LCD with the BEST black point...

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jyi786

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I'm now in the market for yet another LCD.

I currently own both the Viewsonic VP201b and the Viewsonic VX922. The 201b I use specifically for graphics/office work and the VX922 specifically for gaming, but they both have HORRIBLE backlighting and black point.

I'm looking for the LCD that has the best black point and uniform backlighting. I don't care about price. Here's basically what I'd prefer:

-1600x1200 resolution or higher
-4:3 scaling (I don't particularly like widescreen, but will go there if only if I have to)
-fast response time
-good color reproduction (not piss poor like the VX922)

I'm open to anything. Thanks for all your help and suggestions.
 
id say go for an eizo. they are expensive and great. or anything with a uxga panel.
 
I would say go for one of the NEC professional models...sorry I can't give you any specific model numbers but that is exactly where I would look if cost were no object.
 
This is primarily going to be used for gaming, I should have mentioned. Dark games like Thief, Doom 3 and the like. I'm not planning to use it for anything else.
 
NEC Multisync 20WMGX2 :

Link : http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16824002319

I own this monitor and it has the best black reproduction i have ever seen with a tiny bit of gamma tuning. Its great for gaming even compairing to fast TN panels for lack of ghosting. Not to mention it has the best color reproduction of any non-professional LCD i have ever used.


ya its expensive but you pay for what you get. What you get is a sweet gaming monitor that has inputs for all kinds of functions.
 
Edit: I was wrong about the LCD2190UXi and the LCD2190UXp being LED backlit. The samsung XL20 is however LED based. You'll need to look at the NEC LCD2180WG-LED-BK for NEC's LED based offering. I'm leaving the text below though so that you can still compare NEC's professional non-LED based displays.

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If you truly do not care about the price, there are three displays you should consider:

1) NEC MultiSync LCD2190UXi
2) NEC MultiSync LCD2190UXp
3) Saumsung XL20 (might not be readily available yet)

These displays are all LED backlit, so blacks will be extremely close to true black (though not totally as the LED array behind the screen is at a lower resolution than the LCD).

The difference between the two NEC displays is that one is S-IPS and the other is S-PVA. Each has benefits and drawbacks depending on how much you care about panel contrast ratio vs response time. In terms of the blacklevel, the S-PVA based LCD2190UXp will be slightly better than the LCD2190UXi. The XL20 has about the same contrast ratio and black level as the LCD2190UXi, though worse out of the box color accuracy (but should be cheaper as well). If black level is your primary concern, any of these displays should be significantly better than standard LCDs.

Here's a useful review of them:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/display/professional-monitors.html

Nite_Hawk
 
Nite_Hawk said:
If you truly do not care about the price, there are three displays you should consider:

1) NEC MultiSync LCD2190UXi
2) NEC MultiSync LCD2190UXp
3) Saumsung XL20 (might not be readily available yet)

These displays are all LED backlit, so blacks will be extremely close to true black (though not totally as the LED array behind the screen is at a lower resolution than the LCD).

The difference between the two NEC displays is that one is S-IPS and the other is S-PVA. Each has benefits and drawbacks depending on how much you care about panel contrast ratio vs response time. In terms of the blacklevel, the S-PVA based LCD2190UXp will be slightly better than the LCD2190UXi. The XL20 has about the same contrast ratio and black level as the LCD2190UXi, though worse out of the box color accuracy (but should be cheaper as well). If black level is your primary concern, any of these displays should be significantly better than standard LCDs.

Here's a useful review of them:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/display/professional-monitors.html

Nite_Hawk
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The type of backlight has absoloutly nothing to do with the darkness of the black level. It is a matter only of the LCD panels ability to block light when set to black.
I would agree that S-PVA and the like will offer darker blacks then S-IPS, but, you're sacrificing everything else.
 
I wouldn't say it has nothing to do with it, although LEDs won't help on their own. Given a sufficient number of LEDs, and a display capable of turning them off (or making them less bright), you could improve the black level significantly. Current LED backlit displays only use LEDs for improved colour reproduction though, correct?
 
I wouldn't bother playing dark games on an LCD, if I were you. I have a 1000:1 S-PVA (Gateway FPD2185W) sitting next to a rather awful CRT (Samsung 997DF), and the CRT just blows it away. I've run games in clone mode and everyone I've shown agree, after you see Thief 3/Splinter Cell on the CRT, you just can't stand to play on the LCD.

Keep an old CRT handy if you really want to enjoy dark games.
 
I wouldn't say it has nothing to do with it, although LEDs won't help on their own. Given a sufficient number of LEDs, and a display capable of turning them off (or making them less bright), you could improve the black level significantly. Current LED backlit displays only use LEDs for improved colour reproduction though, correct?
Click to expand...

Huh, looks like you are correct. I swore that the NEC LED display was dimming individual portions of the LED array to get truer blacks, but now that I look up information on it I see nothing that indicates this is true.

Brightsidetech mentions this technique here:
http://www.brightsidetech.com/whitepapers/papers/LCD_Whitepaper.php

And apparently philips/LG are coming out with a 47" HDTV using this technique later this year:
http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/01/19/lg-philips-readying-led-based-lcd-hdtvs/

Anyway, sorry for the misleading information regarding the NEC/Samsung units. I guess we'll still have to wait a while longer for significantly better blacks.

Nite_Hawk
 
Scyles said:
I wouldn't bother playing dark games on an LCD, if I were you. I have a 1000:1 S-PVA (Gateway FPD2185W) sitting next to a rather awful CRT (Samsung 997DF), and the CRT just blows it away. I've run games in clone mode and everyone I've shown agree, after you see Thief 3/Splinter Cell on the CRT, you just can't stand to play on the LCD.

Keep an old CRT handy if you really want to enjoy dark games.
Click to expand...
truer words have never been spoken :cool:
you just cant get good blacks on an LCD no matter which brand/model.
i think even the most expensive of models are only COLOR accurate, not black level accurate, and i've never even seen a pro LCD monitor with a contrast ratio higher than 700:1, NEC or LaCie...

i need to find a way to fit the A7217A and the benq on the same table :( :D
 
Scyles said:
I wouldn't bother playing dark games on an LCD, if I were you. I have a 1000:1 S-PVA (Gateway FPD2185W) sitting next to a rather awful CRT (Samsung 997DF), and the CRT just blows it away. I've run games in clone mode and everyone I've shown agree, after you see Thief 3/Splinter Cell on the CRT, you just can't stand to play on the LCD.

Keep an old CRT handy if you really want to enjoy dark games.
Click to expand...

This I tried. There's just absolutely no way I can keep a CRT on my desk, not to even mention in the same room. It's just not happening. Although I would agree with you 110%; there's just no better than a CRT. But times have changed; thus, I was asking for an LCD.

Is the black point really good on the NEC 20WMGX2? I've heard lots of good things about it, but the black point is what concerns me the most.
 
Well, if you must get an LCD, I strongly discourage choosing an S-PVA. Due to poor viewing angles, there is always a darker spot in the center of the monitor. This dark spot completely crushes your blacks, resulting in situations where you cannot see an enemy in the shadows directly in front of you. S-PVA is the worst for dark games.
 
ajm786 said:
This I tried. There's just absolutely no way I can keep a CRT on my desk, not to even mention in the same room. It's just not happening. Although I would agree with you 110%; there's just no better than a CRT. But times have changed; thus, I was asking for an LCD.

Is the black point really good on the NEC 20WMGX2? I've heard lots of good things about it, but the black point is what concerns me the most.
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i feel ya man, i just went through the same dilemma with a crt, no room :(
i had an NEC 20WMGX2 myself for a little while, but didnt really care for it. I thought the black points were OK, but not better than any of the higher end LCD's like itself.
Fast panel, but the auto contrast feature drove me nuts for the most part (auto brightening of the page and auto darkening of the page :mad: ) this feature i couldnt turn off, or if there was a way, i couldnt find it.
i didnt think the colors were very good, i thought the samsung i tried before it smoked it color wise, but the samsung had horrible input lag or i would have chosen that one over the two.
its strictly a gamers panel remember, and it doesnt do other things as well as gaming unfortunately.
 
ajm786 said:
This is primarily going to be used for gaming, I should have mentioned. Dark games like Thief, Doom 3 and the like. I'm not planning to use it for anything else.
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Not sure how big you want to go but either the NEC 2490WUXi-BK or 2690WUXi-BK will have excellent black points not too mention amazing color and a response time of 6.5 ms.
 
Those NEC's use a dynamic backlight to achieve greater blacks than other LCD's. While dynamic backlights are generally hit or miss, on a predominantly dark game like Thief 3, it may work rather well.
 
Scyles said:
I wouldn't bother playing dark games on an LCD, if I were you. I have a 1000:1 S-PVA (Gateway FPD2185W) sitting next to a rather awful CRT (Samsung 997DF), and the CRT just blows it away. I've run games in clone mode and everyone I've shown agree, after you see Thief 3/Splinter Cell on the CRT, you just can't stand to play on the LCD.

Keep an old CRT handy if you really want to enjoy dark games.
Click to expand...

Would have to agree there , I have a NEC 20WMGX2 & FW900 CRT side by side and the CRT destroys the NEC in black level reproduction to the point it makes the LCD look pretty poor when watching movies or playing games at night. Even with the LCD's Advanced DV mode enabled and brightness turned down to 0 its still unfortunately no contest. I just watched the latest episode of Lost (720p source) and it looked far superior on the CRT.
 
When you calibrate a CRT with a pro calibrator (like an Eye One Pro), you'll find that the black points are nearly the same as the LCDs. But this is a consequence of proper color reproduction.

My CRT, while it has awesome blacks, has very inaccurate color because of the overcooked blue colors - the black point had to be raised to keep dark grays from being dark blue! This is a result of tube aging, among other things. (A pro CRT should behave much better - I believe the Sony FW900 has a native gamma of 2.2, but I could be wrong.)

My calibrated NEC 20WMGX2 smokes my calibrated CRT for contrast. 700:1 versus 250:1.

But most gamers don't give a crap about color quality, so turning down the CRT's brightness works well. :)

I measured .25 nits - very good for an LCD. It goes down to around .15 if I turned on Advanced DV Mode. I am not bothered by the blacks at all in games - the PQ is so incredibly good in all other ways compared to CRT that I don't want to go back!

Another advantage of LCDs is the 2.2 gamma versus a typical CRT gamma of 2.5 - this means you can see more shadow detail without needing to crank in-game gamma/brightness controls. This reduces chances of banding on good 8-bit LCD monitors.

CRTs are sometimes too dark and you have to turn up its brightness - defeating the purpose of inky blacks! Ugh!

I've watched Lost in hidef on my CRT - the NEC blows it away. However, I understand the difference between Video Levels versus PC levels - if you use Overlay mode in your video player it should look similar to a CRT. If you use VMR9 mode, then you need to reduce the brightness in the player controls to emulate PC levels, as Lost is mastered for video levels (16-235, where 16 is considered black). The typical LCD monitor only understands PC levels, while HDTVs usually understand Video Levels.
 
Rectal Prolapse said:
When you calibrate a CRT with a pro calibrator (like an Eye One Pro), you'll find that the black points are nearly the same as the LCDs. But this is a consequence of proper color reproduction.

My CRT, while it has awesome blacks, has very inaccurate color because of the overcooked blue colors - the black point had to be raised to keep dark grays from being dark blue! This is a result of tube aging, among other things. (A pro CRT should behave much better - I believe the Sony FW900 has a native gamma of 2.2, but I could be wrong.)

My calibrated NEC 20WMGX2 smokes my calibrated CRT for contrast. 700:1 versus 250:1.

But most gamers don't give a crap about color quality, so turning down the CRT's brightness works well. :)

I measured .25 nits - very good for an LCD. It goes down to around .15 if I turned on Advanced DV Mode. I am not bothered by the blacks at all in games - the PQ is so incredibly good in all other ways compared to CRT that I don't want to go back!

Another advantage of LCDs is the 2.2 gamma versus a typical CRT gamma of 2.5 - this means you can see more shadow detail without needing to crank in-game gamma/brightness controls. This reduces chances of banding on good 8-bit LCD monitors.

CRTs are sometimes too dark and you have to turn up its brightness - defeating the purpose of inky blacks! Ugh!

I've watched Lost in hidef on my CRT - the NEC blows it away. However, I understand the difference between Video Levels versus PC levels - if you use Overlay mode in your video player it should look similar to a CRT. If you use VMR9 mode, then you need to reduce the brightness in the player controls to emulate PC levels, as Lost is mastered for video levels (16-235, where 16 is considered black). The typical LCD monitor only understands PC levels, while HDTVs usually understand Video Levels.
Click to expand...

so what brand is this CRT you speak of?
99.9% of every CRT owner will disagree with you unfortunatly, and CRT's are supposed to have a gamma of 2.2, not 2.5. Lcd's are supposed to have a gamma of 1.8 also, not 2.2. LCD technology is vastly different from crt technology, making the difference needed.
I calibrated my benq with a spyder2, and the gamma is 1.83, and i trust the setting. if i choose to up the gamma to 2.2, its not so good and colors start to look odd and unnatural.
I owned the NEC 20WMGX2, and it didnt hold a candle to my HPA7217A in any area, colors or blacks, and was horrendous for photoshop usage. There has been an extreme amount of testing of crt vs. lcd, and so far the crt has been the better display for every catagory that people use monitors for, except brightness and sharpness of text. Pretty much anyone who uses spreadsheets and office work are what LCD's are made for :D
 
Ok guys, enough of the CRT vs. LCD talk. :p

Realistically, let's talk about the LCD that I can get with the BEST black point.
 
ajm786 said:
Ok guys, enough of the CRT vs. LCD talk. :p

Realistically, let's talk about the LCD that I can get with the BEST black point.
Click to expand...

NEC 90 Series for sure. I would look at the LCD2690WUXi-BK for a wide unit and teh LCD2190UXi-BK for a 4:3 unit.
 
My CRT monitor is a Samsung 900p. I also have a Toshiba TW40X81 CRT RPTV - it is still going strong!

CRT's are supposed to have a gamma of 2.2, not 2.5. Lcd's are supposed to have a gamma of 1.8 also, not 2.2
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Where on earth are you getting this information from? It is blatantly wrong.

CRTs, since their inception, have had a gamma of roughly 2.5. I suggest you google for "Charles Poynton gamma", without the quotes.

LCD's are supposed to have a gamma of 1.8? Huh? Look at the gamma charts at the monitor reviews at behardware.com and tomshardware.com. Virtually all the LCDs use 2.2 gamma, when characterizing a monitor's color quality - and they measure it BEFORE calibration against a 2.2 gamma curve.

CRT television sets have 2.5 gamma. My 40" CRT RPTV is a 2.5 gamma. My CRT VGA monitor is a 2.6 gamma. My DLP projector is a 2.5 gamma. Other, newer, projectors use 2.2 gamma so that shadow details come out more. Nobody uses 1.8 gamma, except old Apple Macintosh computers - and those old computers had CRTs with 2.5ish gamma (videocard LUTs on these old macs are modified to fake 1.8 gamma)!

More information here - with input from ISF calibrationists:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=792333

I guess you need to read my post more carefully - after calibration to D6500K (so that all gray levels actually ARE gray at the 6500K color temperature) CRTs do lose contrast - the black point often needs to be raised because color phosphors aren't perfect. 3 gun CRTs have similar issues.

Now, on a pro CRT monitor, you should have amazing contrast - but do you want to spend $20K on a 25" Sony CRT used by DVD/hidef compressionists? :)

But yeah, it is way off topic. But I can't help but correct errors. :)

Anyways - as for black point - I suggest looking at tomshardware.com and read the monitor reviews - I think they give you black point numbers. You can pick the lowest one ignoring all other picture quality issues, if you want! behardware.com might list some black point numbers too - but damned if I could find them - they are very inconsistent with that.
 
Here is an example of a tomshardware review that specifies the black point and white point:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/03/27/the_spring_2006_lcd_collection/page38.html

Note that the Viewsonic VP930B has a very good black point of 0.3! Wow pretty good!

The NEC 90GX2 has a high black point of 0.6 though:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/03/27/the_spring_2006_lcd_collection/page18.html

Very surprising. I wonder if they calibrated the monitor properly?

But the NEC 1980fxi has a good black point of 0.3:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/03/27/the_spring_2006_lcd_collection/page14.html
 
Rectal Prolapse said:
When you calibrate a CRT with a pro calibrator (like an Eye One Pro), you'll find that the black points are nearly the same as the LCDs. But this is a consequence of proper color reproduction.

My CRT, while it has awesome blacks, has very inaccurate color because of the overcooked blue colors - the black point had to be raised to keep dark grays from being dark blue! This is a result of tube aging, among other things. (A pro CRT should behave much better - I believe the Sony FW900 has a native gamma of 2.2, but I could be wrong.)

My calibrated NEC 20WMGX2 smokes my calibrated CRT for contrast. 700:1 versus 250:1.

But most gamers don't give a crap about color quality, so turning down the CRT's brightness works well. :)

I measured .25 nits - very good for an LCD. It goes down to around .15 if I turned on Advanced DV Mode. I am not bothered by the blacks at all in games - the PQ is so incredibly good in all other ways compared to CRT that I don't want to go back!

Another advantage of LCDs is the 2.2 gamma versus a typical CRT gamma of 2.5 - this means you can see more shadow detail without needing to crank in-game gamma/brightness controls. This reduces chances of banding on good 8-bit LCD monitors.

CRTs are sometimes too dark and you have to turn up its brightness - defeating the purpose of inky blacks! Ugh!

I've watched Lost in hidef on my CRT - the NEC blows it away. However, I understand the difference between Video Levels versus PC levels - if you use Overlay mode in your video player it should look similar to a CRT. If you use VMR9 mode, then you need to reduce the brightness in the player controls to emulate PC levels, as Lost is mastered for video levels (16-235, where 16 is considered black). The typical LCD monitor only understands PC levels, while HDTVs usually understand Video Levels.
Click to expand...

Wow , its the other way around here ..Im VERY picky about shadow detail & black levels and can tell you the FW900 blows away my 20WMGX2 in black levels and also beats it in shadow details especially when watching shows like Lost. If your theory on having to run low brightness to achieve good blacks on a CRT is correct then I should be seeing less shadow details on the CRT ,But thats not the case.


FW900 vs. 20WMGX2, I had the NEC set as dark as I could possibly get it here, I had the monitor brightness at 0 which is lower than I'd normally run it plus I had Advanced DV enabled, I had the CRT on its normal settings which is Brightness 25 and Contrast 75:
crt_left_lcd_right_blacklevels.jpg


No matter how you try to spin the CRT vs. LCD black level debate anyone that sees a nice Trinitron CRT & *.* LCD side by side will always choose the CRT when comparing black levels.

It's also worth noting that the Samsung 900p uses a Shadow mask CRT which has considerably less Contrast "punch" vs. a Trinitron / Aperture grille based CRT , For example any shadow mask based CRT ive used always had its Contrast setting at 100 and it was still noticabley darker than a Trinitron at Contrast 75.
 
Hey neat screenshot! It does seem that there are more dots on the NEC though. The black level looks quite good despite the CRT's better black point.

How have you calibrated them? Do you have something like an Eye One Display 2? It would be interesting to see the results after calibrating each monitor (to the same white point).

With a little bit of ambient light black looks black on the NEC. It is comparable to my DLP projector's blacks when it has a new bulb in it, or even my Toshiba CRT RPTV! But I think my Toshiba's brightness is set too high - the damned blue tube doesn't follow the 2.5 gamma of the red and green guns so I lose shadow detail unless I crank the brightness. Grrrrr.

Have you measured the Sony's gamma?

EDIT: You're right about the Shadow Mask versus Trinitron. The Samsung is just doesn't hold good shadow detail at all! The high gamma of 2.6 doesn't help either. After 7 years, I'm still surprised it can hold 125 nits in brightness.
 
Tell me something. I've always figured the black point out by dividing the contrast ratio into the brightness. Therefore, the black point of the LCD2190UXi-BK would be 0.50, as it is has 250 cd/m2 brightness and 500:1 contrast ratio. Is this correct? And if that's the case, why should I consider the LCD2190UXi-BK if its black point is 0.50?

Edit: Another thing. Is the LCD2190UXi-BK a S-IPS panel like my Viewsonic VP201b? Or is it a better panel, in terms of color reproduction, etc.?
 
Rectal Prolapse said:
Hey neat screenshot! It does seem that there are more dots on the NEC though. The black level looks quite good despite the CRT's better black point.

How have you calibrated them? Do you have something like an Eye One Display 2? It would be interesting to see the results after calibrating each monitor (to the same white point).

With a little bit of ambient light black looks black on the NEC. It is comparable to my DLP projector's blacks when it has a new bulb in it, or even my Toshiba CRT RPTV! But I think my Toshiba's brightness is set too high - the damned blue tube doesn't follow the 2.5 gamma of the red and green guns so I lose shadow detail unless I crank the brightness. Grrrrr.

Have you measured the Sony's gamma?

EDIT: You're right about the Shadow Mask versus Trinitron. The Samsung is just doesn't hold good shadow detail at all! The high gamma of 2.6 doesn't help either. After 7 years, I'm still surprised it can hold 125 nits in brightness.
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Most likely my camera or camera settings caused the lack of stars on the CRT side,when I look at the stars in person (just now) the CRT has the same amount visible but some stars are alittle darker than others while on the LCD they all appear around the same brightness.

Ive never actually 'calibrated' either display other than using my eyes when making adjustments lol , The thing that bugs me most about LCDs is the lack of 'deep' black when watching movies or playing darker games like Fear / Doom etc, especially when playing at night. The LCD has a 'washed out' or 'faded' look in darker scenes no matter how I configure it. Admittedly the 20WMGX2 is capable of displaying blacks much better than my previous 2001FP LCD but its still lacking vs. my CRT.

But you're right if you have some ambient lighting present it makes the LCD's black levels look much deeper (ambient light didnt even help my 2001FP) The main problem with that is im so used to watching movies and gaming at night with the lights out.

Dont get me wrong the 20WMGX2 has a colorful , bright & crisp picture when im not bitching about the black levels ;) I tend to use the LCD for web browsing / chat / anything text related and the CRT for everything else. Best of both worlds.
 
What pro-LCD users fail to understand, and what pro-CRT users fail to explain, is that deep blacks is only half of the benefit of a good contrast ratio. Detailed blacks and other dark colors is, to me, a far more important benefit. The LCD displays all dark colors, not just blacks, incorrectly. When you are playing a game, looking down a dark hallway, the CRT blends the dark shadow on the floor with the grey and brown midtones on the walls, seamlessly. The LCD cannot do this. You get splotches of color, which look similar to JPEG artifacting and dithering, in these black-to-grey transitions. It looks nasty. And this is on 8-bit panels.

Black-level detail is just as important as real blacks.
 
Scyles said:
What pro-LCD users fail to understand, and what pro-CRT users fail to explain, is that deep blacks is only half of the benefit of a good contrast ratio. Detailed blacks and other dark colors is, to me, a far more important benefit. The LCD displays all dark colors, not just blacks, incorrectly. When you are playing a game, looking down a dark hallway, the CRT blends the dark shadow on the floor with the grey and brown midtones on the walls, seamlessly. The LCD cannot do this. You get splotches of color, which look similar to JPEG artifacting and dithering, in these black-to-grey transitions. It looks nasty. And this is on 8-bit panels.

Black-level detail is just as important as real blacks.
Click to expand...



I understand it perfectly actually...I have NEVER seen an LCD that gets smooth gradients and blending like a good CRT, however for me at least, the benefits of the LCD far outweigh that. The crispness of text, the vibrant colors, the light weight, small footprint, and less heat output of the LCD own me!:p

I do not do graphic design, I play games, surf, etc., and the LCD is fine for me....I will continue to buy whatever suits my tastes and needs, and there are better LCD technologies coming....ahhhh......
 
Scyles said:
What pro-LCD users fail to understand, and what pro-CRT users fail to explain, is that deep blacks is only half of the benefit of a good contrast ratio. Detailed blacks and other dark colors is, to me, a far more important benefit. The LCD displays all dark colors, not just blacks, incorrectly. When you are playing a game, looking down a dark hallway, the CRT blends the dark shadow on the floor with the grey and brown midtones on the walls, seamlessly. The LCD cannot do this. You get splotches of color, which look similar to JPEG artifacting and dithering, in these black-to-grey transitions. It looks nasty. And this is on 8-bit panels.

Black-level detail is just as important as real blacks.
Click to expand...

Good point ..I've always noticed this as well but wasnt sure how to explain it, This same dark color issue is apparent when watching movies, For example I was recently watching an episode of House on both monitors , House was in a room talking to a patient and the only lighting present was from a lamp above the patients bed and the various machines in the room ,on the LCD side it was very bright as if all of the lights were already on in the room but on the CRT it was much darker without losing any details ,the lighting just looked more natural , later in the same scene house turns the main lights on in the room and all of a sudden the scene looked very much the same on both monitors ..Basically this made me realise how much trouble LCDs have with presenting darker colors. Ill have to keep this episode handy for future comparisons.
 
dunan - I'll take a look! It looks like a german site - and perhaps they have different monitor standards or practices there.

Bruce Fraser (R.I.P) wrote in his Photoshop books and online articles that Apple used to use 1.8 gamma - but their monitors were either 2.2 or 2.5, relying on the OS to do the conversion in the videocards. I do know he mentions that in his Real World Photoshop 7 book.

Poynton, who writes reference material used by broadcast and video professionals, says nearly all CRTs follow the 2.5 gamma - which just happens to match the human eye's logarithmic sensitive to light - a happy coincidence! However, I've read on avsforum that a few HDTV Sony CRTs used in mastering studios are now using 2.2 gamma (although they were using 2.5 gamma ones for most of the DVD mastering).

Anyways - mathesar, et al. - black level is really damned nice to have. Dark scenes in Halo could look a lot better - however, if I turn up the lights a little it looks pretty damned good.

As for black detail - CRTs have this interesting behavior when showing dark scenes that contain bright objects - the black detail actually drops off! Something about the inability of the tube to provide enough light - so blotches of dark pixels get "flattened out" - thus making dark detail look nice and smooth. It's an artifact of the inability to hold picture brightness at low APL.I forgot what APL means - but usually a calibration DVD will show an APL pattern as one bright white rectangle, surrounded by black with two nearly black rectangles on either side.

On a CRT, you will not see those two black rectangles (unless you crank the brightness - but it will wash everything else out) - but on any other display device you will see them - and they will be at the proper light levels! An LCD, DLP, LCOS, etc. display will reproduce the image perfectly. So this is why you see swimming dark pixels in video on a digital display but not on a CRT! The new displays are too perfect in that regard.

Now the above has an interesting side-effect - since most DVD mastering is done on CRTs, the compressionist will notice that black details will appear to be crushed - so he will increase the brightness in those scenes a bit so it will show on a CRT. But this is no good for a digital display - they will appear too bright on them! However, the compressionist does not know that, and we have the situation today where people complain about seeing too much noise (swimming pixels) when watching videos on an LCD screen. Ooops!

(The above explanation is a condensed summary of what was discussed on avsforum.com - those guys are hardcore!)
 
Tell me something. I've always figured the black point out by dividing the contrast ratio into the brightness. Therefore, the black point of the LCD2190UXi-BK would be 0.50, as it is has 250 cd/m2 brightness and 500:1 contrast ratio. Is this correct? And if that's the case, why should I consider the LCD2190UXi-BK if its black point is 0.50?
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Good question. Your math makes sense.

Now, it is possible that the 2190UXi actually has a better black point - but only if the reviewers forgot to reduce the brightness. On some monitors, like the NEC 20WMGX2, reduce the brightness can also reduce the backlight intensity in steps. The backlight could be at its lowest setting between 0-15%, for example, and its brightest setting at 90-100%. The 0.5 black point could have been when the brightness was at 50% in the review.

It would be nice if monitor reviewers would follow the same procedures used by professional home theater projector reviewers - going through the different permutations of settings.
 
Rectal Prolapse said:
Good question. Your math makes sense.

Now, it is possible that the 2190UXi actually has a better black point - but only if the reviewers forgot to reduce the brightness. On some monitors, like the NEC 20WMGX2, reduce the brightness can also reduce the backlight intensity in steps. The backlight could be at its lowest setting between 0-15%, for example, and its brightest setting at 90-100%. The 0.5 black point could have been when the brightness was at 50% in the review.

It would be nice if monitor reviewers would follow the same procedures used by professional home theater projector reviewers - going through the different permutations of settings.
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Perhaps an expert can answer this for me. There are lots of them in here. :D

Really, the black point for my VP201b is around 0.6, and that's theoretical. I'm sure that it's actually much higher.

I'd like to know why most everyone in this thread recommended me the NEC when its black point is only 0.1 lower than my current LCD.
 
ajm786 said:
Tell me something. I've always figured the black point out by dividing the contrast ratio into the brightness. Therefore, the black point of the LCD2190UXi-BK would be 0.50, as it is has 250 cd/m2 brightness and 500:1 contrast ratio. Is this correct? And if that's the case, why should I consider the LCD2190UXi-BK if its black point is 0.50?

Edit: Another thing. Is the LCD2190UXi-BK a S-IPS panel like my Viewsonic VP201b? Or is it a better panel, in terms of color reproduction, etc.?
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You would think that would work but it doesnt because of how some manufacturers measure contrast. For instance a 3000:1 contrast monitor is calculated by measuring a completely white screen at full brightness and then a completely black screen at min brightness. Problem wiht that is those 2 points will never appear on teh screen at teh same time and therefore are just a theoretical contrast at best. The correct way to measure it is with half the screen white and half black and measuring the difference. Generally when you do it htat way your number is much lower.
 
travbomb said:
You would think that would work but it doesnt because of how some manufacturers measure contrast. For instance a 3000:1 contrast monitor is calculated by measuring a completely white screen at full brightness and then a completely black screen at min brightness. Problem wiht that is those 2 points will never appear on teh screen at teh same time and therefore are just a theoretical contrast at best. The correct way to measure it is with half the screen white and half black and measuring the difference. Generally when you do it htat way your number is much lower.
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So if the specs are 250 cd/m2 brightness and 500:1 contrast ratio, I would "properly" calculate the ratio by doing 125/250?
 
ajm786 said:
So if the specs are 250 cd/m2 brightness and 500:1 contrast ratio, I would "properly" calculate the ratio by doing 125/250?
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Your original logie is right it would be 250/.5 but when they measure it the other way so oyu get contrast like 3000:1 it doesnt work because by that math it would be 300/.1 even though the true blackest point is not .1. The only thing you can do is figure out the static contrast ratio of the monitor and do your original formula.
 
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