Monitor!

[Gurm]

Folks,

I have been playing around with getting a new monitor. The one I picked up was a Samsung LCD 17". And... well... it's just not there yet. Maybe another couple years, huh?

Anyway, I'm looking at a 19" flatscreen. NEC? Viewsonic? Cornerstone?

Recommend away...

And I'm in the US, so nobody start in with Sampo or Iiyama or anything else that I can't get here. And I'll be needing it to be a name brand. A BIG name brand.

- Gurm

[Wombat]

I like my Sony, but every Cornerstone owner here seems to love them.

I have a Sony G520. Good bang for the buck. ~$500. Knowing you though, you'll probably be willing to pay more for a "professional" monitor, like the G500 (looks great, but damn it's heavy). These two monitors are not perfectly flat, though.

The F and/or FD series are Sony's pf monitors. I'd check them out (and I found www.epinions.com a pretty handy resource when monitor shopping).

I would keep away from the ViewSonic monitors. They are not the top-notch brand they used to be. I looked at their 19" monitors, including the PF ones, and ViewSonic has horrible problems controlling focus in the corners and edges. Strongly advise to stay away.

Hitachi? I don't know. Their 751 was/is a great monitor (roommate had one, wow!). I don't know about any Trinitron/Diamondtron models from them though.

And if anybody knows where my HP monitor came from, I'd buy one of those. It's an hp p1120. Perfectly flat 21". Great color, great focus. The OSD looks like Sony's, with a whole slew of fine-tune controls, and the features are Sony features, but the buttons don't look like Sony's at all.

[Guru]

LG LG LG LG Flatron 915+!

[Gurm]

Guru,

Who the HELL are LG?

Lucky Goldstar? You have GOT to be kidding.

1. This is the USA, remember?

2. Goldstar here is famous for making disposable shite.

- Gurm

[Greebe]

Lucky Goldstar

http://www.lg.co.kr/english/index.jsp

http://www.lge.com/

[GoSharks]

Gurm

I have put together a monitor selection tool that may help you pick a monitor you can find it at this link

Currently we have two 19" models both using the Hitachi ergo flat CRT, p1450 and p1460. The differance is in resolution capability. P1450 -1280 x 1024 at 85hz, p1460-1600 x 1200 at 85Hz.

I'm about to introduce a two new 19" models. p2450 and p2460, these use the Mitsubishi natural flat apertuer grill CRTs.

We just introduced a new 21" p1750 using the Mitsubishi natural flat CRT and a new 17.4 LCD F1200 using the new Fujitsu MVA LCD panel. Price was reduced yesterday to $799 on the f1200.

Let me know if I can answer any questions you can e-mail me jwitkowski@cptmail.com

Thanks

Jim Witkowski
Chief Hardware Engineer
Cornerstone / Monitorsdirect.com

[ALBPM]

Can't beat that for Support!!!!!

Thanks Jim!!!!

Any reason why you guys don't use Trinitron tubes?????

I prefer the picture quality of the Trinitron over the Mitsubishi aperature grill tubes.

Paul

[Wombat]

Mitsubishi licensed Trinitron tech. If anything, it seems that Diamondtron can have a better picture. We'll see how things change in this market, since Sony's original patents on Trinitron have recently expired.

[GoSharks]

Paul

The Mitsubishi natural flat CRT is the same as Trinitron, both are aperuer grill CRT's. Mitsubishi licensed the technology from Sony, and from my experience the differences are very small. The electronics driving the tube play a bigger part in the video quality IMHO.

Sony is very selective on who they sell tubes to. The can control competition in this way. I have found Mitsubishi much easier to work with.

Jim

[Gurm]

Thanks a bunch! When I punched up image sharpness as #1 and resolution as #2, I got a cheap Hitachi ($275) as the top choice, followed by that Cornerstone 1460.

What's the catch with the Hitachi? Lack o' support for higher resolutions?

- Gurm

[fleabus2]

Gurm:

"I would keep away from the ViewSonic monitors. They are not the top-notch brand they used to be. I looked at their 19" monitors, including the PF ones, and ViewSonic has horrible problems controlling focus in the corners and edges. Strongly advise to stay away."

See my sig for the monitors I use. I have no problems at all with ViewSonic. They were just fine in all parameters right out of the box. They also have a good RMA/replacement policy by industry standards. Any monitor, no matter how good can get screwed by rough handling in transit.

I'm in the video related Usenet groups every day and have not seen any reports of recent or previous ViewSonic monitors having serious quality problems. They appear to me to have about the same number of occasional complaints as quality products fom other mfrs.

My preference is Matrox paired with ViewSonic shadow masks. I have seen nothing better. Give them a look. I don't know much about their aperture grille models. I read a lot of text so I favour sharpness/clarity over colour purity .... and those lines bug me.

Happy trails,

[GoSharks]

Yes

The Hitachi cm715 support 1280 x 1024 at 85zHz max
The p1460 supports 1600 x 1200 at 85Hz

Jim

[Wombat]

Sorry fleabus, no sig there.

When I was looking at ViewSonics, every xx790 had serious clarity issues. My roommate had one of the original ViewSonic 19" monitors. It was gorgeous. After 4 years the flyback blew out though. ViewSonic hasn't made a product that looked as good as that thing in a long time.

[ALBPM]

Cool!!! Thanks for the info Jim.

So, there ya go Gurm Hitachi makes the Best Invar Shadow Mask tube and according to Jim Cornerstone's aperature grill is the same as Sony's.

I have one of the original 19" Hitachi 751s from 1996 or 97 when they first came out and never had any problems with it.

You just can't beat Cornerstone's Support and Warranty.

Paul

[Guru]

http://www.lgeus.com/Product/Monitor/newmonitors.asp

LG Flatron Monitors
LG's unique Flatron perfect flat tube monitors feature higher brightness, sharpness and contrast compared to typical monitors. The flat tube design (flat outside, flat inside) eliminates distracting reflections and special screen coatings dramatically reduce glare and improve contrast, making long periods of use more comfortable, with less fatigue. These features, combined with a fine .24mm stripe pitch slot mask, produce the most vivid images ever, without the thick glass or horizontal and damper wires found on other "flat-ish" monitors. 17" and 19" models available.

http://www.lgeus.com/Product/Monitor/915ft.asp

BTW max resolution is not 1880 x 1440 x@ 70 Hz its 2048 x 1536 70 Hz and it does 1600 x 1200 90 Hz whitout problems (I have not tried any higher then that)!