with is the S-IPS 23'' Premier Pro, and I've seen it used for gaming (paired with a 7800 GT), which yielded very decent results to the naked eye on a variety of games (didn't see any benchmark-type tests or stopwatch applications run on it)...

Eizo, I've read, is known for advanced color calibration options and excellent reproduction...I don't know anyone who owns one, so I'm sorry I can't provide any further information...

[maX_Andrews]

I have an apple 20" cinema in my apartment, and we hyave CRT's and Lacie 321 LCD's at school. The problem with the lacie 321 and the eizo's is that the black is too rich and the finish too shiny. It creates a soft halo wherever there is a light source and I constantly have to move my head around too see properly. It can also mess with the color. I find that the blacks and reds are also a bit too rich and that print will come out a bit less contrasty and more orange than they look on the screen. My apple 20" looks most similar to the prints that come out of the printers, and it is a truly pleasing-to-the-eye screen to work with. I've never gotten eye strain and can stare at this for hours and hours on end. Plenty of brightness and anti-glare coating mean it performs well in a wide-range of lighting conditions.

CRT's are my least favorite thing to work on. They really strain my eyes, they are not as good at rendering text as LCD's, and I find the blacks to be more of a charcoal color than black, and even though we have expensive color calibration tools at school they are always a bit off, usually too green.

Anything from Eizo, apple, or Lacie will work fine, my preference having used all of them for a while is still the apple displays, for being the easiest on the eyes, having the best aspect ratio, and being very flat and stable with regards to color calibration. I'd go with the apple 23" or two apple 20" cinemas if you like dual monitors.

[NealTse]

Thanks! That gives me some direction. The Apple screens are really nice, but way out of my current budget :/. No problem using them with IBM based machines?

I found this on viewsonics pro line, seems like it'll do the trick, seems really good on paper.
VP930B (http://www.viewsonic.com/products/desktopdisplays/lcddisplays/proseries/vp930b/#specs)

[AlexC]

I'm also in the lookout for a new TFT monitor, I just can't stand the heat of this CRT anymore!! and my eyes will love me =)

I've been looking at the Hyundai B19D and the Xerox XA7i - They both have a good contrast ratio( I think both 500:1, and a 300/250 brightness ) and are around £220-250 - Does anyone have one of these monitors or know anything about them? are they any good?

Also I've just been looking at the VP930 which is cheaper than the VP930 B - and that again has a 500:1 contrast ration and 300 brightness. Which shall I go for?

Sorry for using your thread Neal =)

[maX_Andrews]

Neal, the apple displays work with any standard DVI-equipped graphics card, so any modern PC withh be able to use them just fine.
THe viewsonic is fine but it has one HUGE issue, that being resolution and size. First of all it's standard aspect ratio, which means you'll be losing a lot of horizontal space. Because most images are the same aspect ratio, you'll want the extra width of a widescreen monitor in order to leave space for your toolbars. It's also very easy to read a double-spread word document, because you can have two pages side-by-side. The second issue is the resolution. It's only 1280x1024. A 20" widescreen has a resolution of 1680x1050, being much much sharper. The third issue is that it has a 20ms response time, which means you will see ghosting and the dispay will not be good for playing back video. This is because it is a tft-lcd and they tend to be slower than other technologies.
The dell 2005fpw has the same panel as the apple 20" but it's a lot cheaper. The difference is, apple tends to be a bit more selective when choosing their panels to include so the apple lcd's have better color linearity and more even backlights. Although they don't tend to be quite as color accurate as the apple displays, they will most likely work fine for most color matching work, especially if you have a calibration system.
And the best thing? The dell 20" widescreen is only $10 more than the viewsonic professional 19" : http://www.dealshooter.com/views.asp?hw_id=2701

The things I like best about the apple 20" (and dell 20" since it's very similar) displays is that the S-IPS panels are nearly free of the screen-door effect, so blank areas of white and solid areas of color appear smooth rather than pixelated. This is the main thing that bugs me about the Lacie 321 LCD's at school, that the pixels are so easily identifiable and you can see the grid pattern witout trying to.

Alex, those are OK but you'd be much wiser to spend your money on this: http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=278555

It is a 20" monitor and has a resolution of 1680x1050 which is much sharper with a lot more room than the 1280x1024 of that hyundai 19". It's well worth the extra £100 that it costs.

[NealTse]

Alex, how dare we mutually benefit from the same thread, I won't forgive you for this :P

Thanks a lot Max. I was reading the first response time on the viewsonic which I thought was 8ms, but they have a second one too, don't really understand that, but I think I may go with that Dell. Still cheaper then dual 4:3 displays.

Has anyone had any trouble using a widescreen with older apps/games in full screen mode though?

Edit: Impressed you gave different url links as per location :D.

[maX_Andrews]

Yes, manufacturers often list the gray-to-grey response times, which are the response times for the midtones of the display only. This number tests how long it takes the pixel to change from a darker gray to a lighter gray then back to the darker gray. This number is usally around 8ms. But the true response time is the black-white-black response time, which is how long it takes the pixel to go from black all the way up to white and then down to black again, testing the response time for the full dynamic range of the display. Because they pixels have to change to a greater degree, it takes longer. For a display to have no ghosting it needs a black-white-black response time of 16ms or faster. 16ms is fine, as 16ms is less than the length of one frame in a 60hz cycle. (1000ms/60 cycles/second=16.6ms/cycle) But since 20ms is slower than 16ms, that means the pixel can't change fast enough between frames and it will "smear" a bit between them.

Response times for gray-to-gray and B-W-B are not usually linear, that is to say different technolgies behave differently. S-IPS is a very even, flat response, meaning that the crystals change position at a nearly constant speed. Thus the gray-to-gray response is 8ms, and the B-W-B is 16ms. But in tft or PVA panels, the change happens a bit more slowly at the beginning and end than it does in the middle. It starts slow, speeds up, and slows down at the end. The reson for this difference as compared to S-IPS is that the crystals have to turn farther because there are fewer of them and they are larger. S-IPS uses several layers of smaller crystals, so each one does not need to rotate as far to show black or white. Think window blinds with a lot of little blades vs. blinds with a few big blades. The PVA and TFT panels may have a gray-to-gray of 8ms or faster, but usually a B-W-B full response time of between 16-24ms.

Thus ends my long winded response. :)

P.S. thanks for noticing my international linkage skillz ;)

[AlexC]

Alex, how dare we mutually benefit from the same thread, I won't forgive you for this :P

:applause: lol

Alex, those are OK but you'd be much wiser to spend your money on this: http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Prod...roductID=278555 (http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=278555)

It is a 20" monitor and has a resolution of 1680x1050 which is much sharper with a lot more room than the 1280x1024 of that hyundai 19". It's well worth the extra £100 that it costs.

mmm, you are right - I _might_ be able to find £100 some somewhere and get a 20" LCD, the increase in resolution really is worth it. Though I will probably not get widescreen as I do quite a bit of coding, so I need the vertical space more than the horitonzal.

*Goes hunting for new monitor*

Edit: Geee, why are the majority of 20" LCD's widescreen?!

[maX_Andrews]

You can rotate the dell 20" into portrait mode and thus use it as a very long window. In the regular position you can also comfortably fit two documents side-by-side. But yeah it does rotate so that's prety cool.

[AlexC]

Oh that cool! Do you know how long the monitor is? Because i've got a shelve above where my monitor goes with my printer on, so it might not fit when rotated!

[maX_Andrews]

23.6" (60cm) high at full telescope (max height adjustment)
and 20" (51cm) high at minimum telescope (no height adjustment)

So the answer is at least 20" high, up to 23.6" high if you have the room :)

And if it doesn't fit, slide it forward when you need to rotate it into portait mode, do your coding, then rotate it back to normal and slide it back for doing normal stuff.

[sutter_kain]

I have two LCD NEC monitors, AccuSync51v & a MultiSync 1555v.. Since you said that you are working with Photoshop I should warn you about my problem.. When I start Photoshop, I get a warning about a corrupt color profile with my NEC LCD 51v and colors will not match between both monitors. My Adobe Gamma won't load at all when I try to fix this. I get a warning "an exception has occurred ..." when I try to run it. I have tried to go to NEC to find new drivers, color profiles, etc... no luck! I have tried updating video drivers for my ATI 9800 Pro, no luck. This has done this in Photoshop version 7, CS1 & now CS2. Photoshop is the only program that it does this in. AE, Ill, Flash, Fireworks, etc work fine! I never had this problem with CRT..

I just want to encourage you not to buy these models!

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