NEC 23" IPS EA231WMi

I am not altogether familiar with the term.

I have seen it used relating to bad overdrive settings on the DELL2407WFP
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljRCxlf0njk&NR=1) where it appears as a dark shadow chasing a bright moving object (or the reverse I guess).

I see none of this on my EA231WMi. Not even a little bit. However...

I believe the figure of 14ms denotes the switching time on the pixels.

As I understand it, each pixel incorporates its own capacitor to maintain its liquid crystal’s state between refreshes, and the charge/discharge interval varies considerably depending on a lot of factors. Fourteen milliseconds (about 1/80th sec) is probably not a worst case for this monitor.

To put it another way, there is a delay between when the monitor starts to tells a crystal to switch and when it actually switches, and this delay is a lot longer than the old CRT fluorescent dot decay times. IPS switching times are also longer than TN switching times.

I believe this longer switching time does result in noticeable effects compared to CRTs and, I guess, fast TN panels.

On my EA231WMi, when I drag my white cursor about 6 inches per second across a black background, I notice an effect I do not remember happening on my old CRT. The effect is that the white cursor loses it’s borders and becomes a vaguely arrow shaped smudge. The pixels are not switching fast enough to render a sequence of sharply bordered arrows.

I’ll try this on a TN panel the next time I’m in Best Buy and compare the degree of smearing.

I really think this smearing/smudging effect will degrade your gaming fun. Every time your character pivots, things will go greasy compared to say 2ms TN like the Samsung XL2370.

Comments please by those who know more than I. I’m no display guru.
 
vjcsmoke said:
Did the test on that website. Something 19/20 times it said 0% frame drop rate. And there was one time that said 2%. This was for both monitors. I'm not sure how it proves ghosting or lack thereof, I took pictures too and it looks identical on both monitors.

This photo was taken while the test was running. As you can see the bar starting to move from the edge of the screen back to the beginning edge, the positions look identical to me but judge for yourself.

103_6305.jpg


Ok, I also fired up some Wolfenstein in clone mode to do some real in game testing. When running straight ahead and fighting/shooting the Dell and NEC feel identical. However if you turn very rapidly, it seems that the Dell is more responsive.

Not too surprising a result considering that one's a TN panel and the other's an IPS. But 99% of the time they look the same except when turning rapidly. Oh and I also noticed the image quality on the NEC impressed more than the Dell. Blacks were blacker, textures looked crisper and better, etc.

The other factor to consider is that the Dell is running off HDMI out and the NEC is running off the DVI. When the 5970 gets in I'll be able to run both off DVI and make a comparison. And then run the NEC off the Displayport and see if that makes it more responsive as well.
I can't wait to get my 5970 in so I can do some testing on a really fast video card. When it does I will report more later, either here or in the video card forum.
Click to expand...

Great, hopefully you get it soon. Do you think that this ghosting effect you see when turning will hinder your gameplay? Anyways, I envy you, I stayed up until 3 in the morning on the 18th to get that 5970. Alas, they went on sale and sold out when I was in class... :(
 
solracselbor said:
Great, hopefully you get it soon. Do you think that this ghosting effect you see when turning will hinder your gameplay? Anyways, I envy you, I stayed up until 3 in the morning on the 18th to get that 5970. Alas, they went on sale and sold out when I was in class... :(
Click to expand...

I only got maybe 4-6 hours sleep that day. Newegg didn't get them in stock until I think after 3pm Eastern. I knew that camping the 5970 was going to be an endurance thing, so I made sure to get at least some sleep!

PS most classrooms these days have wifi, so if you had brought your notebook you could have camped it even while you were in class! :D

Like I said, I'll report more after my new video card comes in and see if it makes a difference.
 
@chrisliv I have had my 2005fpw since they first came out. Love it, still works like a champ. My setup is almost identical to you. Mac mini hooked to 2005fpw. Going to buy the NEC and do a dual monitor arrangment. BTW, I live in Wisconsin currently, but am moving to Denver in January. You like it there?

What type of cable/adapter did you get to do mini displayport to displayport from your mini, or are you using the minidvi-dvi adapter that came with mac mini?

You are happy with the monitor, is there a problem with uniformity or tinting?

Thanks!
 
vjcsmoke said:
I only got maybe 4-6 hours sleep that day. Newegg didn't get them in stock until I think after 3pm Eastern. I knew that camping the 5970 was going to be an endurance thing, so I made sure to get at least some sleep!

PS most classrooms these days have wifi, so if you had brought your notebook you could have camped it even while you were in class! :D

Like I said, I'll report more after my new video card comes in and see if it makes a difference.
Click to expand...

when do you think you will get the card?

Are there any other games you can try in the mean time? WoW, COD4, Need For Speed, etc? Im asking because they just increased the price of this monitor at provanatage, and i think it will keep going up more and more the long I wait.
 
Sure,

The NEC monitor is a nice upgrade to the 2005FPW, for the reason I mentioned earlier in the thread.

I've got mine connected to the Displayport, via a Displayport cable and a third-party MiniDiplayport-to-Displayport adapter, which is a short, stubby little thing that I got from China or Hong Kong a few months ago. via eBay. But there are now single cables that have the MiniDisplayport-to-Displayport in a single unit.

I don't live too near the Denver area. The hostile, political fiction known as the State of Colorado is probably more fascist than most in North America. They tax Labor directly, Homes/Property (even for those using Private School, or Homeschoolers, i.e. coerced property taxes fund Public School, whether you use them or not), Private Vehicles taxed, Sales Tax on Groceries in many Counties (not all), and numerous other little tyrannies. Otherwise, the land is somewhat scenic, although undoubtedly not as green as you're used to, and the People seem about as typical as most in North America, too.

Anyway, this NEC EA231WMi is a dynamite upgrade to the IPS panel I used before. I don't have any uniformity issues or color shift/tint issues to speak of. A lot of stuff is better, like viewing angles, white glow, HDCP compliance, size, etc. I'm using the Native Mode and an AppleRGB profile right now. Sometimes I use the Eco Mode, but Color and Brightness is better without it, of course.

Since you're a Mac user, too, there is a free Menu Bar item called "Caffeine" that you may like, as I do. I puts a little coffee cup icon in the upper Menu Bar area, and with just one click it enables or disables the Display Sleep settings of the System Preferences, which comes in handy at times and alleviates the need to navigate to and change the Sleep Preference back and forth when you don't want the display to Sleep after a certain interval of inactivity. The little cup shows coffee in and out of the cup to give visual feedback. It's a nifty, little one-trick item.

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/24120

Please do share with everyone here how you also like the NEC, compared to the 2005FPW, which is still considered to be a good IPS panel. Some people have been dissatisfied with it, but my experience with it has been great.

Peace to you,
C. Livingstone
 
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Can anyone recommend an NEC 23-24" monitor for strictly gaming that has the OptiClear screen? I appreciate any responses, thank you Techlord!;)
 
can anyone compare side to side with there 20wmgx , This monitor to me is extremely good deep blacks accurate colors and slight ghosting that i can never really tell :cool:
 
Techlord said:
Can anyone recommend an NEC 23-24" monitor for strictly gaming that has the OptiClear screen? I appreciate any responses, thank you Techlord!;)
Click to expand...


The Opticlear coating is practically gone from all NEC monitors and I don't see it coming back anytime soon. It's a shame because it just makes colors on my own NEC really pop out.


As for console gaming, ToastyX tested this monitor out with a PS3 and he said it was scaled properly and was very usable for this purpose. I don't think you'll any ghosting unless you compare it side by side with a monitor that is slightly faster in terms of response time.
 
the_real_7 said:
can anyone compare side to side with there 20wmgx , This monitor to me is extremely good deep blacks accurate colors and slight ghosting that i can never really tell :cool:
Click to expand...


I asked Toasty the same thing since he owned a 20WMGX2 at one time. He didn't compare it side to side but for someone with his talents he doesn't need to.

ToastyX said:
The 20WMGX2 had overdrive, but I remember it being not as well tuned as the Dell 2209WA. I'd say the response time was somewhere between the Dell and this monitor.

The 20WMGX2 couldn't do higher refresh rates properly, while the Dell and this monitor can, which helps with the responsiveness.

None of these monitors have any significant lag.
Click to expand...


As far as image quality I think they might be pretty much the same. The 20WMGX2 has the glossy coating but the EA231WMi has a newer panel with improvements.
 
Armatoste said:
The Opticlear coating is practically gone from all NEC monitors and I don't see it coming back anytime soon. It's a shame because it just makes colors on my own NEC really pop out.


As for console gaming, ToastyX tested this monitor out with a PS3 and he said it was scaled properly and was very usable for this purpose. I don't think you'll any ghosting unless you compare it side by side with a monitor that is slightly faster in terms of response time.
Click to expand...

So are glossy screens going the way of the dinosaurs? What I wouldn't give for a nice fast gaming monitor with a glossy screen!
 
well i believe toasty is a better screen expert than me for sure , but back when i bought this screen it was excellent for coming off a crt which i noticed ghosting gained closed pixel rate of 2.65 , but im guessing this gloss screen pulls my contrast ratio up alot ? or is there really no diff second My screen was designed with overdrive which probably sucked back then and 14ms on the new screen im sure is equal , what do i doooooooo ugh let hit dell up for one i guess if i dont like return
 
on the TNs Ive seen em and um horrible after you've owned a crt or a nice ips , Ive owned the best screens and would hate to take a quality hit for size
 
Ok I want to mention a few things that I discovered recently.

The NEC has a "gaming" video mode. Perhaps this increases responsiveness/reduces input lag? Haven't fully tested it out yet.

Also the NEC has two ratio modes: Full and Aspect. So I assume it can handle scaling with these options.

Also you can manually adjust the LED brightness. I have it currently set to 20%. And then I have the regular brightness/contrast set to 50 each.
 
I'm finding the backlight uniformity isn't so bad.. it has settled a bit and by moving my head around I could see that part of the problem was viewing angles. 23" is still a pretty big screen. Bigger than I would have liked, and this is the smallest IPS screen I know of. So today it's not too bad.

I'm having a terrible time getting the colours right for downloaded video (skin tones are too reddish) or even in pictures (every picture seems slightly different). My laptop at maximum brightness is 5000K with 120 cd/m2 (I measured just now). It's a glossy 13.3" LG TN. I find it very comfortable for watching videos. Only wish for more black detail.

I am finding this matte screen is tiring on my eyes. I use a matte monitor at work too, but I have the brightness cranked down and the fluoros overhead are terrible magnetic ballast ones that flicker at 60 hz.. some days I wear a sun visor to shield my eyes from the overhead glare. (I'm the only one that does that.) I find myself wishing this screen was glossy. Matte really isn't what you want for watching video imho.

My eyes feel tired watching matte video or looking at a matte screen, part of it is probably the slight blurring of a matte coating combined with the IPS sparkle from the coating causing some sort of shimmery effect. And the blacks are still a bit of a struggle due to their acquiring a 'flat' look. Who knew the colour spaces and gamma video is recorded in isn't the same as monitor spaces?

So currently I have the monitor set for 5000K (much more comfortable that sRGB/Native which are way too blue), brightness at 34% (at 5k this will give you about 120 cd/m2). Standard mode. Eco off. Backlight compensation off.

I'm going to have to continue playing with generating different profiles but with leaving the above settings alone. I'll have to try gamma 1.96 next.

(Btw, gamma 2.4 is very close to l-star and rec 709).

Do you guys like 5000k too? Or have you somehow gotten used to the hot blue colour of the white at 6500k?

Here is my EDID data if you want to see it:

DDC block report generated by SwitchResX version 4.0.2 for display
EA231WMi


-----------------------------------------------------
------------------- RAW DATA ------------------------
-----------------------------------------------------
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 A B C D E F
-----------------------------------------------------
0 | 00 FF FF FF FF FF FF 00 38 A3 79 67 01 01 01 01
1 | 1F 13 01 03 80 33 1D 78 EA F8 05 A4 55 4D 9D 25
2 | 12 50 54 BF EF 80 81 00 81 40 81 80 81 C0 95 00
3 | 90 40 B3 00 A9 C0 02 3A 80 18 71 38 2D 40 58 2C
4 | 45 00 FE 1F 11 00 00 1E 00 00 00 FD 00 38 4C 1F
5 | 53 11 00 0A 20 20 20 20 20 20 00 00 00 FC 00 45
6 | 41 32 33 31 57 4D 69 0A 20 20 20 20 00 00 00 FF
7 | 00 39 38 31 30 30 30 38 33 4E 41 0A 20 20 01 FF

-----------------------------------------------------
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 A B C D E F
-----------------------------------------------------
0 | 02 01 04 00 01 1D 00 72 51 D0 1E 20 6E 28 55 00
1 | FE 1F 11 00 00 1E 8C 0A D0 8A 20 E0 2D 10 10 3E
2 | 96 00 FE 1F 11 00 00 18 8C 0A D0 90 20 40 31 20
3 | 0C 40 55 00 FE 1F 11 00 00 18 01 1D 00 BC 52 D0
4 | 1E 20 B8 28 55 40 FE 1F 11 00 00 1E 02 3A 80 D0
5 | 72 38 2D 40 10 2C 45 80 FE 1F 11 00 00 1E 01 1D
6 | 80 18 71 1C 16 20 58 2C 25 00 FE 1F 11 00 00 9E
7 | 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 15

-----------------------------------------------------
< 00FFFFFF FFFFFF00 38A37967 01010101 1F130103 80331D78 EAF805A4 554D9D25 125054BF EF808100 81408180 81C09500 9040B300 A9C0023A 80187138 2D40582C 4500FE1F 1100001E 000000FD 00384C1F 5311000A 20202020 20200000 00FC0045 41323331 574D690A 20202020 000000FF 00393831 30303038 334E410A 202001FF 02010400 011D0072 51D01E20 6E285500 FE1F1100 001E8C0A D08A20E0 2D10103E 9600FE1F 11000018 8C0AD090 20403120 0C405500 FE1F1100 0018011D 00BC52D0 1E20B828 5540FE1F 1100001E 023A80D0 72382D40 102C4580 FE1F1100 001E011D 8018711C 1620582C 2500FE1F 1100009E 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000015 >

-----------------------------------------------------
Valid EDID block: checksum passed

-----------------------------------------------------
------------------- MAIN EDID BLOCK -----------------
-----------------------------------------------------

EDID Version........1.3
Manufacturer........NEC
Product Code........31079 (7967) (6779)
Serial Number.......01010101

Manufactured........Week 31 of year 2009
Max H Size..........51 cm
Max V Size..........29 cm
Gamma...............2.20

Display Supported Features:
---------------------------
Power Management: Active off Power Management: Suspend Power Management: Standby

Display type:
-------------
RGB 4:4:4 & YCrCb 4:4:4 Color Encoding Formats
Display is non continuous frequency
Default color space is not sRGB standard
Preferred timing mode includes Native Pixel Format


Input signal & sync:
--------------------
Digital Input
Color Bit Depth is undefined
Digital Interface is not defined


Color info:
-----------
Red x = 0.644 Green x = 0.303 Blue x = 0.145 White x = 0.313
Red y = 0.335 Green y = 0.613 Blue y = 0.070 White y = 0.329

Established Timings:
--------------------
720 x 400 @ 70Hz
640 x 480 @ 60Hz
640 x 480 @ 67Hz
640 x 480 @ 72Hz
640 x 480 @ 75Hz
800 x 600 @ 56Hz
800 x 600 @ 60Hz
800 x 600 @ 72Hz
800 x 600 @ 75Hz
832 x 624 @ 75Hz
1024 x 768 @ 60Hz
1024 x 768 @ 70Hz
1024 x 768 @ 75Hz
1280 x 1024 @ 75Hz

Manufacturer Reserved Timings:
------------------------------
1152 x 870 @ 75Hz

Standard Timing Identification:
-------------------------------
#0: 1280 x 800 @ 60Hz (8100)
#1: 1280 x 960 @ 60Hz (8140)
#2: 1280 x 1024 @ 60Hz (8180)
#3: 1280 x 720 @ 60Hz (81C0)
#4: 1440 x 900 @ 60Hz (9500)
#5: 1400 x 1050 @ 60Hz (9040)
#6: 1680 x 1050 @ 60Hz (B300)
#7: 1600 x 900 @ 60Hz (A9C0)

Monitor Description blocks:
---------------------------
Descriptor #0 - Timing definition:
Mode = 1920 x 1080 @ 60.000Hz
Pixel Clock............. 148.50 MHz Non-Interlaced

Horizontal Vertical
Active.................. 1920 pixels 1080 lines
Front Porch............. 88 pixels 4 lines
Sync Width.............. 44 pixels 5 lines
Back Porch.............. 148 pixels 36 lines
Blanking................ 280 pixels 45 lines
Total................... 2200 pixels 1125 lines
Scan Rate............... 67.500 kHz 60.000 Hz

Image Size.............. 510 mm 287 mm
Border.................. 0 pixels 0 lines

Sync: Digital separate with
* Positive vertical polarity
* Positive horizontal polarity

Descriptor #1 - Monitor limits:
Horizontal frequency range.......31-83 kHz
Vertical frequency range.........56-76 Hz
Maximum bandwidth unspecified

Descriptor #2 - Monitor name:
EA231WMi

Descriptor #3 - Serial number:
<removed>


-----------------------------------------------------
------------ EXTENSION EDID BLOCK 1 ---------------
-----------------------------------------------------

CEA-EXT: CEA 861 Series Extension:
----------------------------------
Revision:..............................1
First DTD block at offset..............0
 
vjcsmoke said:
The NEC has a "gaming" video mode. Perhaps this increases responsiveness/reduces input lag? Haven't fully tested it out yet
Click to expand...

IMHO you can't use this mode for anything.. all the modes are useless except Standard, and possibly Dynamic. Load up anything with words on it and you'll see massive oversharpening of text with aliasing in those modes. Hiked contrast, etc. Even photo is a misnomer. Photo mangler more like.
 
Sunspark said:
I'm finding the backlight uniformity isn't so bad.. it has settled a bit and by moving my head around I could see that part of the problem was viewing angles. 23" is still a pretty big screen. Bigger than I would have liked, and this is the smallest IPS screen I know of. So today it's not too bad.
Click to expand...

Dell has the 2209WA, which is the same type of IPS as this (LG EIPS) but at 22" at lower res. Have you looked into that?
 
Yeah but I decided if I was getting a new monitor I should get 1920x1080 as that is blu-ray resolution and the native resolution of a number of ps3 games.
 
Sunspark said:
Yeah but I decided if I was getting a new monitor I should get 1920x1080 as that is blu-ray resolution and the native resolution of a number of ps3 games.
Click to expand...

might be blue ray resolution, but what is a good movie if there is noticeable ghosting effects as a result of such low response rate (14ms) compared to the dell's 5ms
 
Wow.. I was just doing a bunch of calibration and from what I can see, the native WP is actually pretty green after all. So I set it to native, and then used the calibration program to shift it to 6500 and ended up with a pretty white display.

What I also notice, is the profile that's in the EDID that the Mac can see, the gamma in it is probably the same as 1.96 because I made a 1.96 gamma profile and it hardly changed at all.

My eyes still feel tired though.. granted I'm looking at this from a distance for now which is probably part of the problem.. we'll see if I can get used to it. Sux. Never again will I buy matte.
 
Oh, found something just now that made things slightly more comfortable on the old eyes.

Change contrast in the OSD from 50% to 46.9%. It's only a single step difference but it seems to mellow out the harshness on text.
 
Hey,

That slight contrast adjustment does help, Sunspark.

Peace to you,
C. Livingstone
 
Ok so I set my NEC into portrait mode, this is pretty slick. NO SCROLLING required! When I get 2 more, I'll definitely set them up all in portrait.

lmao
 
I've played around with the led setting, and I can see no difference at all. What is is supposed to do??

Larry
 
solracselbor said:
vjcsmoke, any news on the monitors performance with your brand new 5970!?
Click to expand...

Oh I was too busy playing games and benching to do more input lag/ghosting comparisons. LOL. Will try to get around to that soon. I found ONE dead pixel on my NEC! :mad: I dunno if I should RMA it or just keep it. At least it has no tinting issues. Hmmm. But I'll know the dead pixel is there. :( Can't really see it unless i look really close though. Opinions?

Ok correction. It's not a dead pixel. It's a STUCK pixel. Here's the weird thing, when I do certain colors, the pixel will work. but when I do other colors the pixel will not change color or stay black. Anybody ever heard of something like this before?
 
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Ok, heres the reply I got from NEC regarding the colour uniformity problems a few of us here are noticing:

"After evaluation by our technical centre, there has been no fault found with the display and the unit is in specification. Therefore further exchanges would be of the same quality. I advise you to contact your dealer if the monitor doesn&#8217;t meet your needs."

So the moral of the story is: BUYER BEWARE. You'll get no support from NEC if you don't like the colour uniformity problems with this panel.
 
vjcsmoke said:
Oh I was too busy playing games and benching to do more input lag/ghosting comparisons. LOL. Will try to get around to that soon. I found ONE dead pixel on my NEC! :mad: I dunno if I should RMA it or just keep it. At least it has no tinting issues. Hmmm. But I'll know the dead pixel is there. :( Can't really see it unless i look really close though. Opinions?

Ok correction. It's not a dead pixel. It's a STUCK pixel. Here's the weird thing, when I do certain colors, the pixel will work. but when I do other colors the pixel will not change color or stay black. Anybody ever heard of something like this before?
Click to expand...

Do you notice any ghosting or anything different during gameplay?

As for the stuck pixel, unless you bought from a vendor that permits the return of 1 or more stuck pixels, or guarantees satisfaction, then Im afraid your stuck. According to ISO 13406 you must have 6 or more stuck pixels or 1 or more completely dead pixels (white or black). However, there are two loopholes:

1) Go to where ever you purchased the monitor, online or retail. Look for your monitor and select it. If there is no mention of this monitor being a "CLASS II" monitor than you have an argument. ISO 13406 states that if the monitor is not classified at CLASS II, then the buyer and vendor must assume that the monitor is a CLASS I monitor. Meaning, no dead or stuck pixels are allowed. If they pull out any ISO bullshit on you, just remember to tell them that there was no mention of the monitor being CLASS II, thus you made a misinformed decision, assuming that the monitor was CLASS I under ISO 13406 stipulations. However, if this does not work, or the classification is listed on the site, then proceeded to step 2

2) Create your own dead pixels in order to meet the minimum required to return the monitor. I have no experience doing this but I have heard of several way that may work:
-Use a strong laser pointer and fixate it on a portion of the monitor
-Grind up the metal part of a push tack (the ones with the color plastic tops) then smoothen out the dulled tip. Afterwards grab a towel or rag and hold it up to the screen, pick a spot on the screen and slowly use the dulled tack (over the towel) and tap it on the screen. To do this, hold the tack with your left hand similar to holding a nail you are about to hammer, then "hammer" or "tap" the top of the tack with your right hand index finger. This, from what Ive been told, will cause a dead pixel.


Now, how'bout them ghostin effects?
 
The response time of this monitor is very good.
I think it's fully suitable for video playback and moderate gaming.
 
ToastyX how is it you were able to hammer in 74.8 hz when I can't seem to get 72?.. I found a modeline that should work but doesn't.
 
I'm thinking about buying a Nec, but I would like to hear what you say about if the monitor is good enough to use for calibrating and then photo-editing in photoshop. I'm really not a pro user, but I think it's fun to take pictures and make them as good as possible. First I thought about buying an Eizo or a Nec P221 but then I found this. What do you think?
 
well I hit the button and ordered , im going to wait to see if I keep, after I put side to side with my nec 20wmgx2 which even after 3 years has showed no flaws but actually show improvement do to the back lighting dimming a little bringing my contrast to like a sony trinitron level , so lets see I'm not used to a matte screen so im pretty sure this screen will go back to dell but Im being Optimistic , I think it should keep up to my 6ms which may actuallyhave been 12 ms back then and this is 14 ms , Im really looking forward to the resolution and improved blacks , fingers crossed
 
I own a 20WMGX2 and the 6ms advertised response time was a little generous tbh. More like around 10ms. Still great for gaming but I can tell that a newer gaming tn has a tad less motion blur than the NEC. Although without the great color reproduction even the best tn panel just won't do.
 
Hi guys, I'm thinking between this and the HP LP2475w as well. I'm leaning toward the NEC for now, but I have a few things I want to know.

How bad is e-IPS really is compared to other IPS? what about compared to PVA? (I have a 24" Acer PVA pannel.)

Also, I read in the spec that it support 24-bit colors, is this actually referring to windows' 32-bit color? (as I read that 32-bit true color is actually 24-bit +other filter thing) I don't want to buy something that producese less color than my current monitor.....
 
Hi all.

Since these forums have been useful for me trying to decide on my monitor, I will post my impressions on the NEC.

Just so you know my situation: I was most interested in this NEC and the Dell U2410 to replace my 4,5 year old Benq FP937s+ (TN panel). Since the Benq started failing I had to decide quickly. I have the NEC EA231WMi for two days now and got it for €380.

Overall I'm quite satisfied. I think it's a nice monitor and the ergonomics are also great. Quick summary of the most important aspects:
  • Uniformity of the monitor is good. No visible color differences
  • Display of gradients is great, colors are as well
  • Black leven is good (IMO)
  • viewing angles are great, only slight contrast loss with higher angles
  • IPS-glow can be seen from an angle on black colors.
  • The monitor does 60Hz in native res. through DVI
  • No pixel errors or other failures.

Compared to my TN-based TFT viewing angles are a lot better. You do get some contrast loss at more extreme angles (that's normal I guess). IPS glow can definitely be seen, but only on very dark colors, from an angle. The blacks get slightly brighter, this is most visible in the corners. For me it's not a problem. Blacks in general are very good I think.

Concerning games, I didn't see any ghosting in a fast shooter (I may not be extremely sensitive to it). No issues here for the casual gamer. Input lag is minimal, as tests have also showed. 16:9 is a nice aspect for games too.

I understand what people mean with the "sparkly" IPS-coating. I can see it slightly. Just a bit more than my previous panel. I don't consider it to be a real problem though.

Below are some pictures of the NEC, sometimes compared to the Benq. Major improvements of the black level and viewing angles are visible.

Black level of NEC vs. old Benq
00013.resized.jpg


From an angle, differences become even bigger
00014.resized.jpg


Black level test on Lagom.nl. I was amazed to discern all the blacks, which I couldn't see with the old TFT
00015.resized.jpg


Slight IPS glow in the corners, picture from close to the screen (wide angle)
00016.resized.jpg


Uniformity of black (shutter speed: 2 seconds). Subjectively good. Not to be confused with the glow.
00017.resized.jpg


Uniformity of black (shutter speed: 6 seconds).
00018.resized.jpg


Plain grey. Is there any tinting at all? None can be seen in reality.
00019.resized.jpg



Hopefully this is useful for someone. I don't have a CRT or measurement device, so I can't do any tests with such instruments.

I would recommend this monitor for people who like quality colors and minimal lag at a good price.
 
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