My Soyo Topaz S review ($300 24 inch LCD from office max)

P

Presto88

Limp Gawd
Joined
Sep 19, 2005
Messages
491
Medium story short: I just got back from returning it.

Last night I decided to buy myself a present for working hard all summer at a deli (which I would never reccomend). So I had heard about the SOYO from our hot deals section and couldnt find much on it, so I figured lets take a gamble it could be a diamond in the rough. Anyways on to the specifics...

Features: Bare bones jones here. A VGA and DVI inputs and thats it.

Build: The stand is a hunk of plastic that feels very cheap. On the other hand the LCD itself is ridiculously light. the menu controls are on the side of the bezel which is a plus.Also no dead pixels.

Color: One word to sum this up: meh. Even with some adjustment it was just so-so, pictures just dont have that pop or wow factor.

Viewing angles: pretty decent, although I didnt check the vertical angle.

Contrast: not bad but not great.

Gaming: I noticed no ghosting whatsoever in my 25 minute romp, not to say that there isnt, but you know what I mean. A BIG also is that 1080p on the xbox would NOT work properly, the screen was cutoff (over VGA)

All total I had about 45 minutes on the monitor. Last night when I got it everything was fine and it just quit wouldn't display anything after being unplugged checking connections etc. So when I got home today from work I checked and it worked again, thats when I played on my 360 but when I tried to switch back to my computer it did the same thing again! Thats when I decided to truck my ass back to Office Max and get a refund.

Bottom line its definitely a steal at the price point for the average consumer,(assuming you get one that works) however for anyone that needs high quality this is a pass. Hope this helps some people who were on the cusp about this monitor.
 
I don't know if Soyo makes their own monitors or farms it out to another company...but I do know that unpleasant experiences with their motherboards a few years back (first 2 boards DOA, third board working but with issues) left a bad taste in my mouth and I vowed to never again buy anything with that name attached.;)
 
I also was a victim of a bad MB from Soyo. Their turn around time on replacing it was over 2 weeks. I didn't know they made anything else until today. Guess I will take a pass too on this. Thanks for the review it saved me a trip.
 
so close to buying... i'm a gambler sometimes, but it sounds pretty bad. tempted, because i have 2 x 22" monitors... one 24 is more attractive to me and the price it's at right now is very very tempting, but dang.... soyo really does suck. i remember them screwin everyone for a rebate. how's the quality/viewing angle? i saw a lot of samsung and some acers /w bad angles, but westinghouse and gateway have been good thus far. i'll go in and check it out :D
 
I don't like Soyo much either, but I figure Soyo doesn't actually make the panel in the monitor, so they can't really screw it up that much.

The main thing that has me on the fence is the lack of HDMI or component inputs and the craptastic stand.
 
I bought two of these to replace my wife's (2) 2005 fpw's, no dead pixels or ghosting in eq2, guild wars, hl2, wow etc. Light plastic cases with non-adjustable stands. Colors and viewing angles are similar to a dell 2407, but no fancy pip or composite/component inputs.

soyotopaz24.jpg


seem fine so far :p
 
Welp I just got mine. Bought it during lunch and am checking it out at work. So far everything looks great. No dead pixels, viewing angles are spectacular, colors even look great.

Stand is a POS of course. A little low and the tilt is very stiff, thought there was some tilt lock or something at first, but used a bit more force and it finally tilted. But I read about this, and was expecting it. So I bought a little stand for $20 while I was picking this up. Also decided to get the $30 1 year service plan from OfficeMax. Usually I skip that, but this is a Soyo product after all, so felt it was a good idea this time.

I can't wait to hook up my Xbox 360 to the VGA and see how that looks. A bit disappointed to hear the 1080p didn't work for the original poster, hoping I might have better results.

But so far, I'm pretty happy.
 
Okay, I got my monitor home. Unfortunately 1920x1080 over VGA with the Xbox 360 doesn't work. However I have no idea if this is a limitation of the monitor or the Xbox.

However while testing my Xbox I discovered an annoyance and a problem.

First the annoyance. There is no button to toggle between DVI and VGA modes.
I have to press Menu, +, +, +, Menu, +, Menu, to navigate the OSD and get to VGA. 7 buttons to do what should be done with one. This will drive you nuts if you are a person that switches back and forth alot.

Now the problem. When I go from DVI mode to VGA mode, then back to DVI mode, the screen goes blank and doesn't display DVI mode. Also the OSD stop working. Basically the monitor does nothing at all. Powering it off and back on doesn't recover from this. Even rebooting the computer on the DVI connection doesn't fix it. I have to unplug the power cable from the monitor, then plug it back in.

So this monitor will be a major pain in the ass if you want to use both inputs.
 
Does anyone know if there is a driver or any other way to get this to do 75 Hz vertical refresh? It's the same panel as the BenQ and LG that are capable of this; is the Soyo simply not?
 
Ravynmagi said:
Okay, I got my monitor home. Unfortunately 1920x1080 over VGA with the Xbox 360 doesn't work. However I have no idea if this is a limitation of the monitor or the Xbox.

However while testing my Xbox I discovered an annoyance and a problem.

First the annoyance. There is no button to toggle between DVI and VGA modes.
I have to press Menu, +, +, +, Menu, +, Menu, to navigate the OSD and get to VGA. 7 buttons to do what should be done with one. This will drive you nuts if you are a person that switches back and forth alot.

Now the problem. When I go from DVI mode to VGA mode, then back to DVI mode, the screen goes blank and doesn't display DVI mode. Also the OSD stop working. Basically the monitor does nothing at all. Powering it off and back on doesn't recover from this. Even rebooting the computer on the DVI connection doesn't fix it. I have to unplug the power cable from the monitor, then plug it back in.

So this monitor will be a major pain in the ass if you want to use both inputs.
Click to expand...

the manual does not list 1920x1080 as a supported res try one of the following:

640x480, 800x600, 1024x768, 1280x1024, 1280x960, 1280x768, 1440x900, 1680x1050, 1920x1200 are all supported. the input toggle in the menu is not very convenient but it does auto detect input signal if only one device is on at a time.
 
Craftish said:
Does anyone know if there is a driver or any other way to get this to do 75 Hz vertical refresh? It's the same panel as the BenQ and LG that are capable of this; is the Soyo simply not?
Click to expand...

74.5khz is the highest H freq, 66.7 is the highest V freq.
 
hamm3rhead said:
the manual does not list 1920x1080 as a supported res try one of the following:

640x480, 800x600, 1024x768, 1280x1024, 1280x960, 1280x768, 1440x900, 1680x1050, 1920x1200 are all supported. the input toggle in the menu is not very convenient but it does auto detect input signal if only one device is on at a time.
Click to expand...

Xbox goes from 1280x768 to 1920x1080, no inbetween.
 
hamm3rhead said:
the manual does not list 1920x1080 as a supported res try one of the following:

640x480, 800x600, 1024x768, 1280x1024, 1280x960, 1280x768, 1440x900, 1680x1050, 1920x1200 are all supported. the input toggle in the menu is not very convenient but it does auto detect input signal if only one device is on at a time.
Click to expand...

That blows.

Is there any way to convert a 1920 x 1080 signal to 1920 x 1200? Some sort of scaler or something maybe?
 
seems like there is a mixed review on whether the colors are good/bad on this monitor. does this monitor support 1080p and how well does it hook up to a console?
 
jtdaman said:
seems like there is a mixed review on whether the colors are good/bad on this monitor. does this monitor support 1080p and how well does it hook up to a console?
Click to expand...

In the above post by hamm3rhead it's stated that 1080p isn't supported and others have said that it doesn't display properly.
 
450 said:
In the above post by hamm3rhead it's stated that 1080p isn't supported and others have said that it doesn't display properly.
Click to expand...

thats a shame :( i'm looking for a cheap 1080p display to support consoles.
 
The Westinghouse 24" which is a little over $400 AR from newegg can do 1080p (though my video card can't seem to drive it at 1080i, so unsure if its a video card or a panel issue).
 
spotter said:
The Westinghouse 24" which is a little over $400 AR from newegg can do 1080p (though my video card can't seem to drive it at 1080i, so unsure if its a video card or a panel issue).
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm now looking at the Westinghouse too now that it turns out the Soyo doesn't fit my needs.

I like the HDMI and component inputs. I wish there was a DVI input as well or at least included the DVI to HDMI cable.

I'm guessing I'd probably need to use that component connection to use 1080p on the Xbox. And I'd have to buy my own DVI to HDMI cable. I went to Radio Shack last night and looked at the prices, $50 for a 6 foot cable (shortest they had). I ran out of the story as they sales person was trying to convinced me this is the cheapest they come, haha. Fortunately I found them on NewEgg for $10, *whew*.
 
is the samsung 24'' worth spending the extra 200 bucks on or should I just pick this up?
 
Ravynmagi said:
Okay, I got my monitor home. Unfortunately 1920x1080 over VGA with the Xbox 360 doesn't work. However I have no idea if this is a limitation of the monitor or the Xbox.

However while testing my Xbox I discovered an annoyance and a problem.

First the annoyance. There is no button to toggle between DVI and VGA modes.
I have to press Menu, +, +, +, Menu, +, Menu, to navigate the OSD and get to VGA. 7 buttons to do what should be done with one. This will drive you nuts if you are a person that switches back and forth alot.

Now the problem. When I go from DVI mode to VGA mode, then back to DVI mode, the screen goes blank and doesn't display DVI mode. Also the OSD stop working. Basically the monitor does nothing at all. Powering it off and back on doesn't recover from this. Even rebooting the computer on the DVI connection doesn't fix it. I have to unplug the power cable from the monitor, then plug it back in.

So this monitor will be a major pain in the ass if you want to use both inputs.
Click to expand...

This is why I returned the panel. Its unnaceptable.
 
I picked one of these up, I've done some calibrations using ColorEyes Display Pro + a DTP-94.

Profile Option 1 (using hardware whitepoint pre-calibration which resulted in RGB values of 38/39/35):

ColorEyes Display Validation Log
2007-08-22 13:20:17

Display: M24EI5 1
System Profile: Soyo Topaz 2
Created By: Unknown
Creation Date: 2007-08-22 13:20:17

Validation Results:
# C M Y K Target L a b Measured L a b DeltaE
1 0 0 0 0 100.000 0.000 0.000 100.000 0.287 -0.090 0.30
2 0 0 0 0 94.907 0.000 0.000 94.889 0.464 -0.050 0.47
3 0 0 0 0 89.816 0.000 0.000 89.685 0.028 -0.280 0.31
4 0 0 0 0 84.735 0.000 0.000 84.803 0.106 0.456 0.47
5 0 0 0 0 79.646 0.000 0.000 79.617 -0.020 0.305 0.31
6 0 0 0 0 74.558 0.000 0.000 74.564 -0.108 0.047 0.12
7 0 0 0 0 67.128 0.000 0.000 67.239 -0.003 0.018 0.11
8 0 0 0 0 58.918 0.000 0.000 58.465 -0.269 -0.058 0.53
9 0 0 0 0 50.340 0.000 0.000 50.339 0.247 0.217 0.33
10 0 0 0 0 37.885 0.000 0.000 37.403 -0.081 -0.237 0.54
11 0 0 0 0 25.524 0.000 0.000 25.606 -0.245 0.112 0.28
12 0 0 0 0 17.532 0.000 0.000 16.939 -0.600 -0.056 0.85
13 0 0 0 0 57.281 81.569 88.846 57.230 82.206 90.776 0.41
14 0 0 0 0 86.004 -82.860 82.932 86.089 -83.502 83.495 0.16
15 0 0 0 0 31.331 59.912 -91.618 31.058 60.644 -92.322 0.33

Maximum DeltaE: 0.85
Average DeltaE: 0.37

Profile Option #2 (using factory 6500K preset)

ColorEyes Display Validation Log
2007-08-23 18:28:52

Display: M24EI5 1
System Profile: Soyo Topaz 6500K Factory Preset
Created By: Unknown
Creation Date: 2007-08-23 18:28:52

Validation Results:
# C M Y K Target L a b Measured L a b DeltaE
1 0 0 0 0 100.000 0.000 0.000 100.000 0.074 0.166 0.18
2 0 0 0 0 94.910 0.000 0.000 94.616 0.108 0.361 0.48
3 0 0 0 0 89.823 0.000 0.000 89.647 0.151 0.234 0.33
4 0 0 0 0 84.746 0.000 0.000 85.038 -0.201 0.243 0.43
5 0 0 0 0 79.661 0.000 0.000 79.818 -0.399 0.422 0.60
6 0 0 0 0 74.579 0.000 0.000 74.651 0.108 -0.145 0.19
7 0 0 0 0 67.158 0.000 0.000 66.982 -0.164 0.375 0.45
8 0 0 0 0 58.960 0.000 0.000 58.629 0.550 -0.010 0.64
9 0 0 0 0 50.399 0.000 0.000 50.171 0.219 0.388 0.50
10 0 0 0 0 37.985 0.000 0.000 37.898 -0.163 0.188 0.26
11 0 0 0 0 25.702 0.000 0.000 25.569 -0.418 0.229 0.49
12 0 0 0 0 17.810 0.000 0.000 17.600 0.354 0.070 0.42
13 0 0 0 0 57.417 82.288 85.805 57.461 82.921 89.115 0.78
14 0 0 0 0 86.040 -83.325 81.014 86.084 -83.936 81.430 0.13
15 0 0 0 0 30.834 60.423 -91.962 30.513 60.672 -92.803 0.36

Maximum DeltaE: 0.78
Average DeltaE: 0.42

Using my RGB settings: http://www.mediafire.com/?1nbjzlmzdc1
Using the factory 6500K preset: http://www.mediafire.com/?9zudx9x2rt5

Viper GTS
 
Presto88 said:
This is why I returned the panel. Its unnaceptable.
Click to expand...

Considering it's 100-150 more to get a comparable panel that switches inputs better, I think it's really not that bad of a deal. In the context of a single PC it's nice to have the option of either. Hell my 19" acer's (AL1916W) from work don't even have DVI they are VGA only.
 
For $300 you get a great panel. Colors look nice, viewing angles are great and mine had no noticeable dead pixels. The stand is cheap but serviceable. If you don't need to hook anything other than your computer up to it, I would highly recommend this over the LG or BenQ that cost twice as much.
 
Craftish said:
For $300 you get a great panel. Colors look nice, viewing angles are great and mine had no noticeable dead pixels. The stand is cheap but serviceable. If you don't need to hook anything other than your computer up to it, I would highly recommend this over the LG or BenQ that cost twice as much.
Click to expand...

And if you do need to hook something other than your comptuer up to it, buy 2.
 
Viper GT thank you... I have a question though:

Am I supposed to notice a color difference when I load either profile? I didn't see any difference in color when I enabled it as the monitor profile in Vista.
 
Boltaction

You should see a fairly dramatic difference if you're using the 6500K profile. The difference will be much more subtle with the other, as the whitepoint correction has already been made via hardware.

AFAIK Vista is still a bit iffy on color management, I'm using XP x64 these days & it works fine there.

Viper GTS
 
Viper GTS said:
Boltaction

You should see a fairly dramatic difference if you're using the 6500K profile. The difference will be much more subtle with the other, as the whitepoint correction has already been made via hardware.

AFAIK Vista is still a bit iffy on color management, I'm using XP x64 these days & it works fine there.

Viper GTS
Click to expand...

Thanks a lot. So just to be absolutely sure... having been set either way, the outcome should still be the same? And I have to say you were the only one on any of the boards I went to that actually did this... I think that if you didn't, no one else would have.
 
The Topaz S I bought Wednesday night was dead when I got home from work this afternoon...wouldn't power on at all. (Driving to two different OfficeMax stores to exchange the thing was just an unpleasant bonus, though the guys at the second store literally just handed me the replacement without even writing anything up.)
 
Redshirt #24 said:
The Topaz S I bought Wednesday night was dead when I got home from work this afternoon...wouldn't power on at all. (Driving to two different OfficeMax stores to exchange the thing was just an unpleasant bonus, though the guys at the second store literally just handed me the replacement without even writing anything up.)
Click to expand...

I hear stuff like this from other people too. This monitor must really be hit or miss, must be why it was so cheap. Still, assuming mine doesn't have any issue this is a fantastic price and it's very good looking.
 
Viper...
I'll humble myself and show my noobie colors with color management profiles...how do ya load those files?
I opened the color management in the control panel of Vista(32 bit) but couldn't figure out how to load it. Thought notepad might be the way to go but looked like gibberish.

Thanks for any help!
 
mickster said:
Viper...
I'll humble myself and show my noobie colors with color management profiles...how do ya load those files?
I opened the color management in the control panel of Vista(32 bit) but couldn't figure out how to load it. Thought notepad might be the way to go but looked like gibberish.

Thanks for any help!
Click to expand...
I'm still using XP but you should be able to highlight the profile you want to use and then hit "set as default" or something similar.
 
Anyone have a PS3 hooked up to this via an HDMI to DVI cable? Does this monitor have 1:1 pixel mapping or aspect ratio settings?

Thanks in advance!
 
joemama said:
I'm still using XP but you should be able to highlight the profile you want to use and then hit "set as default" or something similar.
Click to expand...

Vista really seems hit or miss, mine doesn't work when loaded either. I am going to see if Adobe Gamma loader works and if so I will let you know.
 
I just got my monitor today. The local OfficeMax ran out of them last week and they had to order mine from a neigboring city. I think this is a terrific monitor for the price. I readjusted it as it was too bright for my eyes. Everything is very sharp and clear. The only 2 games I have in my computer are Oblivion and NWN. Oblivion plays terrific. I couldn't play at the detail level this monitor gives me on my old 19" lcd.
I need to make some kind of adjustment for NWN to play though. I got the 1 yr insurance just in case. Not one dead pixel that I can find. The stand is ok with me I just locked the monitor on and it seems steady enough. I think for me the height is ok. I used the $10 off coupon also.
I find the black is extremely black. I didn't see any side light bleed. This is so my better than my old Viewsonic 19" vp 912b.
I am no expert on these things I just know what I like and I like this monitor.
 
Cally said:
I just got my monitor today. The local OfficeMax ran out of them last week and they had to order mine from a neigboring city. I think this is a terrific monitor for the price. I readjusted it as it was too bright for my eyes. Everything is very sharp and clear. The only 2 games I have in my computer are Oblivion and NWN. Oblivion plays terrific. I couldn't play at the detail level this monitor gives me on my old 19" lcd.
I need to make some kind of adjustment for NWN to play though. I got the 1 yr insurance just in case. Not one dead pixel that I can find. The stand is ok with me I just locked the monitor on and it seems steady enough. I think for me the height is ok. I used the $10 off coupon also.
I find the black is extremely black. I didn't see any side light bleed. This is so my better than my old Viewsonic 19" vp 912b.
I am no expert on these things I just know what I like and I like this monitor.
Click to expand...

Glad to hear it! My wife really likes both of hers. :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top