NEC 2490WUXi - The Full Story

iirc, hold down the input button while turning the monitor on. Then, pull up the menu as usual, but there's many tabs now.

Pretty much everything matched - the wuxi2 seemed to have less stuff I could tweak than the wuxi. Glad I bit the bullet on the calibrator considering that I couldn't tweak anything!
 
Ooh, wuxi vs wuxi2. I've not ever fiddled with the latter model. With different filters (or lack of), not sure about how easy it will be to perfectly match them. Should be close enough if you take you time.
 
Calibration made a massive difference! I was playing with basiccolor 5 and I really like it, think I'll buy it. I used the "softproof" option as I had no idea what I'm doing and let it churn away.

When it started it let me choose my LCD type. I left it to generic but the options are:

Generic
CCFL
Wide Gamut CCFL
White LED
RGB LED
Projector.

I assume it's not a CCFL right? I just leave it to generic?

Now I just want to calibrate everything. My TV, my laptop, CALIBRATE ALL THE THINGS.

Edit: The more I read I think I don't want softproof but instead maybe web design as a profile, and then CCFL as the backlight.
 
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I know it's bad form to double post but I just wanted to say that I switched calibration to CFFL and web design and it looks drastically better. Everything looks exactly how I think it should now, which is ideal. :)

I wish I had bought a calibrator earlier. For anyone sitting on the fence - do it! It makes such a difference.
 
It's definitely CCFL on the 2490. Glad to hear calibration indeed brought them pretty close together! Don't sweat it if it's not a perfect match, unfortunately it's just often impossible. Each CCFL tube will have slightly different light emissions, LCD pixels slightly more or less twist and black level, etc.
 
Found a seller near my place for 2490WUXi2, the monitor seems to have 5600 hours. My question here is, even with all the latest technologies around, is it fine to invest ($400) on this monitor? Please share your suggestions.

Thanks.
 
Found a seller near my place for 2490WUXi2, the monitor seems to have 5600 hours. My question here is, even with all the latest technologies around, is it fine to invest ($400) on this monitor? Please share your suggestions.

I love mine. Until we get operating systems and video cards that are all 10bit, I think sRGB monitors are to be preferred unless you know you need it for some types of printing.
 
It's a great monitor. I have the original version with the AW-Polarizer. The second version of this monitor that swame was asking about no longer has that.

Even if it did, though, I personally would not recommend paying $400 for a 5600 hour used item with no guarantees whatsoever in any event.

If swame_sp is willing to take a gamble and play loose with $400 on that sort of concept, then maybe you ought to consider one of these: http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1675393

$400 or so there at least gets you a brand new product with some newer tech and 14 day return policy if I understand it right. Worth looking over at this rate.
 
5,600hrs is nothing. How can anyone even question this, when the backlight is rated at 50,000 hours (=until half of initial maximum brightess is reached) ? :)
The latest wonders are the new monitors from Korea, but if one is considering a NEC 90 series in the first place, then one wouldn't want to buy a monitor with zero features (no OSD, no hardware calibration) and no US support/warranty, even when it is new. Only my opinion of course. :)
 
5,600hrs is nothing. How can anyone even question this, when the backlight is rated at 50,000 hours (=until half of initial maximum brightess is reached) ? :)

My 2490 hit half brightness at around 12000 hours. I suspect it will totally dead before it hits 24000.
 
I might have asked about this before - but is it still under warranty? If it is, complain about it. Although the degradation shouldn't be nowhere near linear, i'm thinking that this is out of the ordinary. At least the CCFLs can be replaced, but it takes some hours to complete.
Still, I've got laptops with the usual small short life-time CCFLs still working well with 70% of initial brightness - and they have been used heavily since 2005.
It isn't likely that LG only uses one supplier of CCFLs, and they might as well have used bad CCFLs... :(
 
I did some research in the past and this seems fairly normal.

Few of the CCFLs are actually rated for 50000, most were less, and that was the naked tube, once they were actually part of full backlight assemblies, the numbers fell even more.
 
My 2490 hit half brightness at around 12000 hours. I suspect it will totally dead before it hits 24000.

I run mine at 0% brightness setting ... even if the bulb dims, I have a long, long, long ways to crank it up! The 3090 is a different story though, it's pegged at 72% minimum with the rest through digital lowering.
 
I have the NEC 2490WUXi (version 1 with AW Polarizer)...can someone tell me the NEC 30" equivalent to this model...I heard the WUXi2 version was not as good but has NEC released a new model which is better or equivalent to the WUXi version 1?
 
I might have asked about this before - but is it still under warranty? If it is, complain about it. Although the degradation shouldn't be nowhere near linear, i'm thinking that this is out of the ordinary. At least the CCFLs can be replaced, but it takes some hours to complete.
Still, I've got laptops with the usual small short life-time CCFLs still working well with 70% of initial brightness - and they have been used heavily since 2005.
It isn't likely that LG only uses one supplier of CCFLs, and they might as well have used bad CCFLs... :(

They have in the past in their 23" panels. There were ACD 23" batches that turned very pink after a few years, and I had an HP LP2335 with the same panel that had this issue. It wasn't the normal warming up/yellowing of the native white, it was a massive pink/red shift that required a LOT of adjustment to compensate for.

Last batches of the ACD 23" didn't have this problem, though the panel model # was the same.

My 2490 hit half brightness at around 12000 hours. I suspect it will totally dead before it hits 24000.

Maybe/hopefully not.

I have this ebay'd 2490WUXI (former touchscreen model) which has 22,200 hours on it, and it's still able to hit in the high 200 cdm/2 range with native color temperature, and about 30 cdm/2 less with white temperature set to D65 from SpectraView II.

The native white has definitely "warmed up" to 5100K and it is noticeably more reddish than other screens I have. SVII can make this D65 but the more your native color temperature deviates from D65 the more adjustments made to RGB and the more contrast you lose.

At native it's 650:1 contrast, at D65 it's in the 500 range.


I have the NEC 2490WUXi (version 1 with AW Polarizer)...can someone tell me the NEC 30" equivalent to this model...I heard the WUXi2 version was not as good but has NEC released a new model which is better or equivalent to the WUXi version 1?


Neither the LCD3090WQXI nor the PA301W screens have an A-TW polarizer. The PA series is an incredible screen with true 3D LUT and full gamut emulation, but it still has white glow like all other 30" monitors.

The A-TW polarizer is now only available for LG's RGB LED 24" panel.
 
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<snip>

I have this ebay'd 2490WUXI (former touchscreen model) which has 22,200 hours on it, and it's still able to hit in the high 200 cdm/2 range with native color temperature, and about 30 cdm/2 less with white temperature set to D65 from SpectraView II.

The native white has definitely "warmed up" to 5100K and it is noticeably more reddish than other screens I have. SVII can make this D65 but the more your native color temperature deviates from D65 the more adjustments made to RGB and the more contrast you lose.

At native it's 650:1 contrast, at D65 it's in the 500 range.

<snip>

I am considering picking up one of these used touchscreen wuxi's, but I'm still on the fence. Are you satisfied with yours? Did you attempt to remove the touchscreen?

Did yours arrive with 22k hours? The dimmer backlighting appeals to me as I'm looking for a 24" 16:10 monitor with minimal PWM, so the ability to run dimmer bulbs at higher duty cycle is a plus. I couldn't tolerate the Dell 2412's lighting.

I won't be buying a calibrator (anytime soon), so it seems the change in colour temp could be a drawback, but I don't need perfect colour, just reasonably realistic colour, so perhaps I could eyeball it.
 
This monitor is bright as hell. I keep mine at ~20% and turn it down at night. 50% will blind you, I was one of the first ppl to buy it too, right when it came out and everyone else opted for 2690's. I wouldn't worry about 5000 hour eroding CCFLs really.

But really what needs to happen is an email campaign so NEC brings this monitor back online, NEW! I am terrified if mine fails and I have to enter into LCD market again.
 
Thanks for the reply, all.

Now the seller is asking for $360, for the same monitor. He has reduced the price from $499. May be something fishy in the monitor. He has bought it from BH-photo and claims that 2 years of warranty is remaining. (I'm not sure if that's transferable).

Regarding Korean Monitor, No thanks. I would pass it on, with no support or warranty.

I mainly do HTML design (main purpose to buy a bigger monitor), bit photo tweaking and watching movies.
 
I am considering picking up one of these used touchscreen wuxi's, but I'm still on the fence. Are you satisfied with yours? Did you attempt to remove the touchscreen?

Did yours arrive with 22k hours? The dimmer backlighting appeals to me as I'm looking for a 24" 16:10 monitor with minimal PWM, so the ability to run dimmer bulbs at higher duty cycle is a plus. I couldn't tolerate the Dell 2412's lighting.

I won't be buying a calibrator (anytime soon), so it seems the change in colour temp could be a drawback, but I don't need perfect colour, just reasonably realistic colour, so perhaps I could eyeball it.

I remember you were flicker sensitive from the U2412M thread. It came with 22K hours, meaning it was basically on with back-light 100% of the time from date-of-service for three years straight and now is probably a lease return.

It's possible you could get one with fewer or more hours. I don't know. I'm satisfied with mine in general but it does show some age, and the calibrator helps keep the color temperature and calibration in line. Without it, I'd say the calibration is fair at best.

I did remove the touch screen. Not required but I'm not into a panel with some anti-glare grain covered with a shiny plastic type overlay adding glare on anti-glare. Yuck. It took me about 1.5 hours in total. Mostly because it was my first time and I was extra careful.

The seller doesn't check for dead pixels or anything, but I was lucky that mine came with a slightly dark (not dead) pixel and no stuck pixels, and even better the dark pixel is at the start menu so basically invisible.


Really? Is it any good? What model #?

LG W2420R, HP LP2480ZX or Quato. All are $2000.00 or more new with RGB-LED back-light.

Thanks for the reply, all.

Now the seller is asking for $360, for the same monitor. He has reduced the price from $499. May be something fishy in the monitor. He has bought it from BH-photo and claims that 2 years of warranty is remaining. (I'm not sure if that's transferable).

Regarding Korean Monitor, No thanks. I would pass it on, with no support or warranty.

I mainly do HTML design (main purpose to buy a bigger monitor), bit photo tweaking and watching movies.

The warranty is not transferable if registered under their name at purchase.
 
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Generally someone who knocks off a third of the value off of something on a whim is trying to ditch an item fast.

NEC warranties are not transferable. Considering both these facts it is not a safe buy at all. Have you considered the U2410? Usually goes on sale at the $400 mark and it sounds like it matches your needs more.

Thanks for the reply, all.

Now the seller is asking for $360, for the same monitor. He has reduced the price from $499. May be something fishy in the monitor. He has bought it from BH-photo and claims that 2 years of warranty is remaining. (I'm not sure if that's transferable).

Regarding Korean Monitor, No thanks. I would pass it on, with no support or warranty.

I mainly do HTML design (main purpose to buy a bigger monitor), bit photo tweaking and watching movies.
 
For those purposes, I don't see a U2410 being a very logical choice. Unless he's very serious about photos/scans that uses larger color profiles than just sRGB of course... It's native color space would be a bad match for movie watching, and previewing HTML pages (which 99% of the time is intended to be viewed on sRGB monitors) and casual photo work.
Besides, the U2410 is the minimum "pro-sumer" entry-point in wide-gamut IPS displays.

If it was me and it had to be new, i'd just save the extra cash and get the U2412M or ZR2440W or go all the way to a NEC P241W if one really intends to be more serious about this.

But each to his own :)
 
Pretty sure at least FireFox is wide-gamut aware in Win7 if the icc profile is installed. It did that for my wide-gamut NEC3090, and I was like "How does it KNOW?!?!" and took me a while to figure out why my photographs were more or less looking like the non-wide-gamut 2490. The preview icons are not adjusted though, they are color hot.
 
10e Thank you for the information. Surprised how hard it is to find these online. They must not sell well.
 
10e Thank you for the information. Surprised how hard it is to find these online. They must not sell well.

They were discontinued a while back. That's why you can't find them.

The PA series is the successor and current series of monitors along these lines from NEC.
 
Xorbe - don't know if it's was natively adopted in the later FFs, but yeah a "Color Management" add-on existed for FF3 and above for a few years. But when developing web content one must still consider the main target. Most laptops, smartphones and tablets aren't even able to display something as "wide" as sRGB yet, so a wide gamut display won't help him to develop web content better than a standard srgb. Unless he wants the viewers of his web pages to use color aware browsers though.
 
I recently bought a refurb 2490wuxi2 from nec. How can I check the number of hours on it w/out the spectraview software?
 
youngscarface said:
I recently bought a refurb 2490wuxi2 from nec. How can I check the number of hours on it w/out the spectraview software?
I haven't tested this on a wuxi2, so I can't confirm if it works, but:

Go into the Advanced OSM:
- When the monitor is off, hold "Input" and press the power button. Hold the input button for 3-4 seconds and release. Press Select.

- Use the arrow keys to get to tab E.
- Press and hold Up and press Left.
- You'll now see the total amount of usage in both horizontal and vertical position.
 
Neither the LCD3090WQXI nor the PA301W screens have an A-TW polarizer. The PA series is an incredible screen with true 3D LUT and full gamut emulation, but it still has white glow like all other 30" monitors.

The A-TW polarizer is now only available for LG's RGB LED 24" panel.

which is considered to be the better monitor, the LG or the NEC PA series?
 
I picked up one of these monitors with touchscreen off one of the seller on eBay for ~$240. Received it today, it has a little under 13,000 hours on it. However, I'm noticing there's this faint, grey,loose outline around the screen. Mostly noticeable on the bottom edge and corners. From my newbie eyes, it sort of gives the illusion of slight barrel distorsion.

Does anyone know what might cause this? The seller also provides refunds, so I'm contemplating returning it if there's no easy fix.
 
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I would guess that maybe it's due to the touchscreen? I believe they are connected with tape/adhesive, so perhaps some of it is overlapping the screen?

Unless you already removed it... then I have no idea. I think most here who bought one of those took off their touchscreens. Do any of the settings affect it in any way? Colorcomp, etc?

I tried (and failed) to get one of the non-touchscreen versions from a different eBay seller a ways back. An offer of $250 was a bit too lowball for him. I see semi-damaged ones up there now from the touchscreen guy, really cheap. It'd be better if he posted some pics so we had an idea what sort of bezel/frame damage he is talking about, as I'd consider one if the damage wasn't super terrible.

I did contact that touchscreen seller earlier (assuming he is the same one) and asked about hours. He stated 12K-25K, so the one you got at least has low usage (relatively speaking).
 
I was able to remove the touch screen fairly easily, but the issue is still there and it looks like it's getting worse. I think I can best describe it as a watermark around the edge. It's really only perceivable with a flat background color. I think I might just keep the monitor, as it's great otherwise. I contacted the seller as well, but he doesn't have any ideas as to what the issue may be.
 
I was able to remove the touch screen fairly easily, but the issue is still there and it looks like it's getting worse. I think I can best describe it as a watermark around the edge. It's really only perceivable with a flat background color. I think I might just keep the monitor, as it's great otherwise. I contacted the seller as well, but he doesn't have any ideas as to what the issue may be.

I think I've seen this on one of my LCD2490WUXI units. Not sure what causes it but it may be related to backlight issues near the edges. You could try turning up the Colorcomp level, recalibrating the colors, and see if it helps mask the issue. On that monitor of mine, it helps some.
 
Could be the panel layers separating slightly, judging by the solid colours observation. I've seen it on a Dell 2005FPW (mine), an NEC 20WMGX2 (HF member) and HP ZR24W (HF member).
 
This may be a dumb question, as I expect this isn't it... but does it look like backlight bleed? Since you mention the corners and bottom of the panel, it crossed my mind that it could be a little bleed.

Is it worse in a darkened room?
 
Hello all, bought an used 2490Wuxi and should arrive in about 10-12 days, any suggestions on the quick check to be done for the monitor? I would be using it with my mbp 13" (mainly for html design, photography and software development).

Looking forward to it to arrive!!!
 
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