2005FPW vs. 2405FPW - 2005FPW wins.

[koitsu]

I presently own both a Dell 2005FPW (had it for a few months) and a 2405FPW (arrived today). Prior to getting the 2405FPW, I made the decision to get a 2001FP for comparison reasons (and because the widescreen aspect was becoming somewhat of an annoyance in certain games).

Needless to say, the 2001FP went straight back to Dell. Horrible response time, way *WAY* too dark (compare contrasts between all three models; you'll see what I mean...), and had an external AC adapter ("brick" style). So, I opted to get a 2405FPW instead.

I've read numerous reviews and forum posts not only here but on many other sites as well, and all claim the 2405FPW is pretty much "the God of LCDs" right now. There is also a claim that the Samsung panel being used in the monitors runs at 8ms.

I would like to state clearly that the 2405FPW is not what a lot of people think it is; my 2405FPW will be shipped back to Dell later this week.

My issues with the 2405FPW:

1. Colour seems generally "off". Samsung panels (and monitors) have a known history of showing "yellow" or off-white instead of actual paper-white. The 2405FPW is no exception. It doesn't matter how much you tweak it, if you use DVI (what I use) instead of D-sub, yadda yadda. The "white" you expect to see -- and will see on the 2005FPW -- will appear as off-white or possibly even creme-coloured on the 2405FPW. In addition, gray on the 2405FPW looks quite different from that of the 2005FPW. And no, this is not a colour temperature selection problem: I use the OSD's rgb 50,50,50 setting on both monitors (I prefer a generally "cool" look to things, but 50,50,50 seems to be the best general setting for these monitors, as many will agree). Again, no paper-white on the 2405FPW -- instead, you get creme.

2. Sharpness is absolutely *pathetic*. I'm amazed at this fact. For a monitor that costs over a thousand USD, you'd expect it to be quite sharp. My 2005FPW blows it out of the water, especially when placing them next to one another. Fonts look somewhat "blurred" on the 2405FPW (especially bitmap fonts, which are the literal sharpest of all), while on my 2005FPW they look crisp and clean.

3. Response time is guaranteed LOWER than the 2005FPW. Whoever tells you otherwise is full of it. The 2405FPW panel is *NOT* 8ms. There is just no way, not from what I'm seeing. Cross-hatched bitmaps (i.e. pixels alternate white-black-white-black, or gray-black-gray-black, with a black background and a white border around the background) will easily show just how quick rise-falls are. No, they will not show precision for colour-to-colour or colour-to-black, but they will show white-to-black; colour-to-colour no one cares about, as it only matters on panels which are 25ms or higher (you won't notice on anything lower). White-to-black is a completely different story. The 2405FPW looks exactly like a 16ms panel, which is what Dell claims and what Samsung *ORIGINALLY* claimed -- before updating their web site to claim 8ms. So, do not be fooled by Samsung's 8ms claim.

4. Ghosting -- the 2405FPW has plenty of it. I really don't know what these reviewers are talking about with their "we saw no ghosting of any kind" claim. Again, take the cross-hatched bitmap I described above, with the white border, and drag the window around the screen. You'll see ghosting/streaking along the edges, especially when moving horizontally. The 2005FPW has practically NONE (1/16th" black trail); the 2405FPW leaves nice long (1/2") white-to-gray trails as the pattern moves.

On a positive note, however, the 2405FPW's backlighting seems more "equal", and the viewing angle does seem to be much easier on the eyes than the 2005FPW. My 2005FPW has a strange "red sheen" to the panel itself, much like some sort-of anti-reflective film or anti-glare film being put on it. I've run into one other 2005FPW owner who reports the same thing -- everyone else claims we're crazy. The 2405FPW has nothing like this -- you get a nice, evenly distributed lighting with no weird colours when looking at it from an angle.

Either way, to me, the 2405FPW I have sitting on my desk right now looks like garbage. The ghosting and the lack-of decent sharpness are quite disappointing. My eyes actually have to squint to make up for the lack-of sharpness. The best way to describe it would be if you had a CRT that looked razor-sharp running at 75Hz, but looked less sharp at 85Hz (CRT users with good eyes will know what I speak of; not total blur, but a definite degradation in sharpness).

I urge review sites to go back and review the 2405FPW again, with a 2005FPW as a comparison base. These two monitors use completely different panels from two different vendors, and the results are very different.

Summary: the 2405FPW is in no way a 8ms panel. It's 16ms most definitely -- I have a hard time believing 12ms (as I've seen numerous other 16ms panels and they all look like the 2405FPW). If Samsung's 24" panel has been "upgraded" to 8ms, Dell's using the "older" revision of panel, that's for sure...

Comments are appreciated. Pardon me while I go pack up the 2405FPW to send it back...

 

[Matthias99]

2. Sharpness is absolutely *pathetic*. I'm amazed at this fact. For a monitor that costs over a thousand USD, you'd expect it to be quite sharp. My 2005FPW blows it out of the water, especially when placing them next to one another. Fonts look somewhat "blurred" on the 2405FPW (especially bitmap fonts, which are the literal sharpest of all), while on my 2005FPW they look crisp and clean.

You were running it at its native resolution (1920x1200), yes? If you were scaling a non-native res, it could cause exactly the issues you're describing (blurry, poor response time). I haven't used a 2405FPW myself (although, since one of my work monitors is currently dying, I'm hoping I can get one to test out), but this does not sound right at all.

 

[imported_Ged]

Most users have had much better experiences with their DELL 2405fpw.

I'd check to make sure it was running at Native Res.

 

[HN]

I would hope that after writing all that, that the OP would know to run at native res. A dissenting view every once in awhile is always appreciated for research purposes.

given that, I absolutely love my 2405.

 

[JBT]

I've never used a 2005 so I can't comment, but I think my 2405 is absolutely amazing. It also blows away my old 2001FP like nothing.

 

[racolvin]

I have a 2405FPW and my wife has a 2005FPW and she still likes mine better Not sure how your system is set up but when I bring up Visio and bring up a blank page, its so white its almost blinding - like I'm on a ski slope in bright sunlight I play games on mine: EQ2, Guild Wars, Doom 3, Thief 3, and Splinter Cell (all of them) and so far, I've not noticed one single issues with response time or "ghosting" of the sort - they all play flawlessly.

R

 

[darkswordsman17]

There has to be more to the story than this. The OP was doing something weird, as I never had any of those problems with my 2405. It looked as sharp as the 2005 I had, it also didn't ghost, but neither did the 2005.

There are plenty of people, and several who have both a 2405 and 2005, and I haven't heard of any similar opinions. Either you have a bad monitor or something.

 

[JackBurton]

Originally posted by: darkswordsman17
There has to be more to the story than this. The OP was doing something weird, as I never had any of those problems with my 2405. It looked as sharp as the 2005 I had, it also didn't ghost, but neither did the 2005.

There are plenty of people, and several who have both a 2405 and 2005, and I haven't heard of any similar opinions. Either you have a bad monitor or something.

Maybe he works for HP.

 

[Ackmed]

Its subjective.

That being said, I and MANY others prefer the 2405 vs. the 2005. You've had it one day? Bah, hardly enough time to use it enough.

Also, its NOT "ghosting". Ghosting is something different, what you are talking about is "motion blur" for lack of better phrase/word. Ghosting is when you look at an image from the side, and it "ghosts" out of itself.

A thread of mine with lots of pics to compare. The 2405FPW dominates the 2005FPW in size, and everything else as far as I am concerned. Such as no back bleeding as the 2005FPW's all have.

 

[Alexia]

I wish I could afford a Dell 2405FPW. *drools* I already have my 15.4" laptop at 1920x1200.

 

[Rudee]

I think the OP was drunk when he attempted to "review" the LCD's.

 

[ponyo]

Monitors are very subjective. I find 2005fpw too bright and prefer the darker 2001fp. In fact I'm wearing sunglasses right now.

 

[Ackmed]

At night, even.

 

[drewdogg808]

i have the "red sheen" on my 2005fpw and the backlight bleeding is so annoying. when a nice deal on the 2405fpw comes along, i'm dropping the 2005fpw without hesitation.

 

[Pete]

koitsu, what video card? Maybe your card or your cable weren't up to sending a clear signal with that much data.

 

[Chucko]

2405 is the god of decent priced LCDs. I absolutely love mine. It is huge and the picture quality is fantastic. TV via HD Motorola box looks better than the Mitsu in the living room. WOW and CS: Source look great and so does everything else. Why not exchange the monitor , maybe a lemon????

 

[Ackmed]

Also, component>rca. I use component in from my HD box, to my 2405FPW. Something the 2005FPW cannnot do. Then optical audio from my HD box to my Z-5500 pod.

VERY nice watching HDTV on this LCD, even in a small PiP.

 

[Hadsus]

Sounds like there's a possibility that the 2405 was defective. After all, itsa Dell which is not renowned for quality control.

 

[XBoxLPU]

I love my 2005FPW

 

[bunnyfubbles]

Yeah uh, the 2405 would have to be MUCH worse in all of the other aspects to be clearly inferior to the 2005 in my book. The increased resolution is worth it, heck with the 2005 you get less overall workspace than the 2001...

However the price of the 2005 is far more attractive as the 2405 isn't exactly close to be practical.

 

[housecat]

Originally posted by: koitsu
(and because the widescreen aspect was becoming somewhat of an annoyance in certain games).

I stopped reading after this line.

Widescreen is one of the few things keeping me gaming. Besides the return of SLI, the advent of DirectX 9C and HDR raising image quality.. widescreen is in an elite league of technologies that are keeping me interested in computer gaming.

Widescreen gaming is a real jump from what we've been seeing for 20+ years in games. Makes Warcraft and Half Life2 much more enjoyable to see so much more. Fullscreen now looks like tunnel vision to me.

 

[imported_OrSin]

Not be rude, but wide screen game still has alot problems. MMORPG wide screen is great, and most FPS make good use of it. RTS games totally suck in wide screen. MOst don't scale the gaming interface currectly. What you end of having is very wide screen but even less hieight them you ahd before. Remember the 20in wide is about or less the hieght of a 17in. For that reason only I game my GF my 20 in wide and I have just ordered the regular 20 in. I will tell how that looks. I should be getting it today.

It al depends on the games you play and I play mostly RTS.

 

[koitsu]

I'll follow up with appropriate answers:

1. Yes, I'm quite familiar with how to properly set up LCD displays using both d-sub and DVI. Yes, the native resolution was 1920x1200; I am well aware of what LCDs look like in their non-native resolution. And yes, the Dell 2405FPW monitor INF profile was in use. Yes, I tried using d-sub to see if it made a difference -- it did not.

2. I agree with JBT's comment that the 2405FPW blows the 2001FP out of the water. However, I do not agree that the 2405FPW blows the 2005FPW out of the water.

3. It is possible I received a bad monitor, but so far all of the Dell monitors I have seen (three 2001FPs, my 2005FPW, and my 2405FPW) have all had zero defects and have looked "how they should" as far as I know. I am going to request that Dell send me a replacement to see if it looks any different. My guess is that the 24" Samsung panel being used is the cause for most of this.

4. Ackmed, the term "ghosting" I have always understood (from Toms Hardware, Sudhian, and other review sites) to represent if there were literal ghost-like trails when animation occurred -- NOT "a ghost-like effect when viewed from an awkward angle". Angled viewing on the 2405FPW looks fine; the rise-fall times between black and white pixels, however, leave much to be desired.

5. I was not drunk when posting the original article. However, I AM known for being incredibly meticulous/pedantic when it comes to quality control. I prefer to drink my ale far *far* away from a computer -- particularly at the pub. ;-)

6. I agree with Naustica's comment that monitors are quite subjective. It's highly possible the 2405FPW just looks like trash to me because that's how it looks **to me**. However, if you dig deep enough on Google, you can find some folks on forums discussing the fact that the 2405FPW uses a Samsung 24" panel, which is known for being somewhat "sub-par" compared to some others (including their own smaller panels).

7. drewdogg808, my 2005FPW also suffers from the "red sheen" problem (only when viewed from an angle). I've never seen this problem mentioned anywhere -- and other 2005FPW owners look at me like I'm crazy. All I've found mentioned are how sometimes the backlighting hardware is installed improperly, resulting in one corner of the screen being more lit than the other. I've never seen anyone mention the "red sheen" you and I both see on our 2005FPWs. It doesn't bother me, however.

8. Pete, same results with both my Sapphire Radeon X800 XT AGP and my ATI Radeon 9800 Pro. I used the DVI cables that came with the appropriate monitor. As mentioned, I also tried using the d-sub just to see if it made a difference (and it didn't). This is most definitely not a cabling issue -- I know what shoddy cables result in, visually.

9. Ackmed mentioned the component inputs on the 2405FPW. Yes, this is something I was drooling over (I didn't even know it had them prior to purchasing it!). Perfect for high-end DVD players...

10. Hadsus, I'll be contacting Dell and requesting a *replacement* before I request a refund. I want to see if a different monitor they send me exhibits the same problems. If I got a bad unit, then I'll *gladly* retract all of my statements and take the heat. But for something that costs over US$1000, you can see how "testing" numerous monitors is a bit outside of what most people can afford (e.g. buying 2 or 3 of them at once and comparing).

11. housecat, sadly widescreen **windowed** gaming isn't something game developers seem to care about. Sure, that game will run in my native 1920x1200 (or 1680x1050 for the 2005FPW) resolution, FULL SCREEN. If you examine the games' resolutions for windowed modes, you'll find they offer 1360x768 (or something like that), then jump up to 1600x1024 (vertically too big, hides under the taskbar!), and then your native full-screen resolution. WoW, EVE Online, and Guild Wars all offer widescreen options for full-screen folk -- for us windowed folk, we're left shaking our heads, as we want something that's 1500x{whatever the correct Y size should be in 16:10 ratio}. I don't play FPS games, and even I find myself agreeing with OrSin.

I'll follow up to this thread once Dell sends me a replacement.

One positive note about ALL of the Dell monitors I've used, seen, and own -- NONE of them have sported dead or lit pixels of any kind. I'm incredibly impressed by this. Returning the 2001FP I tried out was a snap as well (Dell gave me no lip about the fact that I simply "was not satisified", and paid full return shipping charges as well, ditto with a call tag pick-up. Hard to find that level of service these days...)

 

[darkswordsman17]

Nice dignified response, glad to see you didn't reply in the same tone that some of us did.

Hope it turns out well. I loved my 2405 more than having a 2005 and 2001 in a dual monitor setup. However I couldn't afford to keep it and thus I will be going back to a 2001FP for $600 less.

I absolutely love Dell for their no questions asked return policy that I've dealt with (well they do ask something, but thats if it works for me and if there's anything else they can help me with). I have to say they've won me over with their good quality monitors and helpful return system (although I know I might just be lucky so far judging by other stories I hear). If they'd only adopt AMD and the Athlon 64, they'd win over a quite a bit of enthusiasts (in fact it was the dealbreaker for me, as I was set on buying an Inspiron XPS Gen 2, but realized I'd miss my Athlon 64 too much).

 

[Pete]

I'd be interested to hear how the replacement fares, so please follow up. I didn't thank you for the detail in your original post b/c I thought maybe something was amiss, but it sounds like you know what you're doing.

So, thanks.