Monitors -- a cautionary tale...

[regnaD kciN]

Monday night, my computer monitor expired. No great surprise there -- I'd had it for many years, and was surprised it had lasted so long. Anyway, those cool new widescreen flat-panel monitors were available everywhere, for a much-lower price than I had paid for my monitor the last time around. Piece of cake, right?

Well, not exactly.

After a bit of research, I discovered that there are several different types of panels used on current flat-screen monitors. The most popular, and the one used on almost all lower-cost monitors, is a type called Twisted Nematic (TN). TN panels have the advantage of having very fast refresh times, so action (DVDs, video games) appears to be running at a high frame rate. The (big!) disadvantage of TN panels is that they only do 18-bit color (6 bits per channel), and therefore don't even display the full color gamut of sRGB (the smallest of normal gamuts used in digital photography). In other words, for "digital darkroom" work, not very accurate in giving you an idea how your pictures really look.

There are other types of flat-panel displays. Two that work much better than TN for photography uses are In-Plane Switching (IPS) and Patterned Vertical Alignment (PVA -- better versions are identified as S-PVA or cPVA). Both of these will reproduce true 24-bit color. Unfortunately, they're both considerably more expensive. While TN models are easily found in the $110-$140 price range, in my research, I only found one acceptable non-TN monitor (Samsung's PVA-based F2080, which Fry's listed as in the process of being "closed-out") for under $250. And the sky's the limit when it comes to IPS displays -- I've heard of some "professional photographer" models that sell for over $5,000!

How to make sure the model you choose is right for photographic purposes? Obviously, the first step is to stay far away from TN panels. One quick test is to look at a monitor from either above or below. If the images inverts (looks a bit like a color negative), you're looking at a TN panel. To find an appropriate IPS or PVA panel, you might want to check here or here, although neither of these covers all models currently available. I understand the Dell UltraSharp monitors, from around $300-$500, have a good reputation, although I seem to recall some people having qualms about Dell's political affiliations, which I don't know anything about myself.

By the way, one other thing to be prepared for, if you're moving from a 4 : 3 display to a new widescreen one, is odd behavior from your video card upon making the switch. When I did so, I found my ATI card would not allow me to set the display to the F2080's native resolution of 1600x900 (the closest it would give me was 1440x900, giving everything the "funhouse mirror" stretch effect familiar from people playing 4 : 3 television programming on new 16 : 9 sets). I finally did get it to give me 1600x900, but only by uninstalling everything related to the card (drivers, Catalyst, etc.) and going straight back to 640x480 VGA, then re-installing the video-card software from scratch, starting with the several-years-old version that came with the card, then upgrading to more recent downloadable versions of the support software. (And then, of course, I had to re-calibrate the monitor with my Spyder2express as soon as it got dark enough to do so.) Everything's working now, but, between the failure of the original monitor, shopping for the new one, then going through the installation craziness and final calibration...let's just say there go a couple of days of my life I'm never going to get back...

[BrightKnight]

1. You can't go wrong with an Eizo ColorEdge if you have

an unlimited supply of money. I make do with a good general purpose display.

http://www.eizo.com/global/products/coloredge/index.html

[ConsAreLiars]

2. I went through this challenge 15 months ago.

I didn't get into the tech details, but used reviews and sale prices at newegg.com to finally replace a very dubious CRT.

Looks like the Hanns-G 22" 1680X1050 I got ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824254035 ) uses S-IPS tech, ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TFT_LCD ) and provides a 24-bit resolution. I got it on sale for $145, free shipping, including a $5 immediate rebate, although it's $179 with shipping now. Seems to be a good line.

Fortunately it worked without The Giant Hassle on the old XP machine that had replaced a newer dead box, and more importantly, when I completed building the new one and become familiar and comfortable enough with the truly delightful Linux Mint Operating System to swap monitors, it worked perfectly and XP is gone forever.

Good links, but incomplete as you noted. This monitor showed up in neither, but some good information about monitors and how the techs compare. There are likely better deals on other monitors today. Just a few words to say that getting a decently usable non-CRT monitor does not mean spending Thousands.

[regnaD kciN]

3. That's a very good deal...

Unfortunately, because my old monitor was not just dubious, but demised (replay your own Monty Python routine here), and I needed a working desktop computer on a day-to-day basis -- especially when the monitor died right in the middle of a lengthy Lightroom import-and-develop session -- I didn't have the luxury to go the e-commerce route, but had to find something I could pick up at a brick-and-mortar store and have running by the end of the day. I was lucky that the local Fry's was one of the few to still have F2080s in stock; if not, I might have had to buy something in the $500-$1,000+ range, just because that would be the only option available to me.

BTW, you're the only person I know of here running Linux. What do you use for asset management and photo editing?

[ConsAreLiars]

4. Sadly, I still need to run my preferred editing software under Wine within Linux.

(Wine Is Not Emulation) = reverse engineered Linux native modules that respond effectively when Windoze programs call up the equivalent routines.

Although there is editing software native to Linux (GIMP, at the top of the list, does layers and such and pretty much more if you learn it), I'd become fond of Picture Windows Pro for many reasons, and although it was coded only for Windoze the "Tips" forum for it made getting it going under Linux pretty straightforward. It works perfectly.

There is also a "WineDoors" app available within Linux Mint and other Linux variants that will install some Photoshop CS? version and all the other small bits that might be needed within Wine for it to work. (Once Wine is installed, clicking on any .exe will start the install, but success will often depend on whether other stuff beyond the basic Wine is present, and WineDoors first adds that stuff.)

As for asset management, I'm just a amateur and never even wanted to sell a pic and get into that accounting mess. I've seen some comments on forums on how (which apps) to catalog (tagging and such) but paid no attention to the details. For the money in-out side there may be something but I have no clue. I know Linux is used to manage transactions within very large organizations, including financial activity, I'd guess that is easy if you find that answer, but I don't have it.

[Blue_In_AK]

5. I don't understand any of this.

Mine is called DCLCD. It's 20 or 22 inches and seems to do just fine. I don't have that negative thing you're talking about, so I assume this is okay. My resolution is set at 1024x768 or something like that (because I'm blind) and there's no distortion.

But since you're talking about ATI and Catalyst, I've been getting a prompt for ages when I first turn on my computer that says something about my drivers not supporting something having to do with ATI Catalyst, but since it's not causing any issues that I'm aware of and I don't know anything about computers, I've kind of ignored it. Do you know what it means and is it something I should be concerned with?

[regnaD kciN]

6. If it's working for you...

...I wouldn't worry about it. Of course, on the other hand, I could repeat Red Green's famous bit of advice: "If it ain't broke, you're not trying." :evilgrin:

If you really want to check out the situation, download the newest set of drivers from ati.amd.com. They have an all-in-one installer, that will detect which ATI video card you have, and install the appropriate updates. But please back up your system first -- if an update breaks your video setup, I'm not responsible!