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Buying LCD monitor is not as easy as you think it is. Nowadays consumers are given such a wide range of choices that you dont know which one is better than the other. With recent petrol hike, people will usually choose the one that gives free petrol voucher. But remember, you are buying LCD monitor, not filling up gas tank. 17" LCD monitor costs RM500-600, 19" LCD monitor costs RM600-750. 20" LCD minotor costs RM700-900, 22" LCD monitor costs RM850-1200.

So how should you read the specs and be a wise consumer?

First understand what you want, start with native resolution. 17", 19" native resolution is 1280×1024. Some monitors although 19" but promise to upscale to 1600×1200, do not buy into that upscaling bull-shit. if you want 1600×1200 resolution, go for wider monitor. Upscaling will only result in poor quality, blurred and jagged images. Anyway normal user will be satisfied with 1280×1024 nowadays, so dont have to spend the extra for the upscaling feature.

Second understand wide-screen vs regular screen. If you realize, wide screen monitors are now widely sold everywhere but not regular screen. Screen  size is measured in diagonally, therefore for example a 21-inch wide-screen is actually a 19-inch regular-screen, the hold the same number of pixels. So while you thought you are paying RM800 for a 21-inch, it is actually price of a 19-inch regular screen monitor. That is why when you look at a 22-inch wide-screen monitor, it does feel a little bit smaller, dont you feel that? I personally preferred regular screen but wide screen is good for spreadsheet use and watching DVD - as many are in widescreen format. The marketing technique nowadays is to use smaller screen that measured wider in diagonal, and fool the consumers to think they are cheap, it is a good marketing technique!

Third contrast ratio. Contrast ratio is a non standard measurement method, therefore each manufacturer comes up with their own method of measuring it. Contrast ratio is the difference between the darkest black and the brightest white a LCD can produce. The greater the number, the more realistic the picture. For example SAMSUNG markets their LCD panel to be 2000:1, 8000:1, sometimes 20000:1! DELL sells their LCD monitors with contrast ratio of 1000:1 to 2000:1 only. Does that means DELL LCD monitors are bad? Not exactly, actually LCD monitor will not show any advantage if contrast ratio is more than 600:1. The 20000:1, 2000:1 is all marketing gimmicks with non standard fuzzy mathematics to calculate it. Forget the contrast ratio, as long as it is > 600:1, it is good enough. Want better quality? Get a plasma TV, forget about LCD monitor. Btw, do you realize the dark spot when viewing DVD with LCD monitor always look greyish and not so black.

Number 4, brightness. Brightness is measured in candelas/meter square. Rule of thumb, as long as more than 250 cd/m2, it is good enough. Almost all manufacturers set at least 250cd/m2. Some manufacturers will set to 300cd/m2, the image will look brighter and sharper, but life span may decrease while may not be so comfortable to your eye over long time. Anyway, you can always adjust the brightness. Brightness is not something you need to worry about.

Number 5, check the video input. Most of the cheap LCD monitor comes with VGA input which means the video signal is in analog form and needs to be converted to digital form before displaying it, everytime there is a conversion process there will be loss of quality, so try to avoid if possible. Choose LCD monitor with DVI-D input, direct digital display without conversion. Some LCD monitors do come with DVI-D and analog.

Number 6, response time. There are 2 types of measurements, 1 is black-white-black rise-fall time, another is grey-grey change time. The 1st measurement technique is an industrial standard while the 2nd one is yet to be standardized. Poor response time will result in ghosting image, or you will see shadow of the image response that should have happened few seconds ago. Response time normally will show in 8ms, 5ms and 2ms nowadays. 8ms recommended for normal use, 5ms is ok for gaming and video, your eye cant really differentiate between 5ms to 2ms, actually even 8ms to 5ms is hard to differentiate. Most LCD monitors are 8ms nowadays, so another feature you dont have to worry too much.

There is some other additional features that people actually neglect, when they purchase LCD monitor with great contrast ratio, brightness, response time but oppsss…the monitor height cannot be adjusted, so in the end it is less ergonomic. I had seen wonderful 22" LCD monitor selling at 1.5k but no height adjustment, terrible design. So choose those with height adjustment if you plan to work in front of monitor for a long time, if you will not, monitor with only tilt adjustment normally cheaper by RM100~200.

One more thing, some LCD monitors actually comes with USB input, component input, speaker, microphone, webcam. These are the little little extra features you might want to consider when purchasing LCD monitor. Rather than spending big money on contrast ratio, brightness, response time, might as well spend that little extra money on USB input, component input to be a TV, speaker, webcam, it is more practical in the end.

So my LCD monitor of choice, 19"/20" regular screen monitor with height+tilt adjustment, DVI-D input, USB-input plus soundbar(speaker+microphone) and webcam. More parctical, while I will not worry about brightness, contrast ratio and response time too much as those are well taken care of nowadays. You can get this with the price of 1k for 20" from DELL store. But that just me…enjoy!

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 12th, 2008 at 2:14 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.