Quick Review Asus VW266H

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interested

Gawd
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Feb 3, 2006
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Thought i would put up a very quick review on the new monitor i just recently purchased.
The monitor is an Asus VW266H, TN LCD , 25.5".

I have only had the monitor for 2 days.
I bought this monitor mainly due to it being big and cheap (under $300 CAD after rebate, and on sale)
There were several people recommending it, so i though i would give it a try.

So here are a few quick first impressions.

+The Good+

+ Monitor is big, 25.5" is big enough for me @ 1920x1200, in my opinion any bigger and individual pixel sizes get to big (if at same native resolution, think 28").

+ Image quality is not so bad, (but definitely not perfect)
I don't notice any blue hue or blue tint in images(like some here have mentioned).
There is a lot of room to adjust this monitor as it allows for various presets to be edited and saved and switched to on the fly.
There is also a lot of things you can tweak from individual colors, brightness, contrast, sharpness, skin tone, dynamic contrast, overdrive, and a bunch more i cant remember..
Blacks are ok, i played Batman Arkham Asylum, (a pretty dark game) with no issues

+ Rapid response times with user adjustable overdrive, absolute pleasure to play games on, super fast no ghosting seen at all (by me).
( I have not tested the CRT vs LCD latency on this monitor yet)

+ Good connectivity options, HDMI, DVI, VGA, Component, Sound.

+Quiet: this monitor makes no noise at all, no buzzing or hissing etc.. I just hate monitors that make electrical noise, some of you may know what I'm talking about here,
(yes some cheap LCD monitors do make noise, especially big ones)

-The Bad-

-Stand is pathetic simple cheap plastic. with only a slight vertical tilt adjustment, nothing more. This monitor is VESA compliant, so i would recommend buying a better stand.

-Vertical viewing angles: the lagom tests really show how awful large TN panels are in their viewing angles.
This Asus one is not so bad compared to a few other TN monitors and laptops i have tried the tests on, however it is poor compared to my PVA monitor.

Now this is just based on this synthetic benchmark, in practice i don't notice the viewing angle shortcomings when playing games, surfing the net, or working with office.
However since i have used PVA, IPS panels before i know that viewing angles on this TN monitor are nowhere near how good it can be, and this monitor would definitely not be suitable for professional photo editing etc..

- Only 60Hz, My older PVA panel can do 75Hz which is nicer.

Conclusion:

Well i have only had it for 2 days, so far there are more positives then negatives, and given the cheap price i really shouldn't worry to much about the negatives.

I have no idea about the reliability of this monitor.
As long as this monitor remains reliable, i would say it was a good purchase.

I will add more pros/cons to this list as i find them.
I hope this quick review helps others out there thinking of getting a new monitor.
 
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I'm kinda wondering if maybe I should've gotten this monitor as well.

I went with a 2209WA dell on sale at 256 with tax, and I'm not very impressed. IPS is not that great as some said (only had TN before) and even these suffer from color shift or un-even backlight (don't know which exactly is the problem).

the 26" at 1920x1200 would be the perfect size vs resolution for me (I don't like 24" at same res), so not sure if I did the right choice and only get a 22" just because of IPS hype.

In the end, until OLED's will be available in LCD's, I lost all my hope LCD's will ever even come close to what CRT goodness was.
 
Please test Counter Strike Source on de_dust2 with overdrive set to 100. You will see corona effects/ghosting due to the agressive overdrive.
 
Its blue i tell you! BLUE! :p Just messin, good to hear its workin out. If you compare it side by side with another screen does it not look blue at all?
 
SoniCraze said:
Its blue i tell you! BLUE! :p Just messin, good to hear its workin out. If you compare it side by side with another screen does it not look blue at all?
Click to expand...

The default settings in "Standard" mode may have been a bit cooler, then my PVA monitor, but i would not say it looked blue.
I then spent quite some time tweaking various settings and i now have it looking quite normal and balanced.
The default "Scenery" Mode on this monitor i actually found to be a bit to saturated.
Generally all the preset modes by default were way to bright, but that may just be me since i find most LCD monitors are usually too bright.
Fortunately you can edit and save settings on every one of the default presets

If anything i think my old PVA monitor was way to "warm" even on its coldest default setting.

I do have another old LG, TN monitor at my home that is very blue so i know exactly what people are talking about, fortunately i don't see this kind of effect on this Asus screen.

Once again, i would not say that this screen is professional photo editing grade, or perfect.
All I will say is that the monitor offers enough user modifiable settings that it helps one to establish a decent looking image for a TN panel.
 
Thanks for the review.

I have a old Dell E207wfp (TN i believe) and have been back and forth between a few monitors.
 
Just got this monitor yesterday so I'll add in a little about it as well.

Couldn't resist the pre-Black Friday deal ($270 PLUS the $30 MIR...just cannot be beat) and was upgrading from Dell S2309W, thinking the added real estate would balance out the average/above average image quality I've been reading about this monitor.

Well, getting it, it definitely required a good deal of tweaking. And even now I'm not completely there. I can't seem to get a good balance of color saturation no matter what way I go. And yes, things are initially bluish but that can easily be remedied. Only thing is that I don't think it can't be completely subjectively "perfect". I definitely think my 1080p Dell was better in terms of image quality. Definitely better than the viewing angle; it is HORRIBLE on this Asus.

I'll probably land up keeping it, simply because of the added real estate and I want to get the most out of the 5870 I also got. Just know that if you do indeed buy this monitor, it IS budget.
 
Bugs in the monitor: it sometimes powers itself off. I've only noticed this when rebooting the computer a lot. I have to climb under the desk and unplug and replug the monitor power ( a hassle ).

"Things that make me go hmmm": My previous LCD monitor was a Samsung 215 TW. When watching an exercise DVD close up ( which is not something that you would normally do on such a large 25 inch screen ). I did notice the "graininess" or what I would describe as a light, white fog probably due to the blockiness of the pixels. Sitting 6 feet away mostly alleviates that. I would like to watch more movies, to get a better opinion but there's nothing coming out of Hollywood that I actually want to watch and I don't feel like watching anything in my DVD collection.

Eliminate the viewing angles by sticking two telephone books under the stand, so that your nose is dead centre with the centre of the screen.

I have no problems with gaming. I do have a piece of shit video card though ( Nvidia FX5500 ) so I can't comment on ghosting in FPS. I played Need for Speed: Most Wanted on the PS2 which was fine.

I have no problems with the stand, I actually like the design. My previous LCD monitor, Samsung 215 TW had adjustable height and horizontal - vertical pivot. I've read that an expensive stand would bump the cost by $100 - telephone books are cheaper.

The monitor is pretty much a gaming monitor, for gamers who want to play both PC and console games but don't want to spend $600.
 
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