Results: Color Gamut And Performance
Color gamut is measured using a saturation sweep that samples the six main colors (red, green, blue, cyan, magenta, and yellow) at five saturation levels (20, 40, 60, 80, and 100%). This provides a more realistic view of color accuracy. The On-Lap has no color management system, so the chart is the same before and after calibration. Additionally, adjustments made to grayscale are too small to have any effect on the secondary color points.
This is the only area where we feel the On-Lap 2501M comes up short. Its color gamut is quite a bit smaller than the sRGB/Rec 709 standard.
Take a look at the dots furthest from the center of the CIE chart. They should be at or near the outermost squares, which represent the correct color points. It seems that only cyan is close to accurate. The other colors never quite reach the full saturation point. The visible effect is that the color looks somewhat washed out and light. This is made up for a little bit by the increased luminance, which you can see in the middle chart. Red, blue, and magenta are brighter than they should be, but this gives an illusion of extra saturation. And the Delta-E chart shows these errors are visible to the naked eye.
When a display measures this far off the standard, we do a test called Actual Secondaries. The monitor’s actual measured primaries are used to calculate where the secondary colors (cyan, magenta, and yellow) should be.
We can tell that the On-Lap is the product of some clever engineering because its secondaries fall exactly where they should in the altered gamut. Given this fact, combined with the increased luminance values, the color on this display actually looks OK. It’s a little washed-out, but not nearly as much as these charts suggest.
All of our recently-tested screens come much closer to the sRGB/Rec 709 standard.
The average value doesn’t tell the whole story of the On-Lap. The Delta-E error for blue is over 10, but the extremely low error for cyan pulls the average number down somewhat.
Gamut Volume: Adobe RGB 1998
There are basically two categories of displays in use today: those that conform to the sRGB standard like HDTVs, and wide-gamut panels that show as much as 100 percent of the AdobeRGB 1998 spec. The On-Lap displays less than half the latter gamut. In fact, it only displays 55 percent of the sRGB gamut, which is a good deal behind other TN-based monitors.
We use Gamutvision to calculate the gamut volume, based on an ICC profile created from actual measurements. With only 39 percent of the AdobeRGB 1998 gamut available from the On-Lap, you won’t want to use this product for critical graphics work. Its color output would be difficult to match to other devices like cameras and printers. For gaming, video, and business use, though, it should be fine. Even though the color is under-saturated, the On-Lap is accurate relative to its actual color measurements.
