Recommend a good quality 20-22in monitor for photography

leinsterman

Hi,

Can anyone recommend a good quality LCD monitor for photo work ?

I don't have space for a CRT ...

Thanks ...

rymus

those dell monitors look nice...

http://accessories.euro.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=ie&l=en&s=dhs&cs=iedhs1&sku=88221

Maybe then get some black mountboard and make a hood for it?

mikeanywhere

rymus wrote:

those dell monitors look nice...

http://accessories.euro.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=ie&l=en&s=dhs&cs=iedhs1&sku=88221

Maybe then get some black mountboard and make a hood for it?

I have the 24" version of that and it works a real treat!!

sionnach

Be very very careful with the monitor you pick. "The 24" version of that" is completely different. Currently there are no 8 bit 22" panels manufactured, they're all 6 bit. The 24" dell is an 8 bit panel.

What's the difference? 8 bit panels display 16.7 million different colours, 6 bit panels can only display 262,144 colours. Monitor manufacturers will claim their six bit panels display 16.7 million colours but they don't, they just try to fool your eyes by blinking between two different to approximate to a colour close to the one it's actually supposed to be.

If you think 6 bit panels are fine, then ignore all this, but if you do want the highest quality for image editing and graphic design, make sure you do a proper investigation of the monitor and make sure it's not a TN film (6 bit, crappy blacks, poor viewing angles) monitor. Most monitors are TN because it's cheap and has faster response times. Ideally you want an S-IPS panel (all apple displays are S-IPS, hence some of the price premium) or an S-PVA, they display true 8 bit colour.

The Dell 2007WFP and 2007FP are both S-IPS panels , true 8bit, 4 port usb hub. They'd be great for photography. They're both 20" panels, the WFP is the widescreen version.

I'm saving up for the dell 24" as it can display 1080p HD natively.

sineadw

That 22" Dell only has 1680 x 1050 Pixels res - that's pretty bad for the size (and the price!).

sionnach

sineadw wrote:

That 22" Dell only has 1680 x 1050 Pixels res - that's pretty bad for the size (and the price!).

That's the resolution of every consumer level 22" tft.

leinsterman

jaysus ... you can go nuts with this stuff ... check this one out -

http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?pid=10897

I guess spending a fortune on L lenses and then doing all your adjustments on a cheapo monitor defeats the purpose a bit ...

... damn this is becoming an expensive hobby !!!

sionnach

Don't forget your second flatscreen beside it to hold all your photoshop tools to leave the big one free to display the photograph on it's own (: I'll have my current 17" in portrait mode beside the 24" once i get it.

sineadw

sionnach wrote:

That's the resolution of every consumer level 22" tft.

Really? Wow.

My brother's 19" laptop goes up to 1900 x something or other. He works heavily with graphics (autocad etc) and you can really see the difference with the higher res.

leinsterman

sionnach wrote:

Don't forget your second flatscreen beside it to hold all your photoshop tools to leave the big one free to display the photograph on it's own (: I'll have my current 17" in portrait mode beside the 24" once i get it.

Yep ... my other screen is a 42" Panasonic TH42PV500 Plasma connected via HDMI (... hey idea for a geek bumper sticker) ... 16Billions colours ... Contrast ratio of over 3000:1 ... lovely!! ... though probably more suited as a video display ...

I have a budget on this occasion of around €500 ...

mathias

These are a good compromise between price and performance , and S-IPS into the bargain ,

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=332061

Oriel

You can't beat Apple on qualiy:
http://store.apple.com/Apple/WebObjects/irlstore.woa/wa/RSLID?mco=5C4F3312&nclm=AppleDisplays

Borderfox

tasty monitors sinecurea

Valentia

I have the Dell 2007 jobbie 20". A grand yoke but way too shggin' small.. The 6 bit stuff is, as far as I know, nonsense. All do the trillion (or is it million) pixel stuff.

Try and get your hands on a Dell 24" at least. Yep Apple are good too, but don't they rip you off, price wise?

To clarify.... 20" flatscreen is very disappointing size wise, though not quality wise.

sionnach

Valentia wrote:

The 6 bit stuff is, as far as I know, nonsense. All do the trillion (or is it million) pixel stuff.

It's not nonsense, it's very real. One minute of googling and research will confirm it. Almost all 6 bit monitors are advertised as displaying 16.7 million colours and with 24bit colour, but the manufacturers are, surprise surprise, just trying to sell monitors and stretching the truth.

Valentia

sionnach wrote:

It's not nonsense, it's very real. One minute of googling and research will confirm it. Almost all 6 bit monitors are advertised as displaying 16.7 million colours and with 24bit colour, but the manufacturers are, surprise surprise, just trying to sell monitors and stretching the truth.

Wow. That is amazing. Apologies.

leinsterman

Hi ... does anyone know if I can connect the VGA output of my PC card (NVida 6600GT) to the DVI on an Apple Cinema 23inch display ?

I know you can connect the DVI on a pc to a VGA display ... but does it work the other was around?

Roen

Will get back to you in the morning. I'll check it out in work.

JMcL

The Dell monitors are apparently susceptible to the panel types being switched depending on what happens to be on Dell's shelf that month, and there's no easy way other than digging deep into a service menu to determine which. This put me off when I went looking at Christmas (and I thought the choice was going to be straightforward!).

I eventually ended up with a HP LP2065, after reading many glowing recommendations of it. It's got a S-IPS panel, calibrates very nicely and is very nice to use. It's a bit pricey, but worth shopping around for (I got mine from PCWB.ie, but this is only good if you're VAT registered, or your boss is very nice!)

leinsterman

JMcL wrote:

The Dell monitors are apparently susceptible to the panel types being switched depending on what happens to be on Dell's shelf that month, and there's no easy way other than digging deep into a service menu to determine which. This put me off when I went looking at Christmas (and I thought the choice was going to be straightforward!).

I eventually ended up with a HP LP2065, after reading many glowing recommendations of it. It's got a S-IPS panel, calibrates very nicely and is very nice to use. It's a bit pricey, but worth shopping around for (I got mine from PCWB.ie, but this is only good if you're VAT registered, or your boss is very nice!)

Can you calrify what you mean ? ... I was rounding on the Dell because the price is quite good and the new firmware seems to sort out previously reported problems ...

magicbastarder

leinsterman wrote:

Can you calrify what you mean ? ... I was rounding on the Dell because the price is quite good and the new firmware seems to sort out previously reported problems ...

dell have a habit of changing suppliers at the drop of a hat.

for example, while HP might maintain the same WLAN card in a specific laptop model for six months or a year, at one point, there were drivers for seventeen different cards when you went looking for WLAN drivers for the latitude D610.

JMcL

leinsterman wrote:

Can you calrify what you mean ? ... I was rounding on the Dell because the price is quite good and the new firmware seems to sort out previously reported problems ...

Things may well have changed since Christmas, but when I was buying, I did a lot or reading on dpreview, photo.net etc (a lot more than I thought I would!). It would appear that late last year Dell changed the panel technology they were using from S-IPS to an S-PVA panel. S-PVA can be good as well, Eizo apparently make use of them in some very well regarded monitors, but S-IPS is generally thought to be superior in terms of colour accuracy at angles.

Anyway, loads of people seemed to be having problems with Dell flat panels around Christmas, so having initially had the intention of buying one, I got scared off. The problems were apparently worse than you would expect from just a switch to an S-PVA panel, so you may well be right in saying the problem's been sorted, or at least improved by firmware updates.

I'd suggest doing a trawl of various forums to see what the current user experiences are. There's also a good website that has a searchable database of panel types used in various monitors, but I can't remember the URL for now, though it's a .dk domain.

leinsterman

Took a chance on the Dell 24 inch at €707 ... too good a price to ignore ... hopefully this firmware issue will not be a problem ... apparently the Samsung equivalent uses the same panel andgets better performance but the price is more too at €1000...

Apparently if it says A01 on the back of the monitor you may have problems ... but this was a good few months ago ...


Thanks for the advice everyone ...

Valentia

As i mentioned on another thread I got the Dell 2007 WFP. It has the S-IPS screen and was a very good price on a special offer. I love it quality wise but you are right to go for the 24" Simon. The 20" is just too shaggin small for portrait formay shots.

My (our ) SSIA money is going on a (not) new car today otherwise a BIG monitor would have been on the agenda.