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Thank you very much for your response, travbomb. That really helps to set me at ease. I wish there was a knowledgeable company rep for each and every major manufacturer in these forums.
I've got one more question for you. I've noticed that many NEC displays, particularly high-end models such as the 2690 have small slats (i.e. vents) that run all along the rear portion of the bezel.
I'm wondering - is this a design choice specifically made by NEC, or is it more utilitarian in nature, more for dissipating heat the display generates?
Thanks!
I'll update the review I have during this week with new observations. Some I need to validate a bit first.
I did run a test with ToastyX's checkerboard patterns btw.
The one with checkerboard bleeding into the solid, didn't happen on my screen. Seems like its not an issue.
The one with the boxes however is another chapter. From middle to left side of the screen I could see parts of the boxes turning pink as ToastyX stated. When the screen is calibrated, the boxes are normal no matter where on the screen I put the pattern. But, I noticed that if I turn the black level settings down after calibration, the boxes turn pink again. Since its not happening when calibrated, I don't care much about it, but I am curious of why this happens. I think it adds red in the lower end of the gamma curve. On the black level adjustment, its possible to choose the black level RGB values and its function is to adjust the lower gamma curve values I think.
I'll update more later when I'm finished updating my review.
I've checked for the colorcomp problem when you described it in another thread, but couldn't find it. I'll test it with a moire pattern as well to check. When I put out a white screen, it seems uniform and so does grey, so I don't use colorcomp. The checkerboard test with boxes problem might be related to colorcomp, since its only happening at one side of the panel though. But, I can't calibrate the screen with colorcomp on with Spectraview profiler. In their 2690 version of the Spectraview profiler, colorcomp gets turned off.
I downloaded it off their homepage and used the method I posted earlier (link )to enable LUT calibration on it. I have the multisync version of the screen and spectraview profiler refused to LUT calibrate the screen (it was greyed out) unless spectraview was enabled in OSD. Don't want to try the non-2690 version in case I get problems I don't have now... They can't blame any pixel defects on you going into the service menu... I think its only there for use with the EU version. If I turn off SV and then on again, colors here turn to a red shade. This disappears when I reenter SV profiler and choose "select system profile". Then I can reload the calibration profile and the 2690 will adjust itself after the calibration settings in the profile automatically. It looks like it stores the hardware settings in the profile and autoadjusts the display if you change profile through the spectraview profiler. 
A while back, I went to the local Apple store to look at the new iMacs. I could tell that the 24" iMac was using an H-IPS panel, and it looked great. It didn't have the faint horizontal lines, and it wasn't oversaturated. It made me want to try the 24" NEC, but I was put off by the problems I experienced with the 26" NEC.
After trying the EIZO HD2441W and being very disappointed with it, I decided I might as well get the 24" NEC LCD2490WUXi and live with whatever problems it has. Well, it turns out I don't have to live with much because the 24" doesn't have most of the problems that the 26" has.
Faint horizontal lines - The 24" does not have any faint lines like the 26" has. The strange thing is I saw the same lines on the 26" Planar, which makes me wonder if this is a problem with the 26" panels.
Backlight bleeding - The 24" is mostly uniform with only slight variations:
Saturation - The 24" is not wide gamut, so the colors are not oversaturated. The 26" does not have an adequate way of reducing saturation. It can't be internally calibrated to sRGB, and the sRGB preset does not look right at all.
Noise - The 24" does not have the continuous cricket-like buzzing noise that I heard on the 26" when I put my ear up to the vents at the top, which makes me wonder if something was changed in a recent revision. I have revision 2C.
Input switching - The 24" does not "miss" the PlayStation 3 when switching inputs with the video detect option enabled, which makes me wonder if this was fixed in a recent firmware update.
Standby mode - The 24" does not have the standby mode problem on Macs like the 26" does, which makes me wonder if this was also fixed in a recent firmware update.
Checkerboard pixel patterns - The 24" does not have problems with checkerboard pixel patterns changing colors like the 26" does. I saw the same problem on the 26" Planar, which makes me wonder if this is a problem with the 26" panels. The pattern bleeding still happens, but that's an extremely minor problem that rarely occurs during normal use.
The only problems left are the tearing at 480p and the lag, which I expected anyway. The 24" exceeded my expectations. This is the kind of image quality I've been looking for. I'm very happy with the the 24".
Backlight bleeding - The 24" is mostly uniform with only slight variations:
You might be right, but according to another user above, this might have been fixed in a revision on the 2690wuxi also. I don't have a mac here.