Monitor Suggestions?

[Mark Elberson]

I am looking to purchase a monitor to hook up to my laptop. Are there any makes/models to consider or steer clear of???

[Daniel Browning]

Generally, the ones with the most accurate color are more expensive. It's hard to find the accurate ones, since that's not measured by most (any?) of the monitor reviews around the web. I've been very pleased with the NEC 2490WUXi, but it's spendy.

[Colin]

I really love my NEC CRT monitors...


I'm almost tempted to pull one out of storage...

[Jon Ruyle]

Wow. If that isn't love, I don't know what is...


(I loved my Sony CRT's so much I was almost tempted not to throw them in the trash.)

[Colin]

It probably sounds worse than it is....


My house is on the market, hence the need for as little furniture as possible.


But, I really do love the color on them. They're horrible in terms of having enough resolution to actually do a lot of work on them, but, I just turn them on as a second monitor to do a color check. They work very well, better than any LCD monitor I could afford, that I knew of anyway..


but they do take up too much space

[Madison]

If money is no option: check out Eizo's monitors (upper range for designers and photographers).


*But* do realise that no matter how expensive a monitor you will get, if you need color consistency you *will* need to calibrate it with an external calibrator (hardware) and calibrate your ourput as well. Most people think just buying a monitor with 'pretty colors' does the trick but they are wrong. PS: Most fo Eizo's monitors come with calibration devices, and they reproduce almost all of the Adobe RGB gamut, which is a lot more than just the standard sRGB monitors.

[Mark Elberson]

If money is no option: check out Eizo's monitors (upper range for designers and photographers).


*But* do realise that no matter how expensive a monitor you will get, if you need color consistency you *will* need to calibrate it with an external calibrator (hardware) and calibrate your ourput as well. Most people think just buying a monitor with 'pretty colors' does the trick but they are wrong. PS: Most fo Eizo's monitors come with calibration devices, and they reproduce almost all of the Adobe RGB gamut, which is a lot more than just the standard sRGB monitors.
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Money most certainly is an option :( I checked out the screen that Daniel is working with and that is several times my budget! I currently have an hp tablet (12'' diagonal touch screen) laptop. I am just looking to get a larger screen with more accurate color rendition...and yes, I do plan on calibrating it. Am I only going to get a marginal increase in color accuracy with a standard consumer-grade screen? If nothing else at least I can go from 12 inches to 24 inches!!!

[Madison]

Color accuracy depends on a number of things:


1. The capability of a monitor to render certain color values on screen. Laptop screens are usually 6 bit, so they are not as capable as 8 bit screens. Even 8 bit screens usually render a color gamut (color space) called sRGB, which is fairly limited. Your camera captures a lot more color than that color you will not see on screen. Monitors that render Adobe RGB's color space will be a lot more capable of faithfully reproducing the colors captured with your camera. These screens are very expensive.This is about color SPACE: aka how many shades of each color a monitor is able to reproduce on screen to better match the colors that are actually in the captured image you took. (Depending on your camera: some cameras capture sRGB, others capture AdobeRGB, some capture 8 bit, some 16 etc. I shoot raw so this whole story is bades in that).





2. Calibration. No matter how well a monitor, 6 or 8 bit, sRGB or Adobe RGB, can render color spaces, ACCURACY is a matter of calibrating your screen. Every serious photographer need some device like Color Monkey (I keep misspelling it because they named it differently) or Pantone Huey Pro etc. There is calibration in every price range. Software calibration based on your eyes/perception only won't work.





So: get the screen you can afford, and get something to calibrate it with. I used to work in Graphic Design and got a Huey Pro (which is fairly affordable yet entry level in terms of calibration) and even that makes a huge difference.





(3. If you want your images to be faithfully reproduced: you need to start working with color profiles of your printer or of your photo lab but that is a whole other chapter).

[canoli]

Without knowing your budget or your level of expectation, it's impossible to say "steer clear of all TN panels." If your budget is at least $600 I would recommend that, but under $600 you won't find anything but TN panels. TN panels are great for gamers, not so great for photographers. It's harder than it should be to find out what type panel is in a particular monitor, but viewing angle and price are good indicators. Look for 178 degree angles and prices over $600 if you want to avoid TN panels, but also google google google!


If you're just looking for a step-up from your laptop monitor, almost anything you buy new will look better, mostly because it'll be much bigger. Beyond that, it really depends on what you need the monitor to do.


I'd say one of the "lines in the sand" is at the TN panel vs. all other types. At about $600 you start getting into more color-accurate panels - or, I should say, these $600+ panels have the ability to be calibrated accurately. Actually the cut-off point is higher if you want true hardware calibration and not just graphics card "bending." Monitors that allow direct LUT calibration are closer to $1000.


Good luck on the search! There is a ton of information out there. If you plan to buy on the internet, make sure the return policy isn't ridiculously prohibitive - some require a certain amount of dead pixels before they'll accept a return...


I'm a huge B&amp;H fan; their return policies are the standard by which I measure all the others - I was there the other day looking at a demo monitor - about $300 off the original price - and the policy was still "2 weeks to return, no questions asked (with receipt, packaging, etc)."

[samoksner]

i would suggest some of the Dell monitors. They are very well manufactured and i found mine to be pretty close to spot on as to color.

[varok]

For photography, get a monitor with either a MVA or IPS panel. Stay clear of TN's. If you're looking for a 22", I'd suggest the Dell 2209WA. It's relatively cheap for a IPS monitor but the quality is really good. Also, calibration is very important. It doesn't matter how cheap or expensive your monitor is if it's not calibrated properly.

[chrisc]

I have the Hewlet Packard HP LP2475w monitor calibrated with the Spyder 3 Pro colororimeter.Beautiful color. Check out the reviews. It is an H-IPS monitor and I couldn't be happier.


My budget couldn'tafford the NECMonitors so I went with this one. Got it at Provantage (received it in two days) for a great price (less than 530 delivered)