Help me pick a 24" LCD.

[themisfit610]

Hey folks,

So I've been a CRT guy forever. I've currently got a VERY nice Sony G500 21" Trinitron that I love dearly, but it's almost 10 years old, massive, hot, and power hungry. I also tire of its warm-up, and imperfect picture (one corner stretched out). Still, I love resolution flexibility, and its superb color.

What do I do? A lot of photo editing. Prosumer level stuff, lots of Photoshop, Lightroom etc... I work with RAW images, and do a lot of very fine color correction. I also do video editing with Premiere, so the extra pixels there will be a big draw for me. I plan on getting into professional colorizing at some point, but that's not a major "biggie" for me.

I also watch a lot of video. Obviously most of my stuff right now is SD, but I am transitioning over to HD. Most of my DVDs have been ripped to high quality x264 / AC3 streams in MKV, and I use ffdshow to scale and enhance all my footage in realtime on playback.

One thing that has always irked me with LCDs is the black. I really need good blacks in my display. Seriously. Also, back light bleed drives me freaking crazy.

I also game, but I'm a very casual gamer these days. I find it hard to believe that any LCD these days would have a response time low enough to really frustrate a standard issue gamer.

The lack of resolution flexibility is something I hate about LCDs. I'm very accustomed to playing games at 1280x960, and running my desktop at either that or 1600x1200 for Premiere. I also occasionally go to 1920x1440 for watching HD stuff. Obviously, most 24" panels are 1920x1200 (16x10). That's all good for me, but I HATE scalers.

Let me emphasize that more than anything. I HATE SCALERS. I don't ever want to have my LCD's scaler kick in, unless I'm playing some old 640x480 game like Starcraft.

I have heard that some LCDs have a quarter resolution mode where you can select (for example with a 1920x1200 panel) 960x600, and it will literally double the size of every pixel, so that you don't get the ugly scaler look (but of course be at a much lower resolution).

I guess my only real concern in this area is for gaming. I don't want to be forced into gaming at 1920x1200 (or 1600x1200 with black bars), because this would be unacceptably slow with some games like Oblivion with my current GPU. Yes, I plan to build a whole new Core 2 Duo system with an 8800gts or whatever's hot by the end of the year, but for now I don't want to have craptacular frame rates.

Component input would be nice, in case I ever get an HD cable box, or some other device. HDCP would be ok, not needed.

So yes to sum things up, I want (in order of importance)
* Good blacks, with no bleeding edges
* Excellent color reproduction
* Good contrast
* Quarter resolution (if available)
* Component input
* HDCP (for later when I get a new GPU)

I would like to spend no more than $800, preferably somewhere around $700.

It's a big investment, but I want my transition from tube to panel to really make me happy. I don't want to look at my CRT with green eyes of radiation bombarded envy

LCD Gurus, enlighten me. I am open to your knowledge. I'm prepared join the digital way.

Thanks in advance!!

~MiSfit

 

[mercanucaribe]

You can scale up the 1/4 resolution with the graphics card, but I've never seen a game that supported that res. I don't now if the card would do any interpolating or just double the pixels.

 

[mercanucaribe]

http://www.notebookforums.com/thread197303.html

 

[Azulsky]

Believe it or not, you might actually be okay until that new system comes in, i run a 7800GTX on a 2407 LCD and to be honest until recently i have had to disable almost nothing. You could run the games you have but take off the AA and get the framerates easily playable since the ridiculous increase in pixels make up for alot of the rough edges in the graphics. Games like Half Life 2 i have every thing turned up as hight as possible. If you can keep off of the HDR and AA(greater that 2x i would say on newest games) then you will actually be fine.

 

[manimal]

For photo editing and video editing I still use my G500s. I have some cheaper 20inch lcd panels for my gaming rig that just didnt cut it for final cut and photoshop for me. I took a look at the gateway 24 and the dell and I kinda liked the dell more. I am in no way a lcd guru though I have very good eyes and used to do color correction for TV and man nothing still compares to the 21s I used to use in the Avid and the flame suites I used to work at. Its been a while but those old school crts at really high refresh rates still seem better to me than most of the lcds I see.

 

[Athena]

Originally posted by: themisfit610
So yes to sum things up, I want (in order of importance)
* Good blacks, with no bleeding edges
* Excellent color reproduction
* Good contrast
* Quarter resolution (if available)
* Component input
* HDCP (for later when I get a new GPU)

I would like to spend no more than $800, preferably somewhere around $700.

I'd recommend that you look at the LG LCDs and pick one of those. They really have the best image quality for graphics.

 

[xtknight]

You could pick up the Dell 2407WFP for $670 from Dell: http://accessories.us.dell.com...dhs&cs=19&sku=320-4335
According to LesNumeriques, the Dell has slightly better accuracy before and after calibration. But, the BenQ has been known to have less backlight bleeding and according to others it passes some grayscale tests better than the Dell. So, it sounds like the BenQ may be the best for you.

FP241W vs 2407WFP: http://www.lesnumeriques.com/d...16&p1=1217&ma2=48&ph=5

You can pick up the BenQ FP241W for $670 at Newegg.

Then, grab a colorimeter, or else if you're just kidding yourself when it comes to anything critical. The Eye One Display 2 (from Pantone or Gretag-Macbeth) can be had for <$200 if you look in the right places. http://www.google.com/products...+2&btnG=Search&show=dd

The colorimeter, in my opinion, is crucial no matter what LCD you have. All LCDs suffer from poor factory calibration. It's simply never been as good as CRTs. If you don't get the colorimeter you've basically screwed yourself over when it comes to anything critical, so please take that into consideration and spend the extra $$.

The best 24" for photo editing would be the $1400 NEC S-IPS display: http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16824002168

With the 2407WFP or FP241W and a colorimeter I don't think you'll be that far from an uncalibrated G500. Even if doesn't match the G500 in dynamic range (sheer black level) it should be more than adequate in color accuracy (most dE94<0.40) and contrast (revealing of detail).

Linear scaling is probably going to be even more ugly, so be glad that the BenQ has better.

Also most video playback will not be affected by the colorimeter, only photos and the Windows/OS desktop. My friend recently calibrated his 2407WFP for 120 nits and ended up with a ~0.25 nit black level, about as good as it gets for LCDs. Just don't edit photos with the lights off and you won't notice that it's not pitch black.

 

[themisfit610]

Thanks for your insightful replies! The 24" BenQ looks like the way to go for me..

It's a bit of cash, but I will be able to afford it with the next paycheck

I'm very excited, to say the least.

As far as calibration, if I was doing anything for broadcast, then I would definitely get a colorimeter. I will get one eventually, but for now it's no big deal.

I really love this G500, no matter how old she is... 100Hz (96 actually, for watching 24p material... ok fine 95.504 for 23.976x5) is totally flicker free at 1280x960, and at the price I got it for ($50), I think it's a sin to even consider retiring her...

Alas, more desk space and display real estate are pressing demands.... Maybe I will hold on to the G500 for when I have more room... I think a G500 and the BenQ would make a nice team someday.

Again thanks for the help. If anyone else has insight, please don't hesitate to post.

One last question, How's HP's 24" these days? I have installed a lot of HP 19s at work recently, and have been pleasantly surprised both in build and image quality.

~MiSfit

 

[vhx]

Was the BenQ 1:1 pixel mapping ever fixed? I know it use to have problems, but not sure if they released a new revision or what.

I too was definitely considering buying a Dell 2407WFP but the price went up to $669 and thats the same as the BenQ. I hadn't really heard much on the BenQ before. But if the BenQ uses a better panel than the Dell and also has a HDMI connector then what reason would there be to go with a Dell if they are priced the same?
Dell $669: Text
BenQ $669: Text