Apple iMac or Pro PC Monitor

BlastedGlute

I'm going to do my PP a big favor and get a new monitor. It was in the form of a 27" iMac, but right now I'm a PC user, always have been. I'm wondering if I would be better off spending the same amount but on a professional monitor, something from NEC or Dell like the ultrasharp series.

Main reason for the upgrade is to get much more accurate prints and over all colour monitoring when working on images and stuff.

Any advice?

Cheers

My monitor cost me, I think, €170 about two years ago (came with the PC). Made by some crowd called "Hanns-G".

Whenever I edit photos on it, when I get them printed, they always look identical (prints from Harvey Norman, local Kodak Express store and Photobox among others). Through this experience, I've decided that spending a fortune on some Dell overpriced monitor wouldn't be a great judgement call.

This probably doesn't help you if you if you're looking at particular monitors already, but I'm just saying it as it may be worth your while taking a look at some cheapo monitors out there, too. You don't need to spend a fortune to get a decent monitor (unless there's some specific settings/features you want that may push the price). I recommend Amazon reviews.


Anyway, just thought I'd throw that thought out there to you.

BlastedGlute

Cheers for the advice KKV. Right now I use a painfully low end LG 2361V, which is awesome for gaming, but not so hot for sRGB accuracy on a printable level. I wont be printing the images myself either.

Most of my stuff will be sent off to a publisher who will most likely let their team hack it and jack the levels and such(again....). So I want the most accurate representation of what I want to see printed, so hopefully any additional changes will be minimal.

I like the Ultrasharp 30", but there's little to nothing mentioned by way of it being a photographers best friend or anything. I'm thinking of an NEC screen, price is crazy, but I'm about to buy an iMac which was going to cost me 1500ish anyway. My PC is already an absolute beast being a custom gaming machine, so I dont need the performance boost from an imac or anything.

Still very unsure.

Well mine is an LCD (TFT?) I think? Something along those lines. Not sure where TFT fits in amongst the different types of monitors, but as I say, I've had no issues myself, personally with it (and it was a cheapo one).

I'm about to get a new computer on Tuesday (that a generous boardsie has offered to buy the parts for and put together for me). On the site I got the different parts of the PC, I bought a 24" monitor, which was fairly cheap (as I say, after my current experience, I'm not rushing to spend a lot on monitors).

This is it;

http://www4.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=30854&agid=1650&lb


€150 for a 24" screen - even if it's ****e I still have my old monitor anyway, so can't really complain. I'm very curious about it's photographic performance though. I think you can calibrate any monitor though, and that would usually solve most problems that I reckon people would run into, so that may be of use...

I really don't know what I'm talking about though. I don't know the first thing about monitors. Just really happy with my current one and it's price/performance is great value to me. Just thought I'd throw it out there.

Best of luck with whatever you end up with (if you want I can let you know how that €150 one turns out?).

magicbastarder

i'm on a dinosaur - a compaq branded 22" sony trinitron CRT. the shadows are fantastic compared to a flatscreen, and it helps heat the room in the winter, but it's out of sync with most photos posted now, so a lot of the stuff posted to boards is darker than the photographer would have intended, but i like that.

magicbastarder

magicbastarder wrote: »

but it's out of sync with most photos posted now, so a lot of the stuff posted to boards is darker than the photographer would have intended, but i like that.

Does that not make your photos darker, too, though?

Kenny Logins

I'd go for the Dell U2412M. I recently bought the 23" U2312HM but could really use the extra 120 pixel height of the 24", which is 1920 x 1200.

Great price on Komplett -

http://komplett.ie/Komplett/product/01_MONITOR/16_MONITOR/ZKB_04RAND/productdetails/80003372/Dell_24_U2412M_LED_8ms_DP_VGA_DVI/U2412M/default.aspx

DaireQuinlan

magicbastarder wrote: »

i'm on a dinosaur - a compaq branded 22" sony trinitron CRT.

God almighty. I have a 19" trinitron CRT and it's a humungous monster that ends up warping desks that it sits on for any length of time. Great picture quality though, I've never seen a lcd or led to match it.

stcstc

actually most monitors will display sRGB as default

and KKV your right with your workflow at the moment you not seeing much difference between monitor and print

BUT

if you had a wide gamut monitor and were doing prints in a wide gamut print you would see that actually your just missing a load of stuff


your workflow is such that your monitor is displaying sRGB and the print companies your using are using sRGB.

if your wanting the best output, you ideally want a monitor that can display adobeRGB and then then print close to adobeRGB. and then compare this with your print from photobox or somewhere and see the difference


this is why spending money on a decent monitor IS worthwhile

BlastedGlute

stcstc wrote: »

if your wanting the best output, you ideally want a monitor that can display adobeRGB and then then print close to adobeRGB.

That is in fact what I meant to say above adobeRGB thanks!

Any suggestions?

Obviously looking for an IPS screen of some sort, not sure of S-IPS or variants as I'm still researching the differences. I'm fairly tempted by the iMac for a few reasons but the main being that I've been after one for ages and feel like I need to use this time and resources wisely and just make the change. And on the other hand I think that if I got an Ezio or NEC pro screen I would also be completely on the right path and wouldn't have to learn a new OS or have a silly keyboard!

Confused.com

stcstc

the imac screens are still not in the same league as the eizo or nec stuff

the others to look at would be the lacie monitors


you will find the odd one from HP, dell etc, but you do have to be careful, as they do revision models and end up changing the panel for example


have a look at tftcentral.co.uk, you can search by exact model and it will tell you what panel is in the monitor

magicbastarder

Deleted User wrote: »

Does that not make your photos darker, too, though?

it would mean that when you see my photos, they would probably be a bit lighter than i would see them.

magicbastarder

DaireQuinlan wrote: »

God almighty. I have a 19" trinitron CRT and it's a humungous monster that ends up warping desks that it sits on for any length of time. Great picture quality though, I've never seen a lcd or led to match it.

i just checked the spec sheet for it. 30kg.
whenever i retire it, i'll give it to the US air force so they can drop it on the enemy du jour. cheaper and more destructive than a bomb, i suspect.

BlastedGlute

stcstc wrote: »

the imac screens are still not in the same league as the eizo or nec stuff

Yeah my research has more or less concluded that the iMac screen is not quite as amazing as I once believed. To that end I have been more or less sold on getting a Dell u3011 30". It's a reasonable price point and seems to have scored high enough to be drawing contrast from Ezio and NEC models. Any thoughts on this one?

stcstc

i have a pair of dells, 24" ones, when i bought them they were 900 each

not that much now


and mine at pretty good, hoping to replace with a couple of the high end eizo or nec at some point but lot of cash

magicbastarder

magicbastarder wrote: »

it would mean that when you see my photos, they would probably be a bit lighter than i would see them.

What about prints?