A new NEC professional IPS? PA series

If you want to compare it to something, compare it to the 10-bit IPS panel (w/ 12-bit 3D-LUT), Display Port wielding Eizo ColorEdge CG243W which sells for $2000+ on average.

Then you'll see why the PA241W with its 10-bit IPS panel and 14-bit 3D-LUT is really a steal for ~$1000.
 
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shawnoen said:
Yikes, saw that this AM on Engadget.

A 24" for $1079? Lets see, a 24" 1920x1200 PA241W or a 27" 2560x1440 Dell U2711 for $30 LESS?

For get. I'd buy for $599 or less but nothing more than that. Should be priced to compete with the U2410...
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Huh? The NEC should be priced the same as the U2410?

You realize that professional display systems are far more than just the panel, which is what you get from Dell. The calibration, LUTs, backlight unevenness compensation etc... are what really make professional displays what they are, and what costs the extra money.
 
drtc said:
The 10bit input through the display port when combined with a display adapter that has 10 bit output capability, is quite useful for photo editing using Pro Photo mode in photoshop.
PIP is nice especially with the different profile setting for immediate comparison, but more practical in the higher density 27' and 30' models. And the USB hub is handy as well.
Lets see apart from these enhancements, how pure image quality scores against the original models.
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Pro Photo is a colour space/gamut. Having a 10 bit panel doesn't increase the gamut of the display, it allows for more shades to be displayed within that gamut.

Editing in 16-bit Adobe RGB (a good match for the display's gamut) will be the same experience as far as the display and user is concerned. Pro Photo is not the "killer app" in this 10-bit scenario. All of the shades in Pro Photo that can't be rendered by ANY output device are cool from a theoretical standpoint, but a waste of shades/tones that could be used to provide smoother gradients in colors which can actually be rendered.

Now, back to the discussion about monitors :)
 
Monitor Guy said:
Price for the P301W will be very comparable with the current LCD3090WQXi. However it won't be available until around early fall.
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Thanks for the info! Too bad we have to wait until the fall...

Will the PA301W support calibration of the sRGB mode with SpectraView? This would be a nice enhancement - the LCD3090WQXi doesn't support this.

Also, will the PA301W use the same LG panel as the LCD3090WQXi (LM300WQ5)?
 
Price for the P301W will be very comparable with the current LCD3090WQXi. However it won't be available until around early fall.
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Hi Bill, can you share with us the expected release for the PA271W? Please say 'Real Soon Now'.... :)
 
visualguy said:
Thanks for the info! Too bad we have to wait until the fall...

Will the PA301W support calibration of the sRGB mode with SpectraView? This would be a nice enhancement - the LCD3090WQXi doesn't support this.

Also, will the PA301W use the same LG panel as the LCD3090WQXi (LM300WQ5)?
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All of the PA series will have wide gamut panels. The color gamut is fully controllable using a custom 3D color processor and you can adjust to any gamut and white point by adjusting CIE xy values.

The sRGB mode on the PA241W is actually better than regular "sRGB native" panels because it covers all of the blue primary - which is normally slightly inside the sRGB blue on "sRGB" panels.

SpectraView will be updated to allow you to calibrate with your own sensor, but the "out the box" gamut emulation and presets are really good and the display has a feature to compensate for color shifts as it ages - in addition the internal sensors for luminance stability.

The 30" panel will not be the same as the LCD3090WQXi. Can't say more on that right now.
 
What is this XtraView+ feature (wide angle viewing technology)? Never heard of it... :confused:

I'm curious to see if it's eIPS. The contrast is very good for an IPS Panel, i don't know if good ole H-IPS can do this.
 
Sounds impressive. A good sRGB mode is very important.

I wonder how the NEC PA301W will compare to the recently-announced Eizo CG303W which is expected to ship in Japan in mid-March.

It looks like the predictions of the death of 30" monitors were very much exaggerated...
 
All of this x-IPS crap gives me a headache. First e-IPS, now the new 24" HP is H2-IPS, and now p-IPS? wtf
 
IanM said:
I know about the high res 27" panel, that should be in the PA series 27" model. However I noted the EA model mentioned in the presentation as the already available 23" is an OK monitor for gaming, a 27" version (with improved uniformity) would be better.
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EA231WMi? Well it's fair but not great for gaming. The Dell IPS monitors are faster.
 
At one point it says the PA241W will be 16:9 and then at the bottom it lists it as 16:10. Which is it?
 
231 = 16:9
241 = 16:10

I've found that manufacturers are getting worse and worse with typos or their own marketing people not understanding what they sell.

I've recently been "consulting" at work on what kind of projector to get for business presentations. In that research it's been clear just how many times specs are completely wrong even in owner's manuals, product glossies etc...

Sure, people make mistakes, but it's getting worse every year. At least in the past you used to be able to trust the product glossies a lot of the time.
 
woodscomp said:
Boo on the price, somebody needs to let NEC know there is a recession in the US and we need a price break.

Honestly who wants to spend that kind of coin on a 24" monitor? I would rather buy a new plasma for my living room than spend that kind of money on a monitor for my PC.
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It's an LCD for the professionals.
 
woodscomp said:
Boo on the price, somebody needs to let NEC know there is a recession in the US and we need a price break.

Honestly who wants to spend that kind of coin on a 24" monitor? I would rather buy a new plasma for my living room than spend that kind of money on a monitor for my PC.
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This is NEC top line professional monitor. For graphics artist/designers, ~$1000 for a pro monitor is nothing at all. NEC pro monitors are a BARGAIN compared to Eizos.
 
People need to stop using physical screen size as the be-all-end-all indicator of price/performance.
 
Hmmmm. Looks really good to me. I think I may have to buy one of the larger ones. I wonder if we'll have to buy a new calibrator puck or if the current ones will work with the new screens. I also wonder if they managed to cut down their latency at all, which I'm sure isn't a real concern for the monitors but would be cool.
 
King of Heroes said:
People need to stop using physical screen size as the be-all-end-all indicator of price/performance.
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I am taking it that you were generally throwing this comment towards me. Don't really care either way.

Price to performance ratio is very important to myself as a consumer as it is to most consumers. I say most because not all of us have a company that will shell out $1000 for a computer monitor for us and we have to go buy it ourselves. Some people (in general) may be oblivious and buy these things no matter what the cost because they have to have what is perceived to be the best on the market in that segment at that time.

It is well docemented that TN screens over 19" are not optimal to look at all day long. Manufactures know this and there answer to it has not been to produce non TN screens that are affordable.

On the TV side of things however LCD's are starting to show up more and more with IPS technology, go figure. They are producing very large panels for under $1000.

My point is the technology is there, these high prices from the monitor companies are nothing more than how well they can market this product and continue to make as high a profit as possible.

For the money these monitors should be profesionally calibrated before ever being shipped to market.
 
woodscomp said:
For the money these monitors should be profesionally calibrated before ever being shipped to market.
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They are (nearly). Individual calibration is just that - adjustments to YOUR panel, it's age, history, any colouration from your display hardware, backlight aging etc... You can't simply use factory settings and get proper results - you need to field calibrate.

That being said, it's been found that NEC 2490s with color temp set to D65 and colorcomp set to level 3 are darn near calibrated/profiled. My correction curve is miniscule, and others have confirmed the same thing.

Again, I feel that you and others are missing the point. NEC isn't making these monitors for "consumers" to put in their living rooms next to their TVs. These are professional segment monitors, along with Eizo, Lacie and others. If you want an IPS panel but none of the rest of the pro features (LUT, colorcomp, array settings, hardware profiling) then buy a Dell, HP or any of the other IPS non-pro monitors which are talked about.

Likewise if one of these pro-segment monitors has too much lag for gaming (I have no issue with my 2490) NEC probably doesn't care one little bit.

To someone who runs a photography-based business, $1k for a tool that exists to reliably make them money is only part of the cost of doing business. It's also the same amount as half of a (decent) lens of which they probably have several. Or one high powered flash kit. Or a quarter of a full frame dSLR body. Or a tenth of a digital medium format back. Or, or, or.... The pro segment of any market is different, and more expensive.
 
woodscomp said:
Price to performance ratio is very important to myself as a consumer as it is to most consumers.
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Are you going to complain about $3000 pro Eizo monitors being to expensive for consumers as well? This is not a consumer monitor.

It is not for you or most consumers. It is a pro monitor. NEC has lower end monitors for most consumers.

EA231 is a consumer oriented/priced IPS monitor from NEC.
 
Surly73 said:
They are (nearly). Individual calibration is just that - adjustments to YOUR panel, it's age, history, any colouration from your display hardware, backlight aging etc... You can't simply use factory settings and get proper results - you need to field calibrate.

That being said, it's been found that NEC 2490s with color temp set to D65 and colorcomp set to level 3 are darn near calibrated/profiled. My correction curve is miniscule, and others have confirmed the same thing.

Again, I feel that you and others are missing the point. NEC isn't making these monitors for "consumers" to put in their living rooms next to their TVs. These are professional segment monitors, along with Eizo, Lacie and others. If you want an IPS panel but none of the rest of the pro features (LUT, colorcomp, array settings, hardware profiling) then buy a Dell, HP or any of the other IPS non-pro monitors which are talked about.

Likewise if one of these pro-segment monitors has too much lag for gaming (I have no issue with my 2490) NEC probably doesn't care one little bit.

To someone who runs a photography-based business, $1k for a tool that exists to reliably make them money is only part of the cost of doing business. It's also the same amount as half of a (decent) lens of which they probably have several. Or one high powered flash kit. Or a quarter of a full frame dSLR body. Or a tenth of a digital medium format back. Or, or, or.... The pro segment of any market is different, and more expensive.
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Thank you for our well thought out reply. I can appreciate your need for the pro monitor that makes perfect sense. I would still like to see these companies start producing quality for the masses though.

I do not and never have ever put a pc monitor in my living room next to the TV. But I do spend a considerable amount of time in front of the monitor for work. There needs to be a happy medium, instead of 1-2 quality panels out there and then a bunch of TN panels that are being offered in larger sizes just does not make a lot of sense.
 
Snowdog said:
Are you going to complain about $3000 pro Eizo monitors being to expensive for consumers as well? This is not a consumer monitor.

It is not for you or most consumers. It is a pro monitor. NEC has lower end monitors for most consumers.

EA231 is a consumer oriented/priced IPS monitor from NEC.
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You have lost the point, we are all consumers, even professionals. Though my work may not be graphic art, nor photography, does not mean that 1: I am not a professional. And 2: I am not a consumer.
 
woodscomp said:
You have lost the point, we are all consumers, even professionals. Though my work may not be graphic art, nor photography, does not mean that 1: I am not a professional. And 2: I am not a consumer.
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Well Mr Pedantic, Professional, assumes professional in the target market.

Products have target markets, you are not the target market.

The target for this one is computer graphics professionals. If you are a lawyer, or a professional race car driver, you are not the target market (but then again you probably would have so much money, you would just buy the best anyway).

Nor is is this targeted at the mass consumer market, where the main driver is price.

It seems like you want to buy top end graphics professional monitor and pay mass consumer prices. It should self evident why that isn't going to happen.

I also provided you with the model number of a more affordable IPS, perfectly acceptable quality IPS monitor from the same company.
 
woodscomp said:
Thank you for our well thought out reply. I can appreciate your need for the pro monitor that makes perfect sense. I would still like to see these companies start producing quality for the masses though.
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You can have quality or price, not both. Just how it goes. If you want a really cheap monitor, you can have one. LCDs are amazingly inexpensive, even for fairly large ones. However, it means it won't be a nice IPS panel, won't have tons of features and won't be really well built. If you want a nice monitor for a reasonable price, you can have that too. There are monitors like the Dell U2410 that use nice IPS panels, have reasonable features, and are moderately prices ($500 or so). If you want a high quality monitor, that you can have too, these NECs being a good example, you just have to pay for it.

What you can't have is that high quality monitor for the cheap monitor's price. It just doesn't work that way. Quality does cost money.
 
Sycraft said:
You can have quality or price, not both.
What you can't have is that high quality monitor for the cheap monitor's price. It just doesn't work that way. Quality does cost money.
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I think that Woodcroft was referring to the fact that there is a distinct absence of quality monitors for your average joe computer user.

Average consumers (read non graphic artists/photographers) want quality and ARE willing to pay....but everything has to be within reason....why pay for features that you will rarely if ever make use of?

Most people do not need a 12 bit lookup table, Ambibright, Colorcomp (though it is a nice feature) or HLUT calibration capabilities.

This goes to the heart of what he was saying:

woodscomp said:
There needs to be a happy medium, instead of 1-2 quality panels out there and then a bunch of TN panels that are being offered in larger sizes just does not make a lot of sense.
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Indeed we are missing that happy medium. The closest we can get ATM is the NEC EA231.

Why not a quality panel without color uniformity/backlight issues across the screen at a decent size 24" or larger without the fancy electronics?

All the advanced features necessitate that PA/wuxi range are targeted to nothing but professional graphic artists etc.

The question is why are there so few options (only 1 Dell, 1 HP and Apple? WTF?) for quality IPS monitors for general consumers? Surely there must be a large enough market for such a product........

EDIT: The point of the rant (and something that Woodcroft alluded to) is why are we presented with options of the order of either:

1) Masses of El cheapo TN panels
2) Uber high end monitors for professional photographers etc costing vast sums of money (NEC PA, Eizo)
3) About 3 options currently for anything in between if you want IPS (HP, Dell, EA231 and maybe a new Viewsonic dont hold your breath though)

Where is the quality for the average consumer?
 
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HowzThat said:
I think that Woodcroft was referring to the fact that there is a distinct absence of quality monitors for your average joe computer user.


1) Masses of El cheapo TN panels
2) Uber high end monitors for professional photographers etc costing vast sums of money (NEC PA, Eizo)
3) About 3 options currently for anything in between if you want IPS (HP, Dell, EA231 and maybe a new Viewsonic dont hold your breath though)

Where is the quality for the average consumer?
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The average consumer gets exactly what they deserve because they buy the cheapest thing they can find (category #1) and that is the biggest reason there are so few category #3 options. We are lucky there are any options like the EA231 at all, because nearly all non pro IPS monitors looked like they were going to disappear completely after everyone went hog wild buying TN screens.
 
Snowdog said:
The average consumer gets exactly what they deserve because they buy the cheapest thing they can find (category #1) and that is the biggest reason there are so few category #3 options. We are lucky there are any options like the EA231 at all, because nearly all non pro IPS monitors looked like they were going to disappear completely after everyone went hog wild buying TN screens.
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I agree, this seems to be what's occurring and the problem is getting worse. Everything is crap, by default, it seems. There's the odd gem (like the Dell 2209WA) that slips through with great quality for the price.

The middle ground that people repeatedly claim is absent is the E series from NEC, the HP LP2475W, the Dell U2410 and 2209WA. I don't see why these posters continue to post after being given these examples that there are no option #3s. It's places like [H] which allow people to come together to discover and track these option #3s.

I'll repeat, it's very important to note that there's a lot more to a professional display solution than the panel. Most people here are obsessed about the panel type, then about the lag, and then to hell with everything else. The rest of the pro grade features work to make the display great. Some are of universal benefit (like ColorComp - resulting in PERFECTLY uniform grey/white screen with no blotches or color variation). Other are pro-specific, and even then only to a certain segment, like the features which help build arrays of displays, set gamma curves for reading MRIs or auto on/off timers based on ambient room lighting.
 
Yes these forums are a great place to exchange info. I originally came to these forums exactly because I wasn't happy with my first LCD and needed a place to discuss LCD issues. The majority of my posts are in this forum as, IMO, the display is the most critical and variable part of the computer, most everything else is just a question of faster/slower, get a benchmark and you are done, but displays? Heck. Viewing angles, screen coatings, lags, Smears/ghosting, color gamut issues, uniformity...

Tough to get a good display if you are picky about visuals, I went through 5 before I was happy.

Though IMO things are a bit better today. There are several alternatives that I would likely be happy with today that didn't exist when I bought my NEC. Example Dell 2209wa, NEC EA231, HP ZR24w. Those are just the IPS choices (I don't like *VA displays).

It seems like IPS is starting to be recognized as a marketing advantage. It seemed like for the longest time, no one would say what kind of panel was included(actively hide it even). But now even on a portable device we see it right in the announcement: 9.7" IPS screen.

Anyway people. Pay more for a better screen, and there will be more better screens to choose from.
 
Surly73 said:
(like ColorComp - resulting in PERFECTLY uniform grey/white screen with no blotches or color variation)
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Yeah, right. :rolleyes:
Except for the fact that the two (2!) different 2490Wuxi2 units i've seen had nasty dark blotches in the lower half and dark vertical stripes across the screen. No use of such fancy features if the panel is defective from the start. NEC should get his act together and kick LG in the a§§ for supplying low quality panels.
 
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Snowdog said:
Yes these forums are a great place to exchange info. I originally came to these forums exactly because I wasn't happy with my first LCD and needed a place to discuss LCD issues. The majority of my posts are in this forum as, IMO, the display is the most critical and variable part of the computer, most everything else is just a question of faster/slower, get a benchmark and you are done, but displays? Heck. Viewing angles, screen coatings, lags, Smears/ghosting, color gamut issues, uniformity...

Tough to get a good display if you are picky about visuals, I went through 5 before I was happy.

Though IMO things are a bit better today. There are several alternatives that I would likely be happy with today that didn't exist when I bought my NEC. Example Dell 2209wa, NEC EA231, HP ZR24w. Those are just the IPS choices (I don't like *VA displays).

It seems like IPS is starting to be recognized as a marketing advantage. It seemed like for the longest time, no one would say what kind of panel was included(actively hide it even). But now even on a portable device we see it right in the announcement: 9.7" IPS screen.

Anyway people. Pay more for a better screen, and there will be more better screens to choose from.
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QFT Don't know what to say more! :cool:
 
mike_j_johnson said:
Spectraview II hasn't been updated yet to support this display:

http://www.necdisplay.com/supportcenter/monitors/spectraview2/downloads/

I too am hoping I can use my 2490's calibration puck and the SpectraView II software to calibrate.
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Hi everyone - I can help answer some of these questions.

We're working on getting SpectraView II updated to support the MultiSync PA Series.

You will be able to use your existing calibration puck when it's released.

Hope this helps!

Art Marshall
Product Manager, Professional and Medical Displays
NEC Display Solutions
 
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