Gateway FPD2485W - 24" HD LCD

[chizow]

1. Ghosting
   More and more I'm starting to notice a little bit of ghosting. Primarily it's on the desktop, when I move windows around, I'll see a small black trail as I move the window. In games I only notice it very rarely, and it's not bad enough to distract me at all.
   
   I don't think any LCD eliminates ghosting completely, its just more/less noticeable on some panels vs. others. Maybe some of the smaller 2ms or 22" TNs have less ghosting but afaik all of the 24" have it to some degree. Ghosting on this panel is better than the Dell where I would get pretty heavy red tracers from forum headers (Anandtech's grey for instance) and an overall lagging/tearing/ghosting effect in games. I probably take for granted how much better this panel is than the Dell in games, but I'm much happier now than I was a week ago with the Dell, that's for sure.
   
2. Banding
   I was a little disappointed at how much the monitor bands. A good example can be found here (scroll down to the gradient test). I definitely notice banding on that horizontal gradient. I also see it a little bit on the Xbox 360 dashboard. I've not noticed any in games.
   Actually I don't get any noticeable gradient/banding in that grey to black test although I do get some noise. I have noticed some banding though, mostly in non-native FMVs and a few times in DVD movies with PowerDVD. The scene in Troy in the beginning when the clouds roll in, there's heavy banding in the clouds. This was before I calibrated my colors though, which has helped a lot. Overall banding doesn't bother me as much as some other LCD weak points so I can live with it.
3. Viewing Angle
   I think someone mentioned this earlier in the thread, but my viewing angle doesn't seem to be centered quite right. If I sit in front of the monitor and stare straight at it, I notice that the left side is lighter than the right. If I move my head a few inches to the left, everything looks great.
   Ya I mentioned the viewing angles and panel uniformity on the Dell are better, as well as the colors out of the box. Its not even really the viewing angles since they are the 178/178 or w/e they advertise, its just not the same viewing angle across the entire panel. Not sure if I've adjusted to it or if the panel has evened out a bit with some backlight burn-in, but it doesn't bother me as much now as when I first fired it up.

I'm torn on whether or not to return it. It sounds like if I could pick up a December model that I'd have a good chance of alleviating a lot of these issues. Alone, none of the aforementioned problems would have been deal-breakers, but together they've started to bug me more and more. I think I'm gonna pack it up and try to hand-pick a December model this weekend from the local BB.

If you're not happy with it its worth the risk of trying to get a December panel. I still see a lot of the symptoms you're seeing and I have a DEC model, but they may very well be present in varying degrees and your next panel could actually be worst. But with a DEC you'll at least have the peace of mind its the latest known build, after that its just a matter of getting a panel without dead pixels and a bad backlight.

Skagen- I haven't seen any "D" models or later in this thread or at the physical B&Ms, I just figure if you're going to ask someone to pick for you might as well put it out there just in case. It makes sense its the next progression for January production runs but it could very well turn out B and C are actually revisions and the C designation lasts a few months of production.

Tzitziki- I still get some banding, although the banding I saw in Troy was before I adjusted color settings. Still saw a bit with lighting effects (like a candle in a dark room) in Dark Messiah but the settings Ferris23 and Drant posted eliminated the crushed blacks. I'll take a bit of banding here and there over crushed blacks any day. Scrolll up a bit as I reposted them on this page or the previous one.

Needo- Ya that's the best thing you can do really, especially now that most of the B&Ms have these set-up with real PCs vs. that generic video feed they run on the wall of display monitors. Keep in mind too that the display you saw was probably a NOV panel so the chances of getting something even more impressive with a DEC model is pretty good.

Hardwareguru- If the panel you have now has problems, you shouldn't hesitate to exchange it. No point in settling on a monitor with major problems when you purchased the warranty. Get a good one, then deal with it dying when the time comes. Who knows if/when Gateway comes out with a 27" and honestly, 1920x1200 doesn't look as good on a 27" as it does on a 24".

 

[chizow]

Me and a buddy were going to get the 37" westy, but after considering how far we would need to sit away from it, the impractibility (sp?) of taking it to LAN parties, haha, and seeing another buddy's 2485W in action, the Gateway it was. It gets used as a PC gaming display, XBox360 display, and as a TV for the bedroom via HD cable box, works GREAT for all of it....

How's the HD cable look? I was planning to get it up and running on my desktop once I got this monitor. Is it displayed in 1080p or 1080i? And what cable company do you use? But ya, this is a great cornerstone for an HTPC set-up for a bedroom or small apartment. I'll make the jump to a full-blown big screen HTPC next round maybe.

 

[needo]

How is the sound quality of the Gateway TDX Sound System that hooks to your FPD2485W?

 

[Manny Calavera]

Yeah please do. I just got in a huge debate with 2 techs and a supervisor and STILL was not able to get the warranty. They said that it has to be purchased online along with the monitor and only from Gateway. IMO it has to be a contract that retailers have with these companies so that Best Buy, Circuit City and such can sell their warranties and not have to compete with warranties of products they sell.

I don't know for sure, but I give up trying to get the cheaper warranty. I do kind of like having the Best Buy plan however because it's right up the road and I can get it swapped on the fly. They rarely try to repair LCD's. That being said it was 60 beans more than the Gateway plan.

I sent off another email after this post,and was again told NO by a Supervisor,unless its bought directly from Gateway Otherwise,I was told to buy a PRP,or PSP from BB,or Future Shop,but they are too $$$ up here in Canada.219$ for a 4 year warranty from BB + the LCD's original purchase price.If it had been different,I might have grabbed the 24" Gateway instead.

 

[Ferris23]

nm.

 

[cslogical]

Can you tell if it's a December model on the box or do you have to open it up? Thinking of getting one at my local Best Buy, also if I buy at BB should I buy their performance service plan?

 

[Ferris23]

I bought the plan just because it's pretty easy to "aquire" an issue with an LCD down the road in time for an upgrade.


You can narrow down getting a December, search this thread using the work sticker and you will get the info.

 

[bigforearms]

My own short review:

After having this monitor for a couple of weeks, I'm

- Greatly disappointed in the amount of banding. I'm not a picky video guy, but it's very, very noticeable.

- Very happy with gaming performance/ghosting

- Happy with colors (needed severe calibration, but they look good now)

- Very happy with size (of course)

- Mostly happy with viewing angle (some issues with this, but no panel eliminates it I guess)

- Happy with its performance watching OTA HDTV and HD-DVDs.

I'll be keeping it despite the banding because it doesn't sound as if the Dells are any better overall, and the BenQ is in an entirely different price range. My Gateway is a Dec. model.

 

[skagen]

My own short review:

After having this monitor for a couple of weeks, I'm

- Greatly disappointed in the amount of banding. I'm not a picky video guy, but it's very, very noticeable.

- Very happy with gaming performance/ghosting

- Happy with colors (needed severe calibration, but they look good now)

- Very happy with size (of course)

- Mostly happy with viewing angle (some issues with this, but no panel eliminates it I guess)

- Happy with its performance watching OTA HDTV and HD-DVDs.

I'll be keeping it despite the banding because it doesn't sound as if the Dells are any better overall, and the BenQ is in an entirely different price range. My Gateway is a Dec. model.

HOw did you calibrate your colors and what settings do you have?

 

[pablo]

first time posting here so hi to everyone. i just picked one up the 22" version and i got some pretty bad bleed at the top and bottom. im gonna have to exchange it tomorrow. anybody tell me the settings they are on.

 

[Drant]

xxx

 

[pablo]

the first part of serial MGK71 and its a jan 07 model

 

[Drant]

xxx

 

[Aquila76]

I really really tried to like this monitor and overlook it's nuances; but in the end, it's going back and I'm waiting for the NEC 24WMGX2.

I just couldn't deal with spending ~$700 on this and not getting it the way I wanted it to look. I got a December model and I didn't have any backlight bleeding; but, no matter what bright/cont/RGB/gamma settings I tried over this last week, I could not get gradients to show properly (ended up with banding or gradations). Also, the games I played where there is darkness (cave, hallway, tunnel, etc.) just lost any and all detail. The 'dark' reproduction of this monitor is too weak. DVD movies looked like ass on this, especially Star Wars where you have bright objects streaking across the dark like spaceships, laser shots, and, well, stars.

I must say, though, that going back to my 21" CRT makes the CRT look puny and dull.

 

[Ferris23]

DVD or HDDVD?

Any DVD movie will look like ass on an LCD, at least all those I have seen them on. Too bad you didn't like it, good luck with your next purchase. I don't have an issue with gradients and blacks are fine with the proper settings only slight detail is lost. To each his own I guess.

 

[jackaroe]

Question for you guys - I have been troubleshooting a nagging (but not disabling) issue with my Monoprice HDMI switch, and I stumbled on to something that may be of interest. I have a program called RivaTuner installed on my PC, which allows me to modify some of my 8800 GTX video card settings. Anyhow, the application also provides monitor information, including EDID. RivaTuner very consistently tells me that according to EDID, the maximum setting for this Gateway is 1600X1200, instead of the 1920X1200 that I have this thing set at. I can't but wonder if this has something to do with the "losing sync" issues I am having at times. Can anyone else out there view their EDID information for the Gateway 24" & let me know if theirs is also incorrect. Anyone know of a way for me to change the EDID values so that they can be correct?

 

[Ferris23]

My EDID tells me 1920x1200. Not sure of a fix but I am sure that your software is not reading your display properly.

 

[jackaroe]

What method did you use to check it Ferris?

 

[Ferris23]

EZTune 1.4

 

[jackaroe]

Ouch - EZTune isn't currently compatible with the 8800 series. Hmm - I wonder if there is another way to check, other than RivaTuner.

 

[Ferris23]

Powerstrip probably.

 

[TheRapture]

Too bad I can't get EZTune to properly see my FPD2485W under Vista.

I will wait though....sooner or later they will get it going....

 

[deeplove]

Guys, I'm sorry if I'm totally off topic here but I need some help.

My PC doesn't have a DVI connection and I want to be able to connect both the 24" Gateway with my 17" Gateway. I play my 360 on the VGA and I don't want to be removing each VGA cable all the time.

What's a pretty cheap and good card that brings DVI and I guess that it's able to play HD content?

Back to topic...

I'm having trouble with the EZ Tune. I keep getting a pop up. And it doesn't let me turn the monitor around to read the websites on the vertical thingy. Help me please.



Other than that, this monitor is sick.

 

[jackaroe]

Interesting, just installed PowerStrip. When I go to Monitor Information, and select "Read data from stored EDID", I get a resolution of 1920 X 1200. When I select "Read data directly from monitor", I get a DDC error which says DDC communication failed or is not supported. When I select "Read data from registry", I get a max resolution of 1600 X 1200. Anyone else have Powerstrip that can let me know if they see the same results with the Gateway?

 

[TalonMan]

Just joined the board! This is the thread that made me want to join. Lots of information here about our monitor. I still love mine if I could just get my HD Movie viewing fixed.

I have a odd resolution problem going on when I try to play any HD DVD on my HP Pavilion m7690n using the pre-installed player program 'DVD Play HD DVD' . When the DVD starts to play, my FPD2485W fills with video side to side, about a ¾” black border top and bottom, but only is displaying the upper left portion of the intended viewing area. Another words when the word UNIVERSAL is displayed at the start of the movie, I only see the tippie top of about the UNIV and the rest of the upper left quadrant of the display area. All of the other portion of the screen that I am intended to see is off of the monitor. I am seeing the upper left quaderant of the movie full screen and 24" wide! I get to see lots of big ear and right eye balls on the face closups.

System info - Running Windows XP Media Edition.
HD DVD drive is: Toshiba DVD/HD SD-H802A.
Current connection method: The digital cable.
Video Card is: NVIDIA’s GeForce 7600 GT (Memory 256MB GDDR3)
I always run in 1920 by 1200, and 32bit color for my screen resolution.

Program to check for HD readyness reported this:
Check Item HD DVD-----------------------------------------------Ready?-----------Info
Processor : Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU 6400 @ 2.13GHz---------Yes
System Memory : 2048 MB------------------------------------------Yes
Operating System : Windows XP Service Pack 2----------------Yes
Graphics Card : NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT-----------------------Yes
Graphics Card Driver : 6.14.10.9371-------------------------------Yes
HD DVD Drive : [G:] TOSHIBA DVD/HD SD-H802A-------------Yes
Software Player :---------------------------------------------------Not found------No More Info
Video Connection Type : Digital(with HDCP)----------------------Yes


Other odd symptoms:

If I open Windows explorer and point it to my HD DVD drive with an HD DVD movie in the drive, Windows reports, ‘Windows cannot read from this disk. The disk might be corrupted or it could be using a format that is not compatible with windows”. I don’t know if that is a normal message for HD DVD’s and explorer, this is my first one but seemed odd to me.

I downloaded another HD DVD player program ‘InterVideo WinDVD8’ and am currently in the free trial period. This HD Player program will not even start to play looking at my G: drive as input. It reports it cannot read the drive with a movie in the drive, same as Windows Explorer does.

I have changed on the monitor’s menu Video Scaling setting to all 3 positions Wide, Zoom, and 1:1 with no luck. Both my HD DVD’s (Doom and Born Supremacy) only play showing the upper left quadrant of the entire intended display area.

Under NVIDIA’s Control panel I have changed the 4 options: Use NVIDIA scaling, Use NVIDIA scaling with fixed-aspect ratio, Use my display’s built-in scaling, and Do not scale, none of which has changed the way my HD movies incorrectly play.

If when my HD Movie is playing showing my little peace of the movie full screen, I turn my FPD2485w off and on, forcing it to re-sync to whatever signal it is being fed, causes the movie to stop and player software to report this error: “Insert HD DVD/DVD or press play button. The content is protected. The content is not allowed to play in current display mode”.

When I had my computer hooked up to my CRT monitor, HD DVD’s played showing the intended viewing area of the movie. It did not look too good display wise, but it was all there. I wanted to get an official widescreen Display that was made for a HD signal. I have yet to see my Dec made Gateway LCD get fead and display a normal HD signal from it’s digital cable.

I would love to get this mystery figured out. Any help would be appreciated. I have given three different HP (cough, cough) teck's a crack at it with no luck.

 

[TalonMan]

Well, as odd as it sounds, my Gateway FPD2485W helped to solve my problem for me! Just for fun I activated the monitor's built in 'Resolution Reminder' option off of the Main menu, and then under Advanced. Even though Windows desktop properties was currently reporting that I was in 1,920 x 1,200 resolution, when my HD DVD started to play, the Gateway Resolution Reminder poped up a warning box telling me I was not in the perfured video mode of the LCD wich is 1,920 x 1,200.

I double clicked my player program to make it not take the entire desktop, and checked my current resolution while the movie was still playing. Windows XP was still reporting I was in 1,920 x 1,200 from my desktop settings. Just for fun I lowered the slider to the next lowest resolution, hit apply, then back to 1,920 x 1,200 and hit apply. Poof!! The entire HD DVD's intended viewing area was now correctly fitting into my players window, just the way the director intended.

Now every time I start my HD Player program, it is playing them correctly. It looks to be a permanent fix?

Windows gave me bad info I guess, or something internal was out of sync? Gateway 's FPD2485W built in Resolution Reminder pop up warning box, kept my nose pointed in the right direction on this trickey issue! This LCD just got 1 more point in my book. Sweet/Smart menu options.

Go Gateway!

 

[gZeoB]

When I play DVD over component 2 with the XBOX 360, I noticed that the image is not stable and flickers, like the monitor loses sync very frequently. It does not do that when I connect over component 1. Has anybody noticed such a strange behavior or is it just my monitor?

 

[wasteomind]

The store I work at sells these and I have been concidering picking one up.

We have about 24 units with the code MGQ71 (if i remember correctly)

Is that a january/febuary manufacture? and if so would this be a good model to pick up?

 

[HardwareGuru]

Just visited Circuit City today and I notice they carry the Gateway 24" in store along with the speaker bar that goes with it. The speaker bar is actually not bad. It has bass and treble settings and when I asked the saleman to test it out, it sounded pretty loud for a small speaker. They also have the 17" Gateway 16:9 LCD which I ended up buying for my notebook. The 24" Gateway would flicker badly when I have my notebook hooked up to it via dual display setup.

 

[Kooch66]

Hi All! This is my first post on here. I've been following a long time and it has been very useful! I've had the monitor for just over month now so I figure I will give my impressions then I have a question about Playstation 3 connectivity.

Impressions: First of all I have a Nov. release with absolutely no noise and no pixel problems. The display does run a bit warm and also shows minor ghosting issues. The only thing that really bothers me is the backlight bleed which varies in intensity in all four corners. Sometimes it is not there at all and other times it can get pretty bad. I contacted Gateway and they offered to ship me a new one but I haven't decided on that yet because I don't know if I want to risk getting one with noise, and dead pixels, etc. Overall I think it is a great display and I am definately glad I bought it.

PS3 Questions: I was thinking about getting a PS3 to go along with the display because I really want to watch Blu Ray movies in 1080P. I really don't want a PS3 right now but I also can't see spending 200 bucks on the 360 HD-DVD drive when I can just spend the 600 to get HD movies and a new system. In any case, I do have a few connectivity questions. I am planning on getting an HDMI- to -DVI cable to connect the PS3 to the display and then using the cables that come with the PS3 for audio. Am I correct that this will work properly? Also, I was wondering if there is any quality loss with a HDMI-DVI cable. Lastly, how is the PS3 interface as far as setting it to 1080p? The guy at Best Buy was telling me all this stuff about having to set the tv to 1080p first or else the Playstation will output at standard def or something...I'm not sure. With the 360 I just set it to 1900x1080 and that's that. Is it that easy? Has anyone watched any Blu Ray movies via PS3 on this monitor? Any good? Well I guess that's all. Thanks for responses in advance.

 

[tzitziki]

One of the reasons I bought the fpd2485w is to connect it to PS3 so here are some of my findings so far.

I am planning on getting an HDMI- to -DVI cable to connect the PS3 to the display and then using the cables that come with the PS3 for audio. Am I correct that this will work properly?

I have tested connecting the PS3 over an HDMI to HDMI cable with an HDMI to DVI adaptor on one side and it worked. I am assuming that an HDMI to DVI cable can only be (even marginally) better.

Also, I was wondering if there is any quality loss with a HDMI-DVI cable.

I wouldn't expect any quality differences cause the HDMI and DVI are electrically equivalent and they carry after all digital signals. The only difference of course is that DVI doesn't carry audio but as you said you can output that over the standard audio output of the PS3.

Lastly, how is the PS3 interface as far as setting it to 1080p? The guy at Best Buy was telling me all this stuff about having to set the tv to 1080p first or else the Playstation will output at standard def or something...I'm not sure. With the 360 I just set it to 1900x1080 and that's that. Is it that easy?

It's as easy as it can be. You set the output settings on PS3 on "Auto" over HDMI and then by default the PS3 picks the best resolution, 1080p that is. Then you need to go to the fpd2485w menu to make sure that 1:1 mode is enabled and you are all set. One nice thing to note is that the black bars on top and bottom, caused by the 16:9 aspect, are actually real black! What I mean is that the monitor actually turns off the LEDs that correspond to those two bars and as a result the screen is pitch black on the bars. This is really nice cause looking at the monitor from a 3 foot distance the bars integrate with the physical black frame of the monitor and you can't even see them! It also eliminates any bleeding you might be getting from the corners (quite a few fpd2485w have this problem) which is an added bonus of the 1:1 on 16:9.

One quick note. If you had connected your PS3 previously to an SD signal over composite/component, then it might not be able to output to HDMI as PS3 doesn't know you switched outputs. Still things are pretty easy. When powering-on the PS3, hold the power button down (the one on the console not the controller) for 5 seconds until it beeps. Then it will auto-detect the HDMI and once again you are all set.

Has anyone watched any Blu Ray movies via PS3 on this monitor? Any good? Well I guess that's all. Thanks for responses in advance.

I have watched "Talatega Nights" the BD movie that came with my PS3 (I got one of the first PS3s). The movie plays back perfectly.

Now some odd PS3 things:

1. 720p
As some people have noticed, when switching to a game that supports only up to 720p (such as the Motorstorm demo) the image fills the screen which doesn't make sense. I have the monitor set to 1:1 and I should be getting bars, but alas the bars are not there. That been said the display still looks awesome. Some people suggested that this is a PS3 issue but then again I don't have an other 720p input to test it.

2. 1920x1080 60Hz
Another odd thing. The monitor has an advanced menu that displays information about the input signal. On all the signals that I have tried outputing from the PS3 I get the correct signal information, for example 1080i, 720p, 480p, except for 1080p. When in 1080p mode the monitor information displays 1920x1080 60Hz making me think that it's either a misprint on the monitor firmware or something deeper which I cannot understand. As I said though, the monitor played the BD movie perfectly which means that HDCP should be working, but then again I have my reservations.

3. Tearing
When you connect the screen to the PS3, then XMB interface starts to tear right on the middle of the screen. As you move on the XMB left and right you see the screen splitting into an upper half and bottom half. This is really weird and it is clearly an issue of the PS3 graphics card. If you restart the PS3 the issue is usually resolved.

All in all hooking up the PS3 over HDMI to the Gateway will blow your socks off!
Enjoy.

 

[tzitziki]

Writing my previous post I realized that the fpd2485w has the potential to fix the corner bleeding by itself! Here is what I did. I was watching a movie from my PC connected to the Gateway over 1920x1200. Of course on the dark scenes I could see some bleeding on the four corners (I think I don't mind it over all but it still nevertheless was there). For some reason and because of my PS3 experience, I remembered that the back-light LEDs are turned off for the black bars when in 16:9 1:1 mode. Then it stroke me, why don't I switch the GC on my PC to 1920x1080 and the monitor to 1:1 to force the black bars to be REAL black?

Well I did, and voila, pitch-black upper-lower bars and bleeding is gone! I realize that this is a gimmicky solution but it still works!

I realize what I nice feature would this be for any LCD monitor. Imagine watching a 2.3 aspect-ratio anamorphic movie that is ultra wide. Can you imagine how nice it would be if you could selectively turn of rows of LEDs to make sure that the black bars are REAL black? ? ?

For a monitor such as the BenQ fp241wz with BFI which essentially turns off rows of LEDs to simulate Black-Frame-Insertion this should be a piece of cake.

Wishful thinking ...

 

[chizow]

The store I work at sells these and I have been concidering picking one up.

We have about 24 units with the code MGQ71 (if i remember correctly)

Is that a january/febuary manufacture? and if so would this be a good model to pick up?

That looks to be a 22" serial #. Someone posted their Serial for the 22" on the previous page and its MGL71. Also 24 in-stock of the 24" seems to be a lot considering most stores I've been to have 2-4 max. The 24" should be MGL6[X] with [X] being a letter from B-???. Good luck. Looks like a lot of people are happy with their FPD2485W.

 

[Tim-in-CA]

Just visited Circuit City today and I notice they carry the Gateway 24" in store along with the speaker bar that goes with it. The speaker bar is actually not bad. It has bass and treble settings and when I asked the saleman to test it out, it sounded pretty loud for a small speaker. They also have the 17" Gateway 16:9 LCD which I ended up buying for my notebook. The 24" Gateway would flicker badly when I have my notebook hooked up to it via dual display setup.

Did you pick up the speaker bar? I also heard that you can get it with a discount thru HSN plus free shipping. There's a comment several pages back in this thread.

Did you try going into your display control panel applet and adjusting the refresh rate on the Gateway 24 display? This may be a limitation of your notebook's graphic capabilities as you are pumping out a log of pixels (1920 x 1200) plus whatever your notebook's res is as well. I don't think that this is the fault of the 24 ... Did you try just the 24W (non-extended desktop)?

On a separate note, how do you like the 17W? Seems like a good value for an entry level widescreen.

Tim-in-CA

 

[HardwareGuru]

Did you pick up the speaker bar? I also heard that you can get it with a discount thru HSN plus free shipping. There's a comment several pages back in this thread.

Did you try going into your display control panel applet and adjusting the refresh rate on the Gateway 24 display? This may be a limitation of your notebook's graphic capabilities as you are pumping out a log of pixels (1920 x 1200) plus whatever your notebook's res is as well. I don't think that this is the fault of the 24 ... Did you try just the 24W (non-extended desktop)?

On a separate note, how do you like the 17W? Seems like a good value for an entry level widescreen.

Tim-in-CA

No, I didn't pickup the speaker bar. I almost did though just to compliment the monitor. But then, I already have speakers and felt it was not needed. It does make the overall monitor look HUGE with that thing attached to it. As far as the flickering, I am not blaming the 24" LCD as others have flickering also when they run dual display also. On the 17", I actually have the 17" LCD near my bed because I work on my notebook on the bed and wanted another screen to copy and paste from one screen to the other. I really like this 17 Widescreen LCD because it is a 16:9 ratio. I have my XBOX360 hooked up to it at 1280 x 720 and it looks perfect. I previously had a 15.4 widescreen SYNAPS monitor I bought at Walmart and that thing really sucked. The backlight bleeding is really bad. The 17" WS LCD has an optional speaker bar that can be mounted on it as well. The buttons and menu settings is setup the same as how it is on the 21" Gateway LCD. Overall, I really like the new 17" WS Gateway LCD.

 

[Kooch66]

Writing my previous post I realized that the fpd2485w has the potential to fix the corner bleeding by itself! Here is what I did. I was watching a movie from my PC connected to the Gateway over 1920x1200. Of course on the dark scenes I could see some bleeding on the four corners (I think I don't mind it over all but it still nevertheless was there). For some reason and because of my PS3 experience, I remembered that the back-light LEDs are turned off for the black bars when in 16:9 1:1 mode. Then it stroke me, why don't I switch the GC on my PC to 1920x1080 and the monitor to 1:1 to force the black bars to be REAL black?

Well I did, and voila, pitch-black upper-lower bars and bleeding is gone! I realize that this is a gimmicky solution but it still works!

I realize what I nice feature would this be for any LCD monitor. Imagine watching a 2.3 aspect-ratio anamorphic movie that is ultra wide. Can you imagine how nice it would be if you could selectively turn of rows of LEDs to make sure that the black bars are REAL black? ? ?

For a monitor such as the BenQ fp241wz with BFI which essentially turns off rows of LEDs to simulate Black-Frame-Insertion this should be a piece of cake.

Wishful thinking ...

First of all thanks so much for such a detailed response!! Great Stuff! However, how do you make the display turn off the top and bottom LEDs?? I watch movies via my 360 in 1:1 mode all the time and I have bars at the top and bottom but the backlight is def bleeding through up there. Did I read this right that I can make the lights actually turn off where the black bars are?

 

[ctishue]

That looks to be a 22" serial #. Someone posted their Serial for the 22" on the previous page and its MGL71. Also 24 in-stock of the 24" seems to be a lot considering most stores I've been to have 2-4 max. The 24" should be MGL6[X] with [X] being a letter from B-???. Good luck. Looks like a lot of people are happy with their FPD2485W.

Nope he's right. I just picked up an fpd2485w from Best Buy today thats is MGQ71, build date of January 2007.

The colors pop a lot more than my HP L2335 23" panel. There's a slight ghosting, but nothing as bad as the original Dell 2405fpw I returned due to input lag. One thing thats bothering me though is World of Warcraft seems to flicker in certain areas now and I seemingly get more texture tearing. It's also hard to get the brightness/contrast right. I can see some banding in the sky in WoW also. I use a Mac Pro so I can't try Gateway's EZtune software. I get no buzzing or anything like that. I have some slight bleeding in each of the 4 corners. Right now I don't know if I'm keeping it. I'll fiddle with WoW some more and see.

 

[wasteomind]

Nope he's right. I just picked up an fpd2485w from Best Buy today thats is MGQ71, build date of January 2007.

The colors pop a lot more than my HP L2335 23" panel. There's a slight ghosting, but nothing as bad as the original Dell 2405fpw I returned due to input lag. One thing thats bothering me though is World of Warcraft seems to flicker in certain areas now and I seemingly get more texture tearing. It's also hard to get the brightness/contrast right. I can see some banding in the sky in WoW also. I use a Mac Pro so I can't try Gateway's EZtune software. I get no buzzing or anything like that. I have some slight bleeding in each of the 4 corners. Right now I don't know if I'm keeping it. I'll fiddle with WoW some more and see.

Ok thank you for the response, I was sure that I saw MGQ71. Just wanted to be sure it was a recent build.

I'm probably going to pick one up on tuesday then, and we'll see how it goes.

 

[chizow]

Nope he's right. I just picked up an fpd2485w from Best Buy today thats is MGQ71, build date of January 2007.

The colors pop a lot more than my HP L2335 23" panel. There's a slight ghosting, but nothing as bad as the original Dell 2405fpw I returned due to input lag. One thing thats bothering me though is World of Warcraft seems to flicker in certain areas now and I seemingly get more texture tearing. It's also hard to get the brightness/contrast right. I can see some banding in the sky in WoW also. I use a Mac Pro so I can't try Gateway's EZtune software. I get no buzzing or anything like that. I have some slight bleeding in each of the 4 corners. Right now I don't know if I'm keeping it. I'll fiddle with WoW some more and see.

Ah cool thanks for the confirmation. When you mean flicker, its like the backlight is going out like a lightbulb that's going bad? One thing you can try is connecting your monitor through a power conditioner (fancy surge protector). You can also try a different DVI cable as the one that comes with it isn't as nice as the one that came with the Dell 2407. For texture tearing you might want to try enabling Vsync in your video card drivers. WoW is locked at 60 fps anyways (I think) so enabling Vsync should take care of that. But ya brightness/contrast are horrible out of the box and if you're coming from a Dell 24" it'll be particularly noticeable. Try some of the settings mentioned earlier in this thread, after that it just takes some getting used to.

I'll probably take this back now that there's confirmation of a January build. I'm fine with everything on my panel except the backlight bleeding and 3 dead pixels which leaves only the banding which I can live with.

 

[ctishue]

Nah the flicker isn't a constant thing. It only happens with certain textures (ground textures in some zones) in WoW on these 24" panels. It never happened on my 23" HP S-IPS panel, but I like the 24" panels better because they have eye popping colors/contrast that the S-IPS panels lack.