Comparison Of 15" LCD Monitors - Part I

The Tests

The tests were carried out on a Dell computer, a Dimension 8100 with the following basic features:

• Intel Pentium 4 at 1500 MHz
• 256 MB Rambus
• NVIDIA GeForce 2 Ultra with a DVI and an analog outputs.
• Windows XP Professional

The Testing Procedure

We used N-Test for the following purposes:

• to verify whether the frequency is set automatically
• to evaluate the contrast and brightness

Red, green, blue and grey test images were used to determine how well the color values were displayed. The monitors were reset to display the largest range of hues and shades.

We surfed the Internet and scrolled through pages with both light and dark backgrounds to see how well the monitors responded when switching from bright to dark sections and vice versa.

We used office applications and browsed documents (text and charts) to determine how user-friendly each monitor was.

The monitor matrices were checked to see how they reacted when subjected to pressure.

We also tested how well the automatic setting features work when displaying images and animations.

Video sequences were played to determine whether there was any afterglow and how well different hues were displayed.

We ran both fast and slow games, such as Civilization III, Tropico, and Quake III, in order to determine how well each monitor behaved in a gaming situation.

We adjusted brightness, contrast and sometimes the refresh rate in order to display even the darkest images well. Then we went back to Windows to see whether the new parameters were also acceptable in an office environment.

The technical descriptions from the past several pages are based on several online sources:

• TFT Guide - Part 1 - Flat Panel Displays
• TFT Guide - Part 2 - Viewing Angle Technologies
• TFT Guide Part 3 - Digital Interfaces
• Fujitsu
• Cemes-CNRS

I'd also like to express my heartfelt thanks to Sébastien Bache (Hercules) and Anousone Sukhaseum (ViewSonic) for their assistance.