Samsung 215TW Impressions!!! (DVD, Satellite, Xbox)

Lord Rahl said:
Nobody likes this monitor :(
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I like it. I've been using it for the past month or so, and to me it's better than the previous monitor I used with my main PC, an HP f2105. I can't seem to get the component video in to work though. I need to test it with another DVD player that has the component out to see if the problem is with the monitor or the DVD player.
 
So I just picked up this monitor today at Fry's.
So far I can tell you that the component inputs are horrible.They are not crisp at all and are too dark. Plus no aspect modes.

However XBOX over VGA does look good.

So if your interested in this monitor because it has component inputs, pass on this one. So far I haven't found any monitor that has perfect component inputs. The NEC 20WMGX2 was the best so far but has some minor wavy lines going verticle.
 
I picked this up today too and I got to say I'm pretty impressed! This is my first lcd so I'm no expert but the color is great, it's very bright (haven't turned it down yet), and my card can keep up pretty well (x800xt). I'm satisfied with the inputs as well. My PS2 hooked up through S-Video doesn't look much different then on my TV. Now I just need to hope I don't get the dreaded red lines! It seems so much bigger then my old 19" crt. I'm happy with my purchase.
 
Here are some XBOX 360 pics over VGA. (Sorry 56k) I didn't setup a tripod or anything so they are a bit off, but I can take some better ones later.

samsung_elliot_01.jpg


samsung_hitomi_01.jpg


samsung_kokoro_01.jpg


samsung_kokoro_02.jpg


Over VGA XBOX 360 looks good, but it looks good on all the monitors I've tested so far. (NEC 20WMGX2, Dell 2005FPW (It scales!), Acer AL2216W, and Sceptre 20" WS (worst one).

Here are pics I took from the NEC a while back
http://students.washington.edu/johnqle/DOA/DOA4/christievegas.jpg
http://students.washington.edu/johnqle/DOA/DOA4/doa4.jpg
http://students.washington.edu/johnqle/DOA/DOA4/hitomiback.jpg
http://students.washington.edu/johnqle/DOA/DOA4/hitomiballoon.jpg
http://students.washington.edu/johnqle/DOA/DOA4/hitomivegas.jpg
 
JohnleMVP said:
Over VGA XBOX 360 looks good, but it looks good on all the monitors I've tested so far. (NEC 20WMGX2, Dell 2005FPW (It scales!), Acer AL2216W, and Sceptre 20" WS (worst one).
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Interesting that you tried them all out, how would you rate them?
 
I'm glad to see the positive reaction/interest this monitor is getting. It's nice to see it finally getting some attention. Everyone is always ranting about the Dell or Viewsonic, but rarely does anyone mention the Samsung.

Also, to update, my original Xbox started working again and I was able to play a little Halo 2 on it to test it out. My impressions so far are mixed. Up close, games look horrible and way to jaggy. However, if you back up about 6 ft, the image becomes great and is actually playable. Hopefully my Xbox will still be working in the morning so I can get some pictures up. If not, I'll forget about the original Xbox screens for now and bust out my PS2 to see how well it fairs on this monitor.


JohnleMVP said:
So I just picked up this monitor today at Fry's.
So far I can tell you that the component inputs are horrible.They are not crisp at all and are too dark. Plus no aspect modes.
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What do you mean by no aspect modes when using component cables? The monitor lets you switch between "Wide" and "4:3" when under component inputs, and it also adds two stretch options when under composite or s-video inputs.

slimbim said:
Can you tell me the name of the background from your earlier pics? I looked through all the pages on interfacelift.com, and didn't see it....

Thanks!
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I just realized I mixed up my sites. It was DeviantArt that had it. Here is a direct link, and I'm sorry for giving you the wrong link last time. I know how much of pain searching through endless pages of wallpapers can be ;).
http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/34452503/
 
What I mean by aspect modes are 1:1 pixels, full, or aspect mode. So if I connect xbox to it at 16:9 the 16:10 monitor will keep the 16:9 aspect ratio and leave the rest as black bars. This monitor won't do that so everything is stretched.
 
zero002021 said:
I just realized I mixed up my sites. It was DeviantArt that had it. Here is a direct link, and I'm sorry for giving you the wrong link last time. I know how much of pain searching through endless pages of wallpapers can be ;).
http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/34452503/
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Thank you!.

By the way, I've had two of these monitors on dual screen setup since April, and I love it. (but I don't play any games, just for work/school etc). Though it cost a lot more than same sized monitors when i got them, I don't really regret it... and when I first got them, I was like OMG these things are huge!! I should've only got one!... but now, they look normal.... maybe time to go up to 24's or 30's haha.
 
If you feed it a standard 4:3 signal (from a console, cable/satellite, etc.), can it letterbox the sides of the screen to avoid stretching the picture?
 
This monitor has PIP capability doesn't it? Any chance of a screenshot demonstrating what this looks like? I would like to have a running desktop on one side, and a console running on the PIP... t'wood be groovy.
 
The PIP works pretty good, you can split the screen, make a box (2 sizes), and position it in any corner. It doesn't keep the aspect ratio though so it will squeez things to fit the size of the box and you can't have DVI and VGA as Main and PIP or vise versa.
 
So after a few days of playing with this monitor, I love it more then the first day! I have no dead pixels, no banding that I can see and backlight bleed is minimal (just a little in the corners). I have hooked my PS2, GC and Xbox up to it through component and S-vid and they look good enough. Running Oblivion @ native res with moderate settings and Doom 3 at native res with high settings on a x800xt. Totally satisfied with my purchase!
 
Only one beef with this monitor... the 16:10 aspect ratio is messing up my DVD's... Why do they not maintain aspect ratio when viewing 16:9 "stuff" over component? They have to stretch it vertically to fill in the gaps... I really don't mind the black bars as they are better then elongated faces... any fix for this besides playing the DVD's on my PC?
 
Unfortunately no. Its really an option all 16:10 LCD's should have but only a few actually have.
 
RyoSaeba said:
Only one beef with this monitor... the 16:10 aspect ratio is messing up my DVD's... Why do they not maintain aspect ratio when viewing 16:9 "stuff" over component? They have to stretch it vertically to fill in the gaps... I really don't mind the black bars as they are better then elongated faces... any fix for this besides playing the DVD's on my PC?
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No there's no way around that, besides the point your PC is probably a much better dvd player than the external player your using (unless it costs quite a bit). If the noise and the lack of a remote control on pc really bother you there are a few units that exist with dvi out which would probably fix the problem.
 
I also have the 215TW I took a few pics of it showing HD content. I took the pictures quite quickly so some of them are blurred/not very good. I may post some more later if anyone is interested.

s1.jpg


s2.jpg


s3.jpg
 
StaticSurge said:
No there's no way around that, besides the point your PC is probably a much better dvd player than the external player your using (unless it costs quite a bit). If the noise and the lack of a remote control on pc really bother you there are a few units that exist with dvi out which would probably fix the problem.
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Yeah, I guess you're right... The Panasonic player I have was $100 and it gave a very good picture but I found that you can ran some scripts and stuff on the PC DVD player to sharpen the video. Gonna play with that and report here later...
 
JohnleMVP said:
What I mean by aspect modes are 1:1 pixels, full, or aspect mode. So if I connect xbox to it at 16:9 the 16:10 monitor will keep the 16:9 aspect ratio and leave the rest as black bars. This monitor won't do that so everything is stretched.
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But if I connect the xbox360 with vga to the samsung 215tw, the monitor will keep the 16:9 aspect ratio or the image is stretched as with component?

Sorry for my poor english :D
 
I'm thinking about 2 of the 215TWs. DVD playpack is not really that important, but I like the idea that the playback is useable. I'm not a gamer, will mostly be used to photography, maybe a tad video work. Another I'm considering is the Dell 2007WFP. Is the 215TW one of the best 20-21" monitors in the <$500USD mark right now?
 
Since you said photos, yes this is definately one of a the best under 500 right now. Default color is impressive if not a bit vivid but easy to calibrate. This monitor has impressive contrast and black levels that beat most LCDs on the market this days (including more expensive IPS monitors). Movie playback is average with dvd but can look pretty good with higher res stuff. This is not to say it isn't enjoyable, I've got a CRT HDTV and I still enjoy watching shows on the 215TW to catch missed episodes.
 
Im very picky about image quality so I RMAed 2 monitors before I bought this one. I absolutley love this monitor. :D
 
I've been following a couple of threads about this monitor with great interest, as i bought this monitor a couple of months ago. As I always been a gamer, but do alot of 3d work/graphic, and enjoy movies like everybody else, this seemed like the perfect lcd for the price.
However in alot of games, most noticable in older games like warcraft 3 and the fps games i used to play, there was a major input lag for whenever i moved my cursor.
Didnt bother me too much in games like wow etc, but in a fast paced FPS where you play online, it nearly felt unplayable.

I tried some of the "fixes" people wrote, but mostly was for ATI cards, and i saw people commenting that it had to be driver problems in most cases. After reading through a tweaking guide for oblivion, i stumbled upon this fix, that worked for me in all cases.

Max Frames to Render Ahead

It is usually hidden from the normal Nvidia Forceware control, but by downloading
NVTweak. Run it, and tick the "Additional Direct3d box".
Then go back into Forceware control, and under performance & Quality settings, there will be a new item called Additional Direct3d settings.. voila!

Its default on "3", and this is probably something you gotta experiment a bit with. On Dualcore/HT systems, you might notice reduced performance by setting it to 0.
On my system 2 was great, 1 worked nice to. I no longer noticed any input lag in other games like quake/hl2/war3/oblivion, and im sure there's more tweaks available out there:)
 
No, or at least it shouldn't ;)
Try calling Samsung about it, you might need to RMA it.
 
Well I finally picked one of these up myself. I've been watching threads on it and reading reviews for a couple months, and Office Depot finally had a price I could not pass up ($259 after MIR- thread in GenMay if interested).

My three main concerns before buying it where 1.) Input lag, 2.) RBG 'verticle lines', and 3.) a buzzing sound. All three seemed to have been reported here and there by users all over hardware forums. I don't think I ever saw a real technical review that had mentioned any of the above symptoms though. Either way, after working with the monitor for a few days, I have not seen any of the problems mentioned. The monitor is really top notch.

I have watched DVD's in both Windows and Linux, done a fair bit of programming (text is great, though mind your Clear Type in Windows), and a few photoshop touchups on images. All of it has been comparable to or better then my old top of the line ViewSonic 19" CRT.

I have also tested most of my games for replay-ability on this monitor and I am satisfied with the results. It's a shame all my games are not widescreen compatible, but the ones that are (particularly Oblivion, Company of Heroes, and Civilization 4 at the moment) make having it completely worth it.

I would recommend the 215TW and also note to take most of the complaints about it with a grain of salt. All brands of monitors can be defective at some level, just make sure you buy from a retailer that has a decent return policy.
 
Tweakin said:
Well I finally picked one of these up myself.....
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Great mini review, thanks. I've been looking for more input from a PC gamer standpoint. I have no interest in DVD or movie playback.

My current usage is about 70% games and 30% photo post-processing.

I'm currently using a 970P, and since I got it I've become a huge fan of Samsung and their S-PVA panels. This monitor is damn near perfect for me. But now I'm feeling the bug to finally upgrade to widescreen, and the 215TW is near the top of a very short list.

A few concerns I have about this monitor and widescreen gaming in general though:

1) For games that do not natively support widescreen resolutions, how does this monitor handle that? Would I be able to do a 1:1 pixel ratio and just have black bars on the sides? Or will the monitor force the image to be stretched?

2) How is the backlight bleeding? This is one of my biggest pet peeves about LCD monitors, and I have a low tolerance for it. (970P has virtually none)


Thanks for any extra input.
 
I got this monitor a couple of days ago and I'm reasonably happy with it, but I find it to have a lot more faults than most reviews suggest. I actually bought it because of the extra inputs (so I can hook up my Xbox 360 and PS2), but the component input is absolutely dreadful. There's a terrible glow around sharp areas (it cannot be removed even if the sharpness is set to a minimum) and a lot of combing-like artifacts. I'm used to seeing games properly and I find this completely unacceptable. As about the composite and S-video... they suck whatever you use them with anyway.

The menu navigation isn't the best I've seen, but it does the job. However, the fact that it doesn't have an option for 16:9 aspect ratio is really stupid (especially since they already have one for 4:3). The stretched image isn't nice to look at.

Another thing I didn't like was the extendable stand. It is too hard to move and feels quite flimsy.

I also have one colored pixel (its green when the screen is black), but I don't think it's worth spending 20-30 dollars to send the monitor back for a replacement.

I'll probably get the 360 vga cable, but then I could have just used my good old NEC 1765 and saved myself the 500 dollars.

Overall: 3.5/5 (if you don't use the extra inputs: 4.5/5)

Btw are there any other 20-22 inch widescreen monitors/lcd tvs out there that actually have a component input which isn't there just to fool people into buying them?
 
215TW and Gateway 2185W share the same panel, hence, both are pretty damn good :cool:
 
TheRapture said:
215TW and Gateway 2185W share the same panel, hence, both are pretty damn good :cool:
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Does the Gateway one have better component input?
 
AlDim said:
Does the Gateway one have better component input?
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Not really, I find that it is alas, a bit too dark. Not bad in daytime viewing but at night, blah. Really noticeable when you are looking at a sunny image, it looks like there should be clouds....kinda dim.


Other than that I LOVE the display.
 
I don't care how dark it is. Contrast and brightness settings can fix that somewhat. My problem is the massive glow around sharp lines, the combing artifacts, and the overall blurriness of the image.

Anyway, I went to Future Shop today to get a VGA HD cable for the 360 and to look at the component inputs of some monitors. The one I liked the most was the Samsung LN-R238WX HDTV. 23 inch, satisfactory image through component input (I say "satisfactory" because I did not see a single display that had an image comparable to PC VGA or DVI through component), 16:9 ar, great design. It's no surprise that it's the monitor used for 360 demos.
I also looked at the Gateway monitor. It was quite nice and actually they just made it cheaper than the Samsung. Too bad I already got that one. :(
One thing is for sure though, the Samsung 215TW has the absolute worst component image I've seen. The colors look good, but everything else about it is just terrible.

Edit: Just tried the VGA cable. It's like light and day compared to the component input. As expected the image is a bit less vibrant because of the cable, but that's not much of a problem. At least the combing-like artifacts appear to be the 360's fault.

Edit2: Tried my PS2 with a component cable. The image seems to be a bit better than what I got with the 360. I'm beginning to think my problem could have been a cable problem, but I can't be really sure.

Edit3: Actually there isn't much of a difference. The image probably seemed better because I was playing God of War and it's a pretty dark game, so glowing edges aren't apparent much of the time. The same issues are apparent - blurry image and sharpening that not only doesn't compensate, but makes things worse.
 
zero002021 said:
Well, DVDs are going to look at least a little grainy regardless of what monitor they are viewed on. It's a fault of DVD technology, not the monitor. DVDs are low-resolution when compared to HD at 720p or 1080i/p. I recommend downloading some HD trailers from Microsoft's WMV HD Content Showcase at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/musicandvideo/hdvideo/contentshowcase.aspx

There should be much less grain when watching most of those, if any at all (varies by trailer). If you still see a lot of grain, then the problem may also be with the monitor and not just the low quality of DVDs. Oh, and how close are you sitting to the monitor? At a monitor of 20"+ in size, you can't sit as close to it as you would a 17" monitor. Make sure there is some space between you and the monitor.
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First, the HD content on this site looks great, no question.

But my question is to your comments about lesser sources, such as DVDs, and heck, let's even include those "near DVD" quality xvids so prevalent these days.

I get what you're saying about how their quality will be shown up on LCD, but I would argue that the monitor does matter for these in the sense that on the 19" CRT that I'm coming from they look very good indeed. On a 20" LCD their stock drops precipitously.

Yet HD looks out of this world on LCD.

Is it only that the 20" widescreen is covering so much more area than a square 19" CRT, or is there something about LCD that discriminates against lower resolution video (or something about CRT that favors them)?
 
Colors on this monitor are great and PIP is a cool feature for a monitor and a good idea at that! Backlight bleeding albeit isn't great but not very noticeable and Samsung did a damn fine job on this monitor although now I want another for dual monitors and would pay another $550 too if I had too :p yeah I know the price dropped :D but I love this monitor and wouldn't go back to my smaller TN panel Viewsonic 1912wb for - though I still use it and it rocks for gaming - think an inexpensive LAN party monitor (what it would and will be great for).

END of my rant - oh yeah I like the new sammy and gateway 22" LCDs though I would only upgrade for a 24" or 30" DELL or the like
 
zero002021 (or anyone else), have you tried out Playstation 2 on this monitor? What are the results for different games so far?
 
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