Dell UltraSharp U3011 $1124 + Tax w/ Free Shipping

Dell has an OSD, but more input lag by 250%. The HP only has DVI and DP inputs, but that's pretty much all you need. It's more barebones I must admit. However, if you want to calibrate, why cheap out on calibration software when you are buying a $1200 monitor anyway?
 
BK_201 said:
Dell has an OSD, but more input lag by 250%. The HP only has DVI and DP inputs, but that's pretty much all you need. It's more barebones I must admit. However, if you want to calibrate, why cheap out on calibration software when you are buying a $1200 monitor anyway?
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In absolute terms, this is 25ms compared to 10ms and is not discernible to the average human eye. IMO, it is far outweighed by the other benefits of the U3011. And the factory calibration is a very nice benefit if you are not willing to invest an additional $300 in a quality colorimeter.
 
BK_201 said:
It's all preference and the deciding factor of initial cost I suppose.
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That's true, but preference should also be based on technical factors. My argument was also based on both monitors selling for the same price, which happened to be the case with the latest discounts on the Dell.
 
35% off one of the best monitors in the game is insane i doubt this will beat for a long time.
 
Mine showed up today. I'm liking it. Still need to make the colors match, but fabulous to have all that pixel space again. Will do some gaming on it tonight.
 
heelix said:
Mine showed up today. I'm liking it. Still need to make the colors match, but fabulous to have all that pixel space again. Will do some gaming on it tonight.
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Pics!!! still waiting for mine to show shipped :D
 
heelix said:
Mine showed up today. I'm liking it. Still need to make the colors match, but fabulous to have all that pixel space again. Will do some gaming on it tonight.
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I got mine on Saturday. Loving it thus far! :D

(Now I just need my GTX580 to hurry its way here so I can get some better frame rates at 2560x1600!)
 
Psychor said:
If you play FPS games and have good eyesight I disagree.
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I have good eyesight and play FPS games on my 3008WFP, which has even more input lag than the U3011, and it's been the best monitor I've ever owned. So the U3011 should be even better, even if it's not a massive upgrade.

Look people, this crap has been discussed ad nauseum and many of us are tired of seeing it. You can't really claim that there is a "best" since everyone has different requirements and sacrifices that they are willing to make. BK_201 said it best -- it's all about personal preference. If you're sensitive to input lag, which I'm not, then the ZR30W is probably the better option. If you require multiple inputs and desire an OSD and scaler, the U3011 is the obvious choice.

No point in arguing which is best in absolute terms, since what's best for one particular person isn't going to be the best for everyone. Just like there is no "best" between nVidia and ATI (even though nVidia is better, lol j/k) ;)
 
Hey guys, hoping for pointers, what video card should I be looking for in black friday/cyber monday sales to power mine once it arrives? I currently have an e8400 cpu and a 9800gt video card. I figure I'd benefit from some more juice in the video card department. Basically I've heard that my cpu will bottleneck higher end ones, so I'm wondering what the top end I could see improvement with video card wise is before I get bottle necked.

Thanks.
 
PhantmShado said:
Hey guys, hoping for pointers, what video card should I be looking for in black friday/cyber monday sales to power mine once it arrives? I currently have an e8400 cpu and a 9800gt video card. I figure I'd benefit from some more juice in the video card department. Basically I've heard that my cpu will bottleneck higher end ones, so I'm wondering what the top end I could see improvement with video card wise is before I get bottle necked.

Thanks.
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I think you may have posted this in the wrong thread...
 
Zarathustra[H];1036466403 said:
I think you may have posted this in the wrong thread...
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It's just called threadjacking, and he could start by looking at benchmarks.
 
Well, I've played some games on it. A few pictures.

* Side by side with a 2707 Both monitors were reset back to 'factory default' calibration. The red/yellow differ a bit without tuning.

* Size difference of text. Both scripts are the same size in pixels. Really need to fix my 2707 now (gah, the white is not white).

* SupComl:FA. Primary monitor (u3011) @ 2560x1600, 2707 @ 1920x1200. Looks fantastic. Also started up as a non-native resolution - 1920x1200 - since I had started out with another monitor before plugging this one in. Seemed better than I expected for being an 'off' multiplier.

* TF2 No detectable input lag. This is going to be just fine at native.

* SC2 looks lovely native.

* Crysis @1280x800. Looks fine.
 
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PC_User said:
Who delivers during the holidays?
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Santa?

images
 
So i purchased this monitor on friday the 19th with an expected delivery date of 12/17. Just checked my email and got this:

Ship date
Nov 22, 2010

Estimated delivery
Nov 24, 2010


Awesome, but now I need to get a saw to cut the shelves down on my desk a bit so the 30incher can squeeze in there :p
 
Apathy said:
So i purchased this monitor on friday the 19th with an expected delivery date of 12/17. Just checked my email and got this:

Ship date
Nov 22, 2010

Estimated delivery
Nov 24, 2010


Awesome, but now I need to get a saw to cut the shelves down on my desk a bit so the 30incher can squeeze in there :p
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Same here on the buy/ship dates. Can't wait as this will be a nice upgrade from my 5yr old 24in Samsung. Only problem is I work that day and won't be home. :( Wonder if a sig will be required.
 
Vegasr said:
Same here on the buy/ship dates. Can't wait as this will be a nice upgrade from my 5yr old 24in Samsung. Only problem is I work that day and won't be home. :( Wonder if a sig will be required.
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Yes, it is required. I'm staying home from work tomorrow so I can get mine.
 
Zarathustra[H];1036463776 said:
I have also read about the LUT.

Can anyone - in laymans terms - explain how a monitor uses a lookup table and why?
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LCD's don't have a linear response. This means if you send twice as much current to a pixel it won't open twice as far and become twice as bright. This is in turn compounded by the fact that the color filters used to turn a monochrome 7680x1600 panel into an RGB 2560x1600 device don't produce pure light at exactly equal transparencies. As a result the monitor needs to do a bit of math to know how much current to send to the transistors controlling each pixel to create a given RGB color; the magic numbers plugged into the formulas used to do that are stored in the lookup table. Adding to the joy, each monitor has a slightly different response pattern (so a single calibrated result won't be perfect for other displays); and the color balance changes as the panel ages so even a perfect factory calibration will be slightly off after a few months of use.

The conventional method of correcting for this is to use something called a colorimeter to measure the difference between what a monitor outputs and what the OS thinks its outputting and then create a lookup table in the OS to map each color in userspace to the closest match on the monitor. The limitation here is that it can result in banding because it can't get shades that the monitor isn't producing.

example, grayscale levels 0 through 9 (all values normalized)
Desired value, Measured, value, value in OS lookup table, resulting value on screen

0 0.0 0 0.0
1 1.7 1 1.7
2 2.7 1 1.7
3 2.9 3 2.9
4 3.3 4 3.3
5 6.9 4 3.3
6 8.5 5 6.9
7 8.7 5 8.5
8 8.9 6 8.5
9 9.0 9 9

I deliberately made the measured results here very bad, but errors of about 2 levels (out of 255) are common on good uncalibrated LCDs. While each individual color in corrected by the OS is closer to the correct one, by skipping some output levels entirely and having several levels input levels map to the same output level you end up increasing the banding of the display in gradients.

A programmable lookup table on the monitor would allow you to change the numbers in the 2nd table to be closer to the right values. I'm curious how HP's implemented theirs. I was under the impression that NEC had programmable LUTs on the monitor locked up via patents.
 
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