DoubleSight DS-265W Official discussion!

Newegg charged my card even though I cancelled within an hour...brilliant. The order is listed as "void." I like how they managed to charge me on the day of my order (last saturday) but can't credit me even at this point. No response from customer service via email either...awesome stuff.

As far as dead pixels, they are fairly common. I think with monitors with very low pixel pitch, people don't really bother looking that hard. Another issue is if the dead pixel is in the corners, you won't really notice during normal usage. But during a full screen operation it might show up.

Dead subpixels are more common than fully dead pixels. During certain color operations, one of the main subpixels (red, green, blue) might not turn on at all.

I've had over a dozen TVs and LCD monitors over the last 3 years...only two sets, a 23" Apple Cinema display, and an NEC LCD2690wuxi had no dead pixels. Although the NEC would develop stuck pixels quite often. However, these were very hard to spot given the size of the pixels. If you have an LCD TV, dead pixels are HUGE because of the large pixel pitch. You can see them night and day. And every LCD TV I've had have had at least 1 major dead pixel or dead subpixel, and they are very noticeable when you are looking at ~50" screen. Although with a TV usually you'll sit far back enough and not notice unless you are really looking for it, or if a primary color of R/G/B just happens to show up in that area, in which case it REALLY LIGHTS UP.

Anyway, ~30% LCD screens having a dead pixel seems like a fairly conservative statistic. My guess is, most people just aren't looking for it, or its not obvious enough in normal usage to spot it.
 
Too bad the guy in that review doesn't mention anything about a A-TW-Polarizer, which I'm 99.9% sure the D265W doesn't have anyway.

You know I used to think the difference between a 24" ws and 26" ws was 2 inches, but it's actually just 1.4 inches.
 
Yep, and the 24" is actually 24.1". I guess having decimal points doesn't sound as sexy as a whole number.
 
It's here.

Quick impressions:
It's huge. I've looked at a lot of 26" WS monitors in stores, but when it's on your desk it looks totally different.

Dead pixel check: on arrival, it had one dead pixel, including all the subpixels. After spending several hours with the monitor and rationalizing that I was ok with it, I gave it the lightest rub with a lint-free cloth. It instantly disappeared, which made me happy. So, at least for now, I am dead pixel free.

Pros:
- It's beautiful, and a vast amount of real estate compared to my previous 19" CRT.
- It appears to scale everything very sensibly. It even recognized 480i over component, which I didn't expect. 480i looks like ass, but it's helpful to be able to navigate settings to set games for a higher res. I haven't thrown a 1080p signal at it yet, that remains to be tested.
- The stand is adjustable (see cons for the flipside).
- Qualitatively, I don't notice any input lag playing games.

Cons
- It has only 1 DVI input (the picture posted earlier shows this). I was really expecting 2. This means instead of putting my PC and PS3 each on a DVI, I will probably end up putting my PC on VGA and my PS3 on DVI, or having to get a switchbox or something annoying like that.
- It does not seem to remember the display settings for the component input. The DVI input brightness needs to be turned down to 20 (out of 100) to be non-blinding, but the component input needs 40+ to be visible. Toggling to the DVI input and back to the component input seems to set the component settings to match the DVI ones. Annoying.
- As shown in the previous picture, the monitor has writing on it for HDMI and USB inputs that don't exist. That's just pathetic.
- The manual and some stuff attached to the monitor is written in really pathetic Engrish.
- I don't know what's expected of a stand, but the one provided seems pretty crappy. You adjust it by sliding it up and down, but everything shakes when you touch it and feels really flimsy.
- The speakers. Out of curiosity I tested them. Better that I had not been born, then to suffer the painful sound of these 5W pieces of garbage.

BTW, I'm an expert computer user but noob to LCD/flat panel displays, so please have mercy. I'd be happy to answer any questions, and I'll make an effort to perform whatever testing I can. I spent a lot of time reading threads here before I bought this monitor and I really appreciate what you guys have going here, and would like to reciprocate to the extent that I can.
 
Looks like I'm glad I got my DS-263N when I got the chance.

Hopefully nothing happens to it in the next 3-4 years :(

Sucks that you guys only have DVI and VGA... whereas the previous version had a DVI-I, DVI-D and VGA...
 
Hey Orange Crush, lots of pics would help. What are your thoughts on the bezel? If you could get one of the monitor from an angle of this wallpaper here:

http://interfacelift.com/wallpaper_beta/details/235/the_blue_marble.html


veritas7 said:
Looks like I'm glad I got my DS-263N when I got the chance.

Hopefully nothing happens to it in the next 3-4 years :(

Sucks that you guys only have DVI and VGA... whereas the previous version had a DVI-I, DVI-D and VGA...
Click to expand...


Are you kidding, the new version has speakers! Who needs that crummy hdmi and usb ports, pfft.
No but seriously, does your version have the polarizer? I'm giving serious though to getting a refurbished DS-263N from the doublesight store. Who knows maybe I'll get a random polarized one.
 
Orange - hope you don't get any dead pixels! I bought an 47" HDTV and I've had to return 2 of them because of extremely large dead pixels (on a TV with 1080 res the pixels are pretty big) and I could see it from ~8 feet away on a dark screen (stuck green & yellow pixels), and some bad transformers/back lights. Good thing about retail--no questions asked. No restocking fee. And you know what, I can still return this in 30 days (they credit/debit your card with each exchange, so its another 30 day running clock...) Paying 15% more is worth it for me to go retail. If I bought this online, I'd be out of two grand and told to suck it up.
 
Wow. All I can say is Doublesight really *@)$! up. I know I for one won't be buying one due to no usb ports/hmdi/etc. . . Not to mention their ridiculous and shady behavior. This seems to be the general consensus with what I read.

All that they had to do to make this screen sell well was:

A. Be honest about release dates/features.
B. Not handicap there screen by removing the useful ports.

They could have minted cash if they:

Added an A-TW polarizer or made version with one. I would pay an extra $100 for a polarizer.

.......

Assed out 5W speakers??? I wonder who they think is going to be buying this screen? People paying 700-800 dollars for 26in S-IPS screens don't need speakers on their screen. Whoever made that decision obviously does not understand the LCD market. I guess its fine... If you don't gimp the important ports.


:::sigh:::

I was really hoping this monitor would work for me. Either the planar/HP/NEC for me.





The labeling for the usb and hdmi are depressing and outright silly! :p
 
Who cares about USB ports and HDMI? If you want USB ports, get a USB hub. If you want HDMI, use an HDMI-DVI cable. If you want more ports, get an HDMI switch. I'm more annoyed that DoubleSight seems to be oblivious to their own products and that they haven't done any research on what their users want. Perhaps they should be called OverSight instead.

This review is disconcerting: http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=566728

As with most monitors, the factory brightness on this one is bright - although it's not anywhere near as bright as some of the other monitors I have tested. Factory default is set to 50%. Anything above 50% is unusable as the screen washes out. At 100%, the monitor is ridiculously unusable.

(snip)

But here's the rub: I changed it to 20% and that give me what I thought would be a good (working) brightness level for testing, but then noticed that I lost ALL difference in my black levels. For example, when looking at the image above of the ports, there was NO image detail.

(snip)

In practical terms, you must have the brightness set between 47 and 52 for this monitor to be usable.
Click to expand...

That sounds like the brightness control is a digital black level control. Does this mean there is no backlight control? That would be a huge oversight if that's the case.

Also, the manual shows the only scaling options are Auto, 16:10, and 4:3. Does that mean there is no aspect scaling or 1:1 mapping? What about 16:9 resolutions? Are they stretched to fill the screen? If so, that's a major inconvenience considering the DS-263N had these options.
 
Sounds like DoubleSight fumbled the ball in their own endzone.

Anyway, will you be trying out the DS265W, Toasty?
 
ToastyX said:
Also, the manual shows the only scaling options are Auto, 16:10, and 4:3. Does that mean there is no aspect scaling or 1:1 mapping? What about 16:9 resolutions? Are they stretched to fill the screen? If so, that's a major inconvenience considering the DS-263N had these options.
Click to expand...

The aspect/1:1 mapping options do not appear in the monitor menu, at least not that I've found :(

I should also mention that at this point I've seen the "blue sparklies" issue mentioned in that review. Although for me, it's not just blue pixels, it's random pixels that are set to the wrong color, with some in the pattern flashing on and off. And it's not a problem with the physical pixels, because when you move the window or icon with the "sparklies", they move with it.

I only have the Doublesight cable to test with, so changing cables is not an option yet. The problem seems to appear rarely, and disappears after toggling to source or a resolution change. To me, this is the most disturbing thing about this monitor so far, and I'm considering sending it back unless I can get it resolved.
 
wow. this panel completely fell off my radar. no hdmi i could live with, but one dvi port?!?!? even the 263N has 2:confused:
 
I got one yesterday from the Egg. My opinion is that the 263N is a far better computer monitor, from a feature set standpoint. The 265W seems to be targeted more at the television, rather than monitor, market. I'm not saying it makes a lousy monitor, far from it, but the 263N offered WAY more value. Doublesight should not have discontinued the 263N.

No dead pixels on this panel, BTW. The panel itself presents a beautiful picture. No sparkling issues here, but maybe that's because I'm not using the provided DVI cable, but an aftermarket one I had lying around.

[Just before I went to post this] Wow, I just made an interesting discovery. I just now went to access the menu, and the display turned off when I pressed the menu button. After playing around with it, it seems that I can't access the menu at all. What's more, the source selection, volume, and move buttons all turn off the monitor when I press them. Hmm. At least it turns back on when I press the power button.

[5 minutes later] Just tried unplugging the monitor, to see if that clears up the button issue. It did not, so now I can't access the menu :( And the power brick gets HOT. I'm not sure I'd want to hold it in my hand for more than a few seconds.
 
Great , ive waited and waited for this monitor to arrive.
Doesnt sound very good to me , What to do now?
Should I get the planar instead??? or is there another
monitor out there thats worth looking at besides the NEC.
 
Well, I've played around with this thing for fifteen minutes now, did several complete power cycles, still no menu access. So I'm going to send it back to the Egg. It's probably just as well, the power brick would probably have ignited my desk sooner or later.
 
Can anyone confirm whether it has the polarizer (i.e., whether it suffers from the white glow problem)? When you look at it from the side, is there a red tint?
 
If anyone on [H] is in an MBA program, this might make a good case study. Here is how I think the class discussion would go:

You: So this company called Doublesight has a niche product line of monitors. They see an opportunity to have a good mainstream monitor manufactured that they can sell at a reasonable price. They get some good reviews and forum support, until they are selling this mainstream DS-263 monitor twice as fast as they can get them manufactured.

So what do you think they did next?

Class: Well of course they started manufacturing the DS-263 twice as fast so they can reap the windfall profits.

You: No. Anyone else have a guess?

Class: They immediately introduced an enhanced model to keep the market going.

You: No, they just stopped making the DS-263.

Prof: This case study is supposed to be based upon a real company. No one would do anything that crazy.

You: Well they did. And then several months later they introduced a replacement product that the market perceived as inferior because it was missing a valued feature (second DVI port) that was on the original DS-263.

Prof: What is the prognosis for this company?

You: I suspect they will continue to kill their golden-egg-laying geese until they disappear.

Prof: Sad. OK class, this is an extreme example of how not to do business. Now you know better than to make the same mistake.
 
wow, expectations crashing!
i mean after all this time that it was promoted here.
I wonder how this came about?
good case study sample by the way.

The W was supposed to be the best IPS in the price range. the HDMI and USB label is just funny.
the Menu problem scares me beyond belief.
 
After reading these impressions, I'm very glad I didn't get my hopes up about this monitor. Initially, I was looking at this but lost faith after the 'delay.' Definitely going for the HP now, just looking for a reputable dealer to buy from who doesn't charge shipping or tax.
 
The Planar is under $800 now. That might be worth considering since it's basically the same monitor as the DS-263N without the A-TW polarizer, except with one DVI port instead of two.
 
ToastyX said:
The Planar is under $800 now. That might be worth considering since it's basically the same monitor as the DS-263N without the A-TW polarizer, except with one DVI port instead of two.
Click to expand...

I figured that for the price, I could pick up a switch and a few adapters from Monoprice. I'll try to remember to post results once it's set up and if it works.
 
I really wanted to buy 2 or 3 of the 263N's but had to abstain for three important reasons:

1. My email dialogue with Dario Dellamaggiore where he repeatedly avoided answering direct questions I asked about the monitor.
2. The whole polarizer fiasco. To this day its not like there ever was officially a polarizer or not a polarizer or an explanation for what was going on from Doublesight.
3. Multiple announcements of bad pixels COUPLED with DoubleSight's marriage with Newegg which has the worst return policy. This seems particularly shady since I am pretty sure that DoubleSight was monitoring these forums at the time.I'm not accusing them of specifically going with Newegg because of their crappy return policy, but they certainly didn't give enough weight to consumer concerns that Newegg was considered to be a bad retailer for LCDs since they have a pretty bad lcd return policy.

When I saw that the DS-263W had become available I got excited all over again, thinking they had taken their success and decided to build the ULTIMATE BUDGET/PERFORMANCE WIDESCREEN LCD. But all they did was add component, a more adjustable stand, a price increase, and still they are in bed with Newegg (crappy return policy) and haven't ever really officially acknowledged any concerns as to whether or not a polarizer ever did or will exist.

I call Shenanigans on DoubleSight. Their job was simple:
1) Find a way to address quality control on the few issues that made people believe they were dealing with a panel lottery
2) Make an announcement to that effect
3) Not FEATURE a retailer their customers have been complaining about (I do love newegg but I just refuse to buy an LCD from them)
4) Not remove any features
Anything beyond that would have been bonus... an adjustable stand? Fantastic! Component? Why the hell not!?

In fact, the way these monitors got popular, they could have easily sold them themselves in a web store except they'd then have to deal with returns due to panel lottery etc. I am convinced that they want to capitalize on the popularity, generate some more hype, and do business as usual with panel lotteries and retailers that make it hard for people to deal with product defects. At this point I think I'm just going to stick with NEC LCDs. I predict that Doublesight is a company that won't be around in 5 years.

-mattaholic
 
At this point I'd also go with Toasty on getting the Planar over the same Doublesight DS263N, which is available at their e-store. Doublesight has done every possible thing wrong with this monitor.
 
I knew the first time I looked at the manual for the 263 and noticed it was actually the Planar manual that something was wrong. All the illustrations showed the Planar base, and they even left in the text about how to adjust it (although theirs was not adjustable), and used the same font Planar uses on their manuals, website, marketing materials, etc.

Then Toasty sent back his first one and got one with the A-TW polarizer, a feature which logic dictates they'd promote, and they denied or didn't realize they had it. Thereafter, some had it and some didn't...now I would definitely pay extra for it, but I'd like to know if I'm going to actually get it...
 
Looks like the true winners of all of this is gonna be Planar, probably
the next best choice since the ds-265W isnt living up to its hype.
 
About the A-TW polarizer. If it's so great, why isn't it used on all LCD monitors? It can't be that much more expensive than the standard polarizers that are on all LCDs.

Scivian: the only place I see the DS-263 is the Doublesight online store. It isn't even listed on Pricegrabber. I suspect that this is residual stock. When they are gone, there will be no more.
 
I say take the plunge and get the doublsight.. My first doublesight didn't have the polarizing but my second one did, and it is by far the best LCD i've ever owned.. A very worthwhile investment.
 
Doublesight had no buisness discontinuing the DS-263N .
It would have been a seller for a couple years , Seems they
were to way too quick on the DS-265W with no thought put
into it.
 
Doublesight still sells the DS-263N on their e-Store.

http://www.doublesight.com/shop/product.asp?idx=7

The last time I checked that out, they were selling Refurbished models. It specifically said 'Refurbished' in the product description and was about $599 I think. The one I linked above does not say that and is closer to the original price of $799. This is probably highly unlikely, but could these be brand-new 263Ns?

EDIT:

If you look at the lower lefthand side, it labels the 263N as 'Hot & New'. More evidence that these might be new rather than refurbished?
 
Hey guys, lurker for about 2 weeks, decided to finally register (and oh wow was it extremely hard to register).

So a little background before I proceed: I'm a programmer/designer. Self-taught, been doing it for about 5 years. Just this year have I gotten a real programming job so things are really coming around for me. I've never been too rich, but I've always been a geek, sorta in the know. But with the job, I'm finally having money around.

So with that said, I made the horrible decision to try a 52" HDTV as my monitor (top of the line one too).......big mistake. I have to sit 2 feet away from it to read anything, and even then it's hard! Color Accuracy? There is none. Lag? You bet. Redeeming qualities of an HDTV being a computer monitor? I can watch a movie from my bed, that's about it. I absolutely hate it.

Why I did that? I've been wanting to buy something to serve all of my needs. Programming, Design, Gaming, etc. But I knew, there must be some niche forum out there that has people just like this. And it took me like 2 weeks but I finally stumbled........ upon you guys. People who actually think there are better monitors than "Dell", and laugh at the notion of using a HDTV for anything serious. So yeah that's my story. I'm on a quest to buy a monitor that works for me, and doesn't hurt my eyes in the process. Anyways, on to relevant stuff regarding the topic.

The Doublesight DS-265W has received it's first Newegg review, here.

Also, there are tons of the Doublesight DS-243N here, the seller has 99.6% feedback and 14 day return policy, but you are not going to like who sells it....

Edit: Matter of fact, don't even look at that eBay listing, I don't know why I even put it. 15% restocking fee? Sorry.
 
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AdamH said:
Can anyone confirm whether it has the polarizer (i.e., whether it suffers from the white glow problem)? When you look at it from the side, is there a red tint?
Click to expand...

Err, I think its been established for a while now that the polarizer thing was just a fluke that only appeared in 1 batch of 263Ns. No one has received a monitor with a polarizer since that batch, DoubleSight doesn't advertise it (and they would if they could, it being such a premium feature), and it doesn't appear in any specification.
 
potential said:
Hey guys, lurker for about 2 weeks, decided to finally register (and oh wow was it extremely hard to register).

So a little background before I proceed: I'm a programmer/designer. Self-taught, been doing it for about 5 years. Just this year have I gotten a real programming job so things are really coming around for me. I've never been too rich, but I've always been a geek, sorta in the know. But with the job, I'm finally having money around.

So with that said, I made the horrible decision to try a 52" HDTV as my monitor (top of the line one too).......big mistake. I have to sit 2 feet away from it to read anything, and even then it's hard! Color Accuracy? There is none. Lag? You bet. Redeeming qualities of an HDTV being a computer monitor? I can watch a movie from my bed, that's about it. I absolutely hate it.

Why I did that? I've been wanting to buy something to serve all of my needs. Programming, Design, Gaming, etc. But I knew, there must be some niche forum out there that has people just like this. And it took me like 2 weeks but I finally stumbled........ upon you guys. People who actually think there are better monitors than "Dell", and laugh at the notion of using a HDTV for anything serious. So yeah that's my story. I'm on a quest to buy a monitor that works for me, and doesn't hurt my eyes in the process. Anyways, on to relevant stuff regarding the topic.

The Doublesight DS-265W has received it's first Newegg review, here.

Also, there are tons of the Doublesight DS-243N here, the seller has 99.6% feedback and 14 day return policy, but you are not going to like who sells it....

Edit: Matter of fact, don't even look at that eBay listing, I don't know why I even put it. 15% restocking fee? Sorry.
Click to expand...

The ebay link you have is not the correct model; that is the 24".
 
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I received my 265W a couple days ago. Because of an enormous amount of work I have to do, I'll be brief. I'm pretty sure it has the a-tw polarizer. Without a doubt there is a faint red glow when looking at an all black screen (within a dark room). It's actually to the extent that when I'm sitting close to the monitor and right in front of it, I can see the glow on the left and right edges of the screen. I'm going to examine it some more tonight, but just wanted to let you all know.
 
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