Am I just spoiled?

Zarathustra[H]

Zarathustra[H]

Extremely [H]
Joined
Oct 29, 2000
Messages
39,093
Hey all,

Started a new job yesterday and just got set up with my new computer.

I have worked for 6 or 7 companies at this point all previously all of them were Dell shops, but the current company is an HP shop.

My new monitor is an HP EliteDisplay 231. Has LED back lighting and a TN panel.

Coming from 10 years of Dell IPS panels both at work and at home, I'm having a terrible time adjusting to it. Colors are washed out and there is a general over exposed shimmer about it.

Been playing around with the adjustments to try to not make it bug me but I have not been successful yet. Turning contrast down a bit from standard settings helps a little but not much.

Is this just a terrible monitor, or can adjustments save it? Is this a TN problem? Have I just been spoiled by Dells IPS panels?

I appreciate any suggestions.
 
Not to mention that the HP manual brags about how configurable and adjustable it is in height, angle and tilt, but I've had to put a stack of books under it to make it high enough to use comfortably. I haven't had to do that since the early 90s :p
 
That's a tough switch, I had a similar scenario at another job and no tweak to any settings really helped... All I could do was make sure the height was to a level where I could view it directly to avoid too much color shifting but there wasn't anything I could do about the color...

Maybe someone else has some magic but my suggestion would be to make friends with one of your tech guys :D HP does make some decent IPS panels if I recall.
 
It sounds like your display is given to you by working place. What suggestions can be given if we don't know if and which alternative choices from monitors your workplace provides and if buying monitor for work is acceptable to you, and what is your budget in that case.
TN is bad for most, no wonder. It's relatively cheapest, relatively fastest .. and with worst colors/picture quality. Unless one is competitive gamer, or wish to get absolutely cheapest ones (common reasoning behind corporate purchase choices), monitors of different panel types like IPS/VA are better choice of course.
 
Church said:
TN is bad for most, no wonder. It's relatively cheapest, relatively fastest .. and with worst colors/picture quality. Unless one is competitive gamer, or wish to get absolutely cheapest ones (common reasoning behind corporate purchase choices), monitors of different panel types like IPS/VA are better choice of course.
Click to expand...

These are particularly bad though. I have an E221 at work and I know exactly what the OP is talking about. The TN monitor I have at home has nothing like this. When you move stuff around the screen, there is very visible x-hatching. But all I do is code or browse on it so it's sufficient, but I can feel the OP's pain.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040974291 said:
Hey all,

Started a new job yesterday and just got set up with my new computer.

I have worked for 6 or 7 companies at this point all previously all of them were Dell shops, but the current company is an HP shop.

My new monitor is an HP EliteDisplay 231. Has LED back lighting and a TN panel.

Coming from 10 years of Dell IPS panels both at work and at home, I'm having a terrible time adjusting to it. Colors are washed out and there is a general over exposed shimmer about it.

Been playing around with the adjustments to try to not make it bug me but I have not been successful yet. Turning contrast down a bit from standard settings helps a little but not much.

Is this just a terrible monitor, or can adjustments save it? Is this a TN problem? Have I just been spoiled by Dells IPS panels?

I appreciate any suggestions.
Click to expand...

What kind of work do you do? I too have a shitty monitor setup at work. I have to prop the main monitor on the little Optiplex to get it to a decent height (2nd monitor is still too low). The monitors are both TN's and suck ass. But then again, it's a work pc, and I'm a developer, so I don't really care that much. I think you need to tune your expectations a bit, to be honest. Shimmering text may be the result of bad VGA phase/clock (if you're on DVI, ignore my comment). The settings that I personally have are slightly raised black levels and lowered white levels. I find that overly bright monitors give me a headache.

Answer to your last question - you've been spoiled by IPS. My co-workers all have better monitors than me (Dell 24-inch IPS) and their montiors all look nicer. But when you're staring at code, it doesn't matter all that much. ;)
 
We use the same displays where I work, and I think that they are just plain using terrible panels. My eyes get so strained throughout the day looking at this thing. Of course if you have worked on a decent quality IPS all these years, the transition is going to make it worse.

Here is a starting point for the lighting levels in my office. Adjust to your own. My monitor is connected to the computer via VGA. I tend to calibrate my color on the cool side.

Brightness: 70
Contrast: 80
Color: Custom (199, 207, 206)
Sharpness: 3 (1 applies a blurring filter)
Clock: 50
Clock Phase: 62

(Bottom two only apply if you're connected with VGA, of course.)
As you can see from my color settings the gamma is way off using any of the presets, so that may be your issue (as opposed to contrast).
 
Last edited:
hannibl said:
Requisition a new one, or bring in your own.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I might just have to. I do a lot of reading, reviewing and editing word documents and excel spreadsheets in my line of work, and black text on a white background is just obnoxious on this monitor.

It hurts my eyes and makes it tough to focus.

I'm not going to say this is the worst monitor I've ever used. Some of the LCD's in the 90's were atrocious.

It is - however - the worst monitor I have used in a long long time.

Washed out colors, headache inducing glare, poor enough viewing angles that the corners look weird when you are looking straight at it, and miserable height adjustment.

The word "elite" belongs nowhere in the name of this heaping pile of junk.

And I have to read about 200 standard operating procedures at ~15 pages each on it...
 
Last edited:
Since the training system is web based, I figured out I can read everything from my Nexus 7 instead.

Never thought I'd prefer a 7" screen to a 23.5" one.
 
Teenyman45 said:
Just for comparison purposes, is it 3,000 pages per day or week that you need to read?
Click to expand...

Well, this batch is really just upfront procedure training after starting a new job. Have to get it all done in 15 days after which my volume goes down a bit, or at least shifts to training only on updates and instead reviewing documents rather than just reading and training to them.

Medical device QA involves a lot of controlled procedures which must be officially trained to...
 
Last edited:
At my work, we are stuck with horrible 10+ year old HP 19" lcds.

1280x1024 sucks donkey balls, no matter the task!
But it especially sucks for engineering work!

I put up with it for 5 years. But as soon as I heard about the $300 Korean 27" lcds, I bought one for work and one for home.

Life is much better now.
 
J Macker said:
At my work, we are stuck with horrible 10+ year old HP 19" lcds.

1280x1024 sucks donkey balls, no matter the task!
But it especially sucks for engineering work!

I put up with it for 5 years. But as soon as I heard about the $300 Korean 27" lcds, I bought one for work and one for home.

Life is much better now.
Click to expand...

Nice. Did they let you expense the one for work?

I have a Dell IPS PLP setup at home. 30" 2560x1600 U3011 in the center flanked by two 20" 1600x1200 2007FP's on the side. Nothing I have at work is ever going to compare.

I'd be satisfied with a decent 1920x1080 (or preferably 1920x1200) at work as long as the quality didn't give me a headache when reading.

Extra resolution/real estate would just be a luxury.
 
Also on dual HP E221 monitors here at work. They suck. However, better to have the resolution on these than the dual 1280x1024 monitors I used to be on.

Not a huge deal for coding and email, but still...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top