Graphic designers LCDs death and decay!

Kosmo

I have been looking reviews and opinions about LCD monitors for graphic design, and apart from LaCie and Eizo, there isn't much there. Since my hectic freelancer times start to be behind me, I'm looking a screen to use for my own needs, that is photoshop/painter work and 3d modelling. I'm not going to use the screen for color correction or anything like that, since I would leave it to professionals anyway. So are the reviews way off or are LCDs just so "crappy" compared to CRTs? I was earlier looking for the 20" Dell widescreen, but then I thought that it might not be suitable for Wacom table use because it is widescreen, so I'm thinking of picking up some 19" monitor that has speed and good colors, but it doesn't have to be pro quality. Any recommendations?

3stripe

I've got a nice 20" Formac flatscreen at work... they're about £450 but you can get similar models much cheaper over at www.dabs.com If they're good enough for a graphic design agency I'm sure they'd tick all of Bitey's boxes as well ;-) (Formac's Gallery Platinum 2010 to be precise I think)

Kosmo

It's coming for PC and I'm going to get my game on on it, is it suitable for that?

3stripe

http://hardware.gamespot.com/Story-ST-8999-x-16-17-x

JoshuaJenkins

There's a nice new intuos "widescreen" tablet to go along with the widescreen monitor goodness if you decide to get one, so don't let that stop you.

sprockett

DELL. hands down most value for money. get a 20inch for about 400 bucks, or 24 for about 800, and 30inch for about 2k. My dream is dual 20 inch monitors (each is 1680x1050). The 24 inch is 1920x1200. Despite dell being not a very cool brand, its relaly value for money. I jsut got a 1920x1200 laptop from them. AMAZING. at less than 1/2 the price of a similarly specced MAC. And did i mention it has a geforce 7800 gfx too? AWESOME for gaming.

Bergamot

Bad things about LCDs:

1. Response times, though getting lower every year, still can't match a CRT. To be honest, I can't really tell
2. Contrast ratios are lower. LCD manufacturers compensate by sticking a really bright backlight behind the screen, which does make the screen look bright and vibrant, but washes out dark colors and blacks
3. The pixels are extremely "sharp", so some dithering effects that look great on a CRT look like total crap on an LCD,
4. OMG DEAD PIXELS

Then again, I find most CRTs to be too blurry, so that's really the deal-breaker.

My wacom tablet (admittedly a few years old) had a lot of settings for mapping weird size screens to the tablet space.

Minisweeper

I dont have a great deal to say that some people havent already (imo nearly all tft's i've ever come across are fine but i've never used them for anything very hardcore so i'm a fairly easy customer), but i will just drop in that if you do end up thinking about 19" take your thoughts very seriously. VERY few 19" have a higher native res than a 17" (both at 1280x1024) and theyre generally more expensive, and with higher response times/whatnot. What the point of getting a bigger screen when you only fit the same amount of stuff on it is i'm not entirely sure. Anyone shed some light on this one?

lech

Kosmo, why not just save up for an apple cinema display? they work with pc's and for color correction and even games, I'm told they're pretty good from what I'm told. The only bitch about them is the price, but they beat just about any other lcd out there.

Bergamot

What the point of getting a bigger screen when you only fit the same amount of stuff on it is i'm not entirely sure. Anyone shed some light on this one?

I can think of three uses:

1. If you have bad eyesight, it may be easier to read text at the lower DPI
2. If you use it to watch movies, extra screen space = good.
3. If you use it for gaming, you get a bigger screen without any extra GPU load.

Kosmo

Worst thing to me is that I have a color calibrated CRT at home, but it is so fucking big, the 19" monitor takes like half my appartment. My intention was to get a monitor for my PC, and then get like a Mac with the sweetest monitor for my graphics, and use my PC like my everyday machine. But yeah, the cost, I often forget that things cost money.. sarcasm aside, I'm going to buy a 19" ViewSonic VP930b because I like the looks and I have heard fairly good things about it (and for what it's worth, ViewSonic sells them as "professional monitors") and one day, if, IF I still need a graphics station with awesome power and display that blows a load, I'll get that Mac.

lech

I've dealt with ViewSonics in the past, and I have grown to hate them. However, that was the CRT's only. They tend to go fuzzy over the course of only a 2 year period which is rediculous :/

sprockett

Best deal is still the dell 20 incher... 1680x1050. Otherwise u can get dual 17inchers. Thats what i have. Love it. my current most affordable "dream" is dual dell 20 inchers, flipped vertically.... That would be set me back about 800 or so bucks.

Kosmo

I WOULD buy the 20" Dell 2001FP but what I hear, they suck at graphic design and gaming, and guess what my PC is geared towards ;) Problem with LCDs is that even the best monitors in the market are tergeted towards either one of those high end users, graphic designers and gamers, not both at the same time. So I must try to get something in between that satisfies me.

Bergamot

I don't even know what it means for an LCD to "suck at graphic design".

Kosmo

I don't even know what it means for an LCD to "suck at graphic design".

I think most people consider their washed colors and poor black depth to be something they can't overcome.

I don't really care since I do digital media for digital environment, what I sees, I gets.

Minisweeper

I've also heard a lot of issues with lag on the high end dell monitors. Not sure if it applies to all of them though.

Kosmo

16ms latency in the Dell 2001FP sounds like a problematic latency on video playback and gaming.

lech

So far, the lowest refresh rate i've seen is a 5ms refresh, that's not TOO bad considering the state lcd's are currently at. Once we get sub-1ms refresh, then I think I'll consider moving to LCD. I would recommend steering away from any ViewSonic CRT's as the ones I've had have all gone fuzzy after a short while, and that's not great.

Minisweeper

it's not so much the latency, kosmo, more just that apparently theres a wierd lag going on. I dont know the intricacies of it but there are various posts around the net concerning the issue. When was the last time you counted to 5ms, lech? :P

Kosmo

Well, Lech there isn't a worry about ViewSonic on the LCD front, the earlier version of the VP930 that I'm getting is the VP191, and it was the editors choise on several different magazines and websites and Tom's Hardware even went as far to say that it is "the best" 19" LCD monitor there is. But one thing I don't get is that how people can complain about 8ms and 6ms displays since human eye can only see 25frames per seacond, you can't possibly see the image changing. Only effect is that you get headache and eye strain and that only comes from really really slow latency like sub 20ms class.