Gateway's FPD2185W: a 21in widescreen 2005fpw killer!

Also note this is only monitor at present that supports high definition video through Windows Vista all other monitors out currently are not compatible with hd through the next windows.

Seems without the protection chip hd will look blurry through next operating system and this is only monitor so far that is compatible through the onboard chip in the monitor. I saw the monitor played with resolutions looks not too great in 800x600 definitely better in 1024x768. I am going to one myself even though little more pricier but reasonable up in Canada its 749.99 before taxes. Get it before thursday you get monitor at 749.99 (original 799.99 after wednesday)


My two cents worth <lol>
 
Got to Best buy and have them look up when it's going to be in their district warehouse... if it's not too long and it shouldnt be... then have them ship it straight to your house... cheers
 
I get almost $80+ off the display and more off the Performance Service Plan when I get it at Best Buy! I think it is worth the wait. ;)

I'd want a brand new one (most likely a better one) if this one ever gives me trouble down the road. I'll just order it under Customer Fullfillment at the store or have it shipped from a nearby store that has one.
 
I think this is the LCD monitor I will get, unless Dell comes out with something by Q1 2006. I will wait until next year probably (due to year-end bonus), unless I see a good sale at Best Buy or something.

Also, I honestly don't see why they shouldn't mark this one down even though it's new - its competition is the Dell 2005fwp and for example that one is on sale now for $439. Compared to $599, that is a HUGE difference in price. Especially when people have gotten the Dell for $400 in the past...
 
I went into futureshop and had a look at this panel. They had it plugged in via vga and none of their crappy display computers could do dvi. Aside from that minor fact the screen looked amazing. I did notice the color wash problem.... when i started bobbing left and right like an idiot. You really have to lean at least a few feet to the left or right to notice it. This makes me wonder what the people complaining about the wash effect are doing.

All in all, it looks great and I'll probably pick one up around christmas time.


Oh, and the salesperson tried to tell me that dcdi meant it "passed very high quality standards and has a low refresh rate". I almost burst out laughing.
 
Hey all,

Just wanted to let everyone know I got my Gateway 21" yesterday via UPS and so far here are my initial impressions:

Desktop looks great, I am currently not using DVI as all I have is a DVI-I and it requires a DVI-D but that will soon be corrected. With VGA I do notice some signal interference and a tiny bit of blurring but it could be a lot worse.

Games look amazing! I played Psychonauts, Half-Life 2, Unreal Tournament 2004 and Neverwinter Nights and there is almost no ghosting. The 8 ms response time really comes through here. I haven't had a chance to play online yet so the real test is yet to come.

I have a few HD trailers and things of the sort and they look beautiful.

Now to the cons. First thing was when I turned the monitor on there was a very slight whining noise, my hearing isn't that great but no one else seemed to notice it though and I stopped noticing after starting to actually use my computer so unless you are specifically listening for it you won't even notice so it's a small con.

There is a little bit of backlight bleeding, not the worst I have ever seen but when messing with the settings I find I could find a decent combination between quality and reducing the black light bleeding, or atleast so I didn't notice it as much.

Plugged in my component progressive scan DVD player, confirmed it was running in 480p and it doesn't look that great but that's kind of to be expected when streching from 480p to 1680x1050.

Tonight I will try and get some component HD Xbox cables and try Halo 2 and X-men Legends (which runs in 720p) and maybe take some pictures for you guys. Let me know if you have any questions or requests for pictures as I am perfectly willing to try whatever I can for you guys. My initial impressions are pretty good and I am really liking it but can't wait to get the Xbox 360 and a DVI-D cable so I can really test this thing out.

EDIT: Also I did notice a minor amount of color wash but it really doesn't bother me and from what I have seen of other widescreen LCD monitors it's really not that bad. Noticable but not that bad and I am coming from a 20" CRT that did 1600x1200 at 85hz and although the image isn't quite as clear it is more than acceptable.
 
I saw this on display at Office Depot and it seemed pretty nice to me. Better than the rest of the monitors on display and better than the Samsung 930B which I bought and took back. And that was in non-native 1024 res.

The first time this goes on sale, I think I'm going to pick one up.

Oh and the stand works perfectly. You can move it up or down with one finger.

... and yes, please post pics. :)
 
Hi there...

For those with experience with this LCD, what happens with a game that can't be made to run in the native res? I'm assuming if I selected 1280*1024 res it would stretch what's left over to fit the 1680*1050 res? If you wanted a non-stretched image, is there a way on the panel to do a 1:1 with bars sides and top/bottom?

I'm a total newb to WS monitors but trying to understand how this LCD would handle it. From what ive read, the Dells have an option for this but I gather the Gateway might not. I'd like to confirm this or here if there's a way around it to avoid stretching of the image if possible.

Thanks a bunch in advance
Steph
 
Trickery said:
Same return policies from BestBuy.com apply just as if you bought it directly at the store. You just have to bring in the printout of the invoice with the BBY online order #.
Click to expand...


They charge for open item stuff right?
 
stephpar said:
Hi there...

For those with experience with this LCD, what happens with a game that can't be made to run in the native res? I'm assuming if I selected 1280*1024 res it would stretch what's left over to fit the 1680*1050 res? If you wanted a non-stretched image, is there a way on the panel to do a 1:1 with bars sides and top/bottom?

I'm a total newb to WS monitors but trying to understand how this LCD would handle it. From what ive read, the Dells have an option for this but I gather the Gateway might not. I'd like to confirm this or here if there's a way around it to avoid stretching of the image if possible.

Thanks a bunch in advance
Steph
Click to expand...

The game will stretch full screen. It looks great though. Some games that have an option in the games options for full screen can be unchecked then you'll get the letterbox. This screen scales very well and I think you'll like full screen better but it's nice when you can choose.
 
I pruchased mine yesterday from Bestbuy. I work at Geeksquad there so I managed to find one even though they are back ordered everywhere.

This is my first LCD and I am moving from a Viewsonic E70fb CRT (actually I haven't moved, I have that as a secondary in dual moniter setup). I was blown away by the clearity of the image on this thing. The contrast ratio is amazing. The blacks look so dark and I love it. I am no exactly sure what bleeding or ghosting means but didn't see any of that. Far cry looked beautiful at 1680 by 1050 (one of the few games I have that have that res).

Now for the questions? I am using VGA cable. I will get a DVI cable today. Whats a DVI-D versus DVI-I? Someone on this forum said it allows 70Hz on native res.

My graphics card X850 Pro (AGP) doesn't have a 1680 by 1050 native resollution support? Is that bad? I was considering a 7800GT to move to since I can return the first card if I want. Does that card support the native res better? I am running it at native at the moment.

Also the DVD's didn't look as great as I expected. Is there something I can do to make that better?

Last question. The quality of my 17" CRT has gone down a lot. It seems to be a lot darker and there are sometimes curving effects. Has that got something to do with it being placed right nex to the LCD?
 
Kasher_Khan said:
I pruchased mine yesterday from Bestbuy. I work at Geeksquad there so I managed to find one even though they are back ordered everywhere.

This is my first LCD and I am moving from a Viewsonic E70fb CRT (actually I haven't moved, I have that as a secondary in dual moniter setup). I was blown away by the clearity of the image on this thing. The contrast ratio is amazing. The blacks look so dark and I love it. I am no exactly sure what bleeding or ghosting means but didn't see any of that. Far cry looked beautiful at 1680 by 1050 (one of the few games I have that have that res).

Now for the questions? I am using VGA cable. I will get a DVI cable today. Whats a DVI-D versus DVI-I? Someone on this forum said it allows 70Hz on native res.

My graphics card X850 Pro (AGP) doesn't have a 1680 by 1050 native resollution support? Is that bad? I was considering a 7800GT to move to since I can return the first card if I want. Does that card support the native res better? I am running it at native at the moment.

Also the DVD's didn't look as great as I expected. Is there something I can do to make that better?

Last question. The quality of my 17" CRT has gone down a lot. It seems to be a lot darker and there are sometimes curving effects. Has that got something to do with it being placed right nex to the LCD?
Click to expand...

Strongly recommend the 7800GT for this display. DVI i is on the videocard and dvi-d is on the monitor. This monitor looks 2x as good on digital (not really but much better ;) ) The Geforce 7800GT will support 1680x1050 fine as it has 1 dvi and 1 dual link dvi. i think the problem you are having may be a card limitation and once you go 7800 you shouldn't have any issue as your setup will be similar to mine.
 
I'm glad to hear some positive opinions of this monitor, as I'm considering going widescreen myself and I love the price + features on this one :)
 
Kasher_Khan said:
I pruchased mine yesterday from Bestbuy. I work at Geeksquad there so I managed to find one even though they are back ordered everywhere.
This is my first LCD and I am moving from a Viewsonic E70fb CRT (actually I haven't moved, I have that as a secondary in dual moniter setup). I was blown away by the clearity of the image on this thing. The contrast ratio is amazing. The blacks look so dark and I love it. I am no exactly sure what bleeding or ghosting means but didn't see any of that. Far cry looked beautiful at 1680 by 1050 (one of the few games I have that have that res).
Now for the questions? I am using VGA cable. I will get a DVI cable today. Whats a DVI-D versus DVI-I? Someone on this forum said it allows 70Hz on native res.
My graphics card X850 Pro (AGP) doesn't have a 1680 by 1050 native resollution support? Is that bad? I was considering a 7800GT to move to since I can return the first card if I want. Does that card support the native res better? I am running it at native at the moment.
Also the DVD's didn't look as great as I expected. Is there something I can do to make that better?
Last question. The quality of my 17" CRT has gone down a lot. It seems to be a lot darker and there are sometimes curving effects. Has that got something to do with it being placed right nex to the LCD?
Click to expand...

When I had this lcd I ran it with a Dvi-d cable on both ends and it ran fine. I did try to connect it with a dvi-i cable originally and it was identified as an anologue connection so I went with the dvi-d cable instead and it gave me a sharper picture. I had an ati radeon 9550 and it ran the 1680x1050 rez fine. The only thing that I had to do was install the software that the lcd came with and the rez showed up on the list. I don't see why your card wouldn't be the same considering that it's much higher end than the 9550. As far as your dvds I used the component connector with the Enhanced video processing with DCDi by Fajoudja for sharp video images enabled and it does make a differnce. Mine was disabled and once I enabled it it looked much nicer. Hope that helps!
rbq
 
Ok! So I went to Bestbuy and got myself a DVI cable ($2.90 lolz). I can't point out what exactly changed but I could swear the screen looks better.

Now the only thing is I can't get the LCD to show 70HZ even though the moniter recognises the DVI input. In my ATI contorl panel, it would only show 60HZ as the max this moniter supports. So please help me figure this out. I installed the Eztune software that came with the moniter but that didn't help much.

Thanx
 
Most you get on digital is 60hz. in vga you can do up to 75hz. In digital mode 60hz is the max on this pannel and it doesn't need any higher.
 
Lord_Exodia said:
Most you get on digital is 60hz. in vga you can do up to 75hz. In digital mode 60hz is the max on this pannel and it doesn't need any higher.
Click to expand...

Thanx Lord_Exodia. I looked back through this thread and realized I had it wrong. I am happy with the image quality and gettin to the higher refresh rate is a just an old habbit from my CRT days :) lolz.

Would highly recommend this moniter to anyone. I have been fidling around with it and no problems so far.
 
Hello all,

I think I found this post/thread like alot of you...looking for more information or a review on this new toy. I am approaching this from a different angle...I have already spent alot of time with one of these monitors....gaming, web, e-mail, word, etc. My friend across the street got one and brought it over to my house to see it on a card with DVI...I have a ATI X800...his laptop just has analog. We both were in awe of this monitor...it looks really good. We saw it hooked up to his laptop at first with a standard vga connection and it was just ok...but once we hooked it up with DVI and could feed it the native 1680x1050 signal....WOW!!!

I am actually looking for a reason NOT to buy one...weird huh? It looks that good and I have had no issue with it playing CS Source...it blows my 19" Samsung 955DF out of the water on color vibrance and text clarity....it has about the nicest black level I have seen on a LCD to date. And...once you play CS in widescreen...it is painful to go back to a standard non-widescreen monitor...which I had to do after several days when he decided to take it back home. He is flying home for Thanksgiving for a week and said I can have it while he is gone...sort of like a sleepover!!! lol ;-)

Everything I have read speaks so negativley about PVA based panels and say IPS is the only way to go...and you read about colorwash...and every other pro/con of the different technologies. My brain is looking for a valid technical reason NOT to buy this thing...because my eyes and my non-logical brain say...."This Monitor Rocks".

I guess what it all boils down to after I read all the technical stuff, specs and reviews is that no matter how much I fight it...I have to say this monitor would make me absolutley giddy everytime I played a game or viewed text on it. Next to my CRT...it blows it away.

I am going to spend this weekend and next week playing with it...and I will give you more or less of what I think after...but right now...the only thing stopping me forom hitting gateway.com and whipping out a credit card is my wife...and even she loves it and is 'this' close to caving in. I think after next week one of these babies will have a new home on my desktop. My only real complaint is the menu button layout is horrible. Anyone have a reason to talk me out of one? :)
 
Nope, I have one and I think it's one monitor I couldn't live without. I have enjoyed it since I bought it. It lives up to all its specs. I have a buddy who said he saw it at bestbuy and walked by stood and watched it, he said it wasn't all that. I told him to go look at it again as he lives in another state. I told him this time sit in front of it. He listened and bought one the same day. He has it beside his dell 2005fpw and likes the gateway more. I think this monitor is very underrated and anyone who has not sat in front of one is really missing out.
 
Hello

I just go back from Best Buy with that monitor, and was striked by buyer's remorses before I even got to open the box.

I really dont know what to think about this monitor. I think I am a bit disappointed. Text under windows doesn't look striking sharp, and everything that doesn't run in the monitor native resolution is just stretched. But the sheer size of this monitor in addition of the widescreen ratio is really something.

I'll post picture and more impression later on after I'll fiddle with some of the options.
 
I decided to order the monitor online. Its cheaper with the 3year warrenty(only 29 dollars) to best buy(119). I can wait a week to get it. I am coming from a sony 20 inch crt. I will post pictures when it comes in.
 
The UPS man just dropped mine off today. It looks sharper than my Viewsonic G220fb(21"crt). I'm very happy with pic and text quality. Unfortunately, BF2 has decided not to work for me. I've tried some of the tweaks @widescreengamingforum.com, but to no avail. Not even with 4:3 resolutions, just exits to desktop. Hopefully, I'll figure this out later. I've got HL2 and CS:Source downloading now. Haven't played those games in a long time, I even uninstalled steam. Can't wait to game some with this. If I have time tomorrow I'll hook up one of my hd cable boxes to this and see how the HD quality looks.
 
Some quick pictures before I go stand in line for an xb360 :D

P1000100.jpg


P1000107.jpg
 
Picked one up today for $705.44 cdn from futureshop (owned by EB).

The text clarity seems to leave something to be desired... but i'm also stuck on VGA so that may not be helping.

Beutiful for gaming, even if its not 4ms I think I can put up with it ;)




Seems to be the colors are almost oversaturated possibly... turning down brightness or contrast helped a bit.

EDIT

Where do I get some drivers for this? My box only had 1 cd with the EZTune software on it.. and a manual, but no drivers? Cant seem to google the drivers either.
 
STEvil said:
Picked one up today for $705.44 cdn from futureshop (owned by EB).
The text clarity seems to leave something to be desired... but i'm also stuck on VGA so that may not be helping.
Beutiful for gaming, even if its not 4ms I think I can put up with it ;)
Seems to be the colors are almost oversaturated possibly... turning down brightness or contrast helped a bit.
EDIT
Where do I get some drivers for this? My box only had 1 cd with the EZTune software on it.. and a manual, but no drivers? Cant seem to google the drivers either.
Click to expand...

Wow! how did you get that deal from fs?
what do you mean by drivers? I wasn't getting the 1680x1050 rez on the drop down list until I installed the eztune software.
 
I noticed a few comments about text quality...and one thing I can definitely add from my experience with this monitor is that the text does not look as good with a analog connection as it does with DVI. When we hooked it up to my friends laptop via analog it looked good...not as crisp and clean on the text as I was expecting...but once hooked to DVI....it was awesome. This did not surprise me one bit to be honest. I build computers as a hobby/side income and one general statement I can make is this...no LCD panel I have ever used in a build looked as good hooked up analog as it did DVI...especially when it comes to text crispness and clarity.

Every computer I have built for the last year or so has a video card with DVI...even if the client does not use it. It is there for when they want to upgrade to a flat panel...and I tell every one I consult...if you buy an LCD...it HAS to have a DVI connection.
 
To everyone who just bought this pannel. Keep in mind this is a HD Flat pannel. It's not among your standard type of flat pannels. this is up there with the Dell Ultrasharp HD Flat pannel series. It only begins to shine with DVI as when it's on VGA the picture is truly degradaded and dvi or component gives it the bandwidth it requires to truly shine. The monitor has a dvi -d port at the bottom. Most videocards have a DVI -i. It would be disirable to get either a;

dvi-d to dvi-d
dvi-d to div-i.

Enjoy
 
rbq said:
Wow! how did you get that deal from fs?
what do you mean by drivers? I wasn't getting the 1680x1050 rez on the drop down list until I installed the eztune software.
Click to expand...

i'm a tricky one ;)

Yeah, I had to install that to get the res too, but my monitor still shows as "Plug and Play..." while the one in the store showed as the make/model like most others...

Its a minor inconvenience really, but my mIRC script would look nicer with it showing correctly :p



BTW GUYS - I disabled Clear Type and the text looks a bit better now. Should get myself a DVI-D cable too I guess.
 
To those asking about 75mhz...

This monitor will run 75mhz 1680 x 1050 res only using DVI input. If you can't access that res in windows, you might have to play with your video card settings/software.

I am running ATI Radeon X850XT using Catalyst 5.10 drivers and the Catalyst control centre..

75mhz runs great! It also ran great using my recently replaced Radeon 9800 pro

75mhz was only available after selecting it on the displays manager tab of the catalyst control centre
 
I'm in vancouver area and I want to buy this monitor. Anyone working at futureshop can hook me up with a deal on this? 799@futureshop is kinda high in price. Anyone know whether it will go on sale during Xmas?
 
Sadly, I ended up repacking this monitor and returned it to best buy today.

I didn't like the interface, the buttons placed on the side are so unintuitive, I ended pressing the wrong button most part of the time, which makes me exit the whole menu that took me several steps to access. It gets extremely annoying when you are trying to fiddle around wit the settings.

Text sharpness with this monitor is also extremely annoying for a monitor of this size and price. Text is blur. Yes a little bit, but still blur, and not as sharp as my L90D+ monitor. I tried to play around with the settings for quite a bit, and couldn't get it right at all.

With FarCry, I was simply blown away. I couldn't notice any ghosting, and the game became so much more immersive due to the sheer size of this widescreen. I couldn't help noticing some tearing on the screen, as if VSync was off. It was on in my option, and I never saw such thing on my L90D+. I am not sure what is causing this. Another thing that annoys me is that if you aren't playing at the monitor native resolution, all other resolution will be stretched.

Under Civilization4, it's another story. First, text is not sharp. Then unlike FarCry, most of the graphics of Civ4 are static. And that's where I started noticing flaws with that monitor. Colors are a bit washed out, there is some backlight bleeding. It just doesn't look good at all. I tried to adjust some settings on the monitor and in the drivers panel, but it didn't change anything much at all.

I then proceeded on testing the component input, and that's when my sweet love for this monitor turned out sour. Backlight bleeding, washed out colors, distorted aspect ratio... I think I got it all. It just looked horrible, and playing with the monitor settings didn't help at all. Screen tearing was even more pronounced when using the component input, the picture was very pixelated, just like those flash video you can watch on video google. I tried about all kind of source on the component input: Xbox, dvd player, and my satellite HD feed box (via component and DVI) and they all looked horrible (480p, 720p, 1080i). I think the image processor, or scaler of this monitor is its Achilles heel.

Sorry Gateway, I'll take my money back :(

edit:
I was using DVI-D between my PC and Satellite HD box, and component cable for the rest.
 
I finally bit the bullet and bought one last night at a local bestbuy.

Now, unlike most of the over sensitive posters, instead of ripping the monitor out of the box and running benchmarks, I decided to just enjoy it (you know..what youre supposed to do?) and played a few games.

Awesome. HL:LC looked simply amazing. Unreal:Tournament was simply stunning.

I never noticed any tearing, ghosting, etc..

I watched about 6 episodes of Rome in HD and it was just as epic as the games were.

Xbox: Spectacular. Nothing quite describes playing 1080i football! Using component input is really simple and only requires one button to chage the input. This is really a minature TV!

I don't plan on doing any testing to the monitor because frankly if you cant see a problem (IE not specifically looking for one) then you don't need to worry about it.

Very, very happy with my purchase.
 
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