Viewsonic VP191 (Rev: MVA 8 ms)

To all the Vp191b owners, I have a question.

Do you notice a faint trail of white from fast moving objects? It looks similar to ghosting, but rather than being a blurred image of the object, the ghost is all white.

I've noticed it primarily in CounterStrike: Source. When another player quickly moves across your view, it looks as though there's an aura of white around that player. I've also noticed it in the Pixperan's "streaky pictures" test. When the little red car moves quickly across the screen, there's a faint white glow following the car.

Can any Vp191b owners can verify whether this also occurs on their monitors? Thanks.
 
To answer some of Imaro's questions:
1) Yes lowering the brightness lowers the intensity of the backlight.
2) I keep the contrast at about 60 - 70%, it's hard to tell as the OSD won't give you the actual percent that you have set. I think 100% is too high, but I can't say what is the best setting.
3) Playing games in clone mode next to my Sony Trinitron HMDA-400, which is a very good CRT, I notice almost no difference at all except for the brightness levels. There is almost no ghosting, and I don't see any dithering effects. DVDs and videos with very little compression don't show any dithering effects, but AVI/MPEG4 videos do show some dithering effects, with the colors being a little better on the CRT, and the blacks being a little blacker on the CRT.
4) Yes the brightness can be changed quickly, pressing 2 buttons is all that is needed.
5) The monitor would probably satisfy your brightness needs, although that seems a little subjective.
6) There is no transformer noise.
7) At low brightness there is some of the flickering effect when waving your hand in front of the screen, no nearly as pronounced as with a CRT though.

Anyone who wants this monitor for games should be satisfied, even at 1024*768 games still look about the same as on a CRT. Videos definitely aren't as good as a the best CRT's but they are pretty good none the less, especially for DVDs. Other than that I have no complaints about the monitor.
 
And to answer WickedSmurf's question; I do notice a white glow in that testing software, pixperan. I agree its not like ghosting, but I have only noticed it in that program, not in any games. I didn't see any blue, or any other colored trails in the flags test from that program. Maybe if you at it long enough and hard enough you will see some colored trails, but its not anything that should affect normal usage.
 
lmaro said:
1) Does the brightness adjust actually change the power/voltage of the backlight, or does it modify the pixel values? (Try setting the screen black, and adjust brightness to see if it changes)
Click to expand...
Brightness adjust the backlight.

lmaro said:
2) Is the contrast "normal" or "best" at 100%, and pixels values adjusted when lower? What do you have contrast set to?
Click to expand...
Best contrast. Set to factory default. I never need to change it. The black and red on HardForum, for a example, is AWESOME!

lmaro said:
3) How often do you see the "sparkling/dithering" effect from the OverDrive feature? Is it noticable or bothersome in videos or games often?
Click to expand...
Not at all, the only videos I watched are High Definition 720P from XBOX 360.

lmaro said:
4) Do the buttons on the monitor allow changing brightness quickly, without digging through the OSD menu? (I like changing it for videos)
Click to expand...
Yes, there are two buttons that go directly to brightness and contrast.

lmaro said:
5) When you set the brightness to 0%, how dim is the monitor? I like my monitor slightly brighter than a piece of paper in a normally-lit room, which is pretty dim.
Click to expand...
I cannot compare as my standards of lighting in my room is different for sure.

lmaro said:
6) Any transformer buzz or high-pitch sounds if you place your ear next to the monitor? If so, is it audible from 1 foot away?
Click to expand...
Super duper quiet!

lmaro said:
7) At a low brightness level, is there any flickering on the panel (if you wave your hand around)?
Click to expand...
It's a LCD, there is no flickering at all because the diodes stay consistent until there is movement in the picture/screen/image.


For everybody! Please, PLEASE, read the reviews articles and read about LCD technology, like on "How stuff works" website.
 
Thanks for the replies. Some LCDs do have some flickering but nowhere near CRT levels, which is why I asked.

I'm posting Benoit's answers from Tom's Hardware, although they're pretty much a repeat of what was said.

1) Does the brightness adjust actually change the power/voltage of the
backlight, or does it modify the pixel values?
=> backlight

2) Is the contrast "normal" or "best" at 100%, and pixels values
adjusted when lower? What do you have contrast set to?
=> don't remember. Sure it's not best at 100 %, it is somewhere around 85 %.

3) How often do you see the "sparkling" effect from the OverDrive
feature? Is it bothersome or do you get used to it?
=> it's there, but it's much better than on any other fast monitor I have seen so far. It's acceptable.

4) Do the buttons on the monitor allow changing brightness quickly,
without digging through the OSD menu? (I like changing it for videos)
=> you can do it quickly.

5) When you set the brightness to 0%, how dim is the monitor? I like my
monitor slightly brighter than a piece of paper in a well-lit room,
which is pretty dim.
=> pretty dim, but hard to quantify here.

6) Any transformer buzz or high-pitch sounds if you place your ear next
to the monitor? If so, is it audible from 1 foot away?
=> no, nothing special

7) At a low brightness level, is there any flickering on the panel (if
you wave your hand around)?
=> ???, this only happens with switched backlighted device. the one I got was a DC controlled backlight.
 
I'm about to buy the monitor on newegg. One absolute last question (I promise) - related to the brightness. My first question was poorly worded.

In a nearly completely dark room, can you set the monitor brightness low enough to be comfortable reading on it for long periods of time?

I know I can lower contrast in the monitor or video card control, but this reduces to total number of colors. Sorry to pester with so many Qs, I just don't want to pay 2-way shipping and 15% if I screw up.
 
I need to know how the Viewsonic VP191B looks when running in lower resolutions (specificially 1024x768 and 800x600) under Windows and gaming. Specifically, my question is for Windows. I design websites; and, I need to know what pages look like at lower resolutions. I really don't want to see an ugly screen when I am running in lower resolutions. Thank you.
 
You can easily check your websites at different resolutions with Firefox and the Web Developer toolbar. This won't help for IE though.
 
lmaro said:
You can easily check your websites at different resolutions with Firefox and the Web Developer toolbar. This won't help for IE though.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply. But, I do need to check in IE. And, I have some other applications that I need to run in lower resolutions as well.
 
I just ordered the VP191b 8ms from Newegg for $470 (including tax and shipping). I'll get it this week, try it in DVI/VGA, post some photos showing min and max brightness, and answer any questions.
 
Most windows applications look about the same at 1024*768, some pictures and graphics show a little reduction in quality, but nothing huge. At 800*600 there is a little more reduction in quality, but I wouldn't say its very noticeable. Text looks about the same at all three resolutions. Games look fine at 1024*768, not perfect, but acceptable.
 
i just ordered five of these bad boys for the computers here at the office. when i get them in and set up, i will post my thoughts as well. one of these screens will be going home with me to replace my 19'' viewsonic crt on my gaming machine. i'm a HARSH critic on image quality, from a not-so-technical standpoint, i just care if it LOOKS good, and not so much about numbers and all that jive :)
 
those who have bought these new models, is there any indication from the box / packaging / TFT itself that it is the new version? ie does it say 8ms anywhere? clearmotiv? anything like that?

what are your serial numbers on the back? do they have a date too?

thanks for the help :)
 
WickedSmurf said:
Do you notice a faint trail of white from fast moving objects? It looks similar to ghosting, but rather than being a blurred image of the object, the ghost is all white.

I've noticed it primarily in CounterStrike: Source. When another player quickly moves across your view, it looks as though there's an aura of white around that player.
Click to expand...

Has anyone else seen this issue? I'm thinking of getting this LCD and the game I play the most is CS Source. WickedSmurf, is it very distracting?

Thanks,
-Croyd
 
If you read my short review, I'm a hardcore FPS player in Quake 3 Arena, if you know that game, its the fastest FPS fast-pace gameplay out there still! Unreal Tournament comes close, but it is not the original compare to Quake.

I see no problem with my VP191b. FYI, when you get your VP191b make sure you have a sticker that say 8ms, if not, don't open it or you won't get full refund when you return it.

---------------------------------------------
http://www.williamchang.org

Creative Crew
http://www.creativecrew.org
 
Last edited:
I was looking at the VP191b in Dell's online store and got interested in the 2005FPW, which is a 20" widescreen 8-bit panel. So it's roughly the same height as the VP191b but somewhat wider. It only has a 16ms response time, but thats pretty close to the response time the VP191b shows on tests. I was wondering whether any of you have seen both, and if so what your preference is between them?
 
Croyd said:
Has anyone else seen this issue? I'm thinking of getting this LCD and the game I play the most is CS Source. WickedSmurf, is it very distracting?

Thanks,
-Croyd
Click to expand...

Well the thing is I'm not exactly sure if this phenomenon occurs only on my unit, or whether it is a common problem experienced by all the owners to a degree. The original intention of my post was to verify that. The reason being is because upon reading Tom's Hardware review, it states that the OverDrive feature eliminates the ghosting effect by saturating the pixels to full white. Therefore, I don't know if what I'm seeing is the side-effect of the OverDrive feature, or whether it is a manufacturer defect.

As it occurs on my monitor it is very distracting. To me it appears as though there's a white glow to the fast moving objects (in relation to your own FOV) in the game (eg. other players, blood splatter, crates, etc.) In some games, such as CS Source and BF Vietnam the effect can be readily seen. However, in other games such as UT2004, it is non-existant.

I implore other owners to look into this.

PS: My unit is the new 8 ms revision, in case of any confusion.
 
Drown Babies said:
Most windows applications look about the same at 1024*768, some pictures and graphics show a little reduction in quality, but nothing huge. At 800*600 there is a little more reduction in quality, but I wouldn't say its very noticeable. Text looks about the same at all three resolutions. Games look fine at 1024*768, not perfect, but acceptable.
Click to expand...

Thank you for your reply. :)
 
I am very interested in knowing if this happens for other people too.

WickedSmurf said:
Well the thing is I'm not exactly sure if this phenomenon occurs only on my unit, or whether it is a common problem experienced by all the owners to a degree. The original intention of my post was to verify that. The reason being is because upon reading Tom's Hardware review, it states that the OverDrive feature eliminates the ghosting effect by saturating the pixels to full white. Therefore, I don't know if what I'm seeing is the side-effect of the OverDrive feature, or whether it is a manufacturer defect.

As it occurs on my monitor it is very distracting. To me it appears as though there's a white glow to the fast moving objects (in relation to your own FOV) in the game (eg. other players, blood splatter, crates, etc.) In some games, such as CS Source and BF Vietnam the effect can be readily seen. However, in other games such as UT2004, it is non-existant.

I implore other owners to look into this.

PS: My unit is the new 8 ms revision, in case of any confusion.
Click to expand...
 
Well I will definitly pick one of these up here in 3 weeks. I just hope newegg.com sends me the newer panel because that is what they have advertised.
 
Songdog said:
I was looking at the VP191b in Dell's online store and got interested in the 2005FPW, which is a 20" widescreen 8-bit panel. So it's roughly the same height as the VP191b but somewhat wider. It only has a 16ms response time, but thats pretty close to the response time the VP191b shows on tests. I was wondering whether any of you have seen both, and if so what your preference is between them?
Click to expand...

If you want something that doesn't smear/blur/ghost, don't get the 2005FPW. I have one right now that's going back tomorrow.

In BFV (the only game I really play right now) when you're in green jungle areas and you rotate your FOV, the whole screen becomes a green blur and you can't distinguish anything (including bad guys) unless you completely stop all movement and stand there for a second or two.

Needless to say, that doesn't help your game play any.

It's also very distracting when flying helos or jets.
 
I just got this monitor from newegg. The box had the 8ms sticker and the monitor OSD has the right serial number. Absolutely no dead or stuck subpixels.

The ghosting is visible in PixPerAn, as well as a slight halo from the OverDrive in the streaky pictures test. Deathmatch in UT2004 is very fast and there was minimal but occasionally visible ghosting. This monitor isn't some sort of magical LCD that behaves just like a CRT.

Videos look amazing and lifelike, but the colors weren't very saturated (but still very good.) I can't see any side-effects of OverDrive in video.

Brightness goes low enough and high enough, but I still wish it could go lower than the minimum. This monitor probably won't suit someone who wants to code at night in a dark room, although contrast can bring it down a bit further without totally ruining the colors.

This LCD has the standard "moire dither" that you can see by moving your eyes or head around quickly. There's a bit of flicker at 60hz/70hz/75hz at low brightness, although this is another standard defect.

In summary, this monitor's good enough for almost everything, and I won't be returning it as long as my eyes get 100% used to it.
 
Update: Changed the color mode from '6500K' to 'User' with 100% on all colors. Looks much better now. This monitor is nearly perfect now.
 
lmaro said:
Update: Changed the color mode from '6500K' to 'User' with 100% on all colors. Looks much better now. This monitor is nearly perfect now.
Click to expand...

How do lower resolutions look?
 
Lower resolutions in games look pretty fine to me. Desktop in 1024x768 looks nasty, but that's expected. (This is in DVI, I'm not bothering with VGA.)
 
lmaro said:
Lower resolutions in games look pretty fine to me. Desktop in 1024x768 looks nasty, but that's expected. (This is in DVI, I'm not bothering with VGA.)
Click to expand...

Thank you for replying.

Now, I have confusing statements. You said the desktop looks nasty @ 1024. However someone else said:

Most windows applications look about the same at 1024*768, some pictures and graphics show a little reduction in quality, but nothing huge. At 800*600 there is a little more reduction in quality, but I wouldn't say its very noticeable. Text looks about the same at all three resolutions.​
 
There's always a quality loss when running a lower resolution on an LCD; some panels can just perform weird sharpening algorithms on the image to make it look slightly better. Except for the occasional old game and to test a program at a low screen resolution, there's no reason to run at anything besides 1280x1024.

If you want bigger fonts in Windows, you can change the fonts in Display settings or the DPI in the graphics card control panel.
 
lmaro said:
There's always a quality loss when running a lower resolution on an LCD; some panels can just perform weird sharpening algorithms on the image to make it look slightly better. Except for the occasional old game and to test a program at a low screen resolution, there's no reason to run at anything besides 1280x1024.

If you want bigger fonts in Windows, you can change the fonts in Display settings or the DPI in the graphics card control panel.
Click to expand...

I realize there is reduction in quality. That's just the nature of LCD screens. But, I have seen some LCD panels do a really good job at this, such as the Dell 1704FPV. If it could do high speed games with as little ghosting as this Viewsonic monitor claims then it would be the perfect monitor for me. The 1704FPV does 720x400, 800x600, and 1024x768 modes really exceptionally for an LCD. Infact, despite having a native resolution of 1280x1024, the 1704VP does 720x400 and 800x600 better than 1024x768.

As I indicated before, I do have specific reasons for running at lower resolutions. I do website design which I need to see at different resolutions in different browsers. And, believe it or not, I do have one game which really doesn't need a fast response time that requires a lower resolution (and looks great on the Dell monitor). Now I am really stuck because no one carries this Viewsonic monitor locally. I can't decide for myself if the reduction is acceptable or not without spending a lot of money.
 
I had a long response written about interpolation quality, but Firefox crashed and I lost it. It doesn't look like this LCD has a very fancy upscaling filter. It just resizes and possibly applies a very light sharpening filter.

Games at any lower resolution look good to me, with rougher polygon/sprite edges as expected.

Desktop @ 1024x768 has moderately-severely reduced image and font quality. Cleartype enabled makes fonts blurry and soft.

Desktop @ 800x600 looks better than 1024x768, with better image/photo quality and more normal-looking fonts. Cleartype enabled makes fonts very soft, and cleartype subpixeling is somewhat visible.

I am completely satisfied with how this LCD upscales at lower resolutions. It does so with minimal artifacts and filters, and there's nothing to adjust in DVI mode. I haven't seen any LCDs that are better at interpolating, but yours may still be better.
 
I've taken a few pics for those that are interested. Nitpicks are also below.

Minimum Brightness Level (0%), Contrast 50% (Normal)
minbrightness.jpg


Maximum Brightness Level, (100%), Contrast 50% (Normal)
maxbrightness.jpg




Minimum Stand Height, 3.5cm from desk to bottom pixel row
minstandheight.jpg


Maximum Stand Height, 14.5cm from desk to bottom pixel row
maxstandheight.jpg




Maximum upward tilt
maxuptilt.jpg


Maximum downward tilt
mintiltangle.jpg




OSD Brightness/Contrast adjust
osdbrightness.jpg



A larger crop reveals a subtle moire/dither effect. This is a good representation of it, but it is usually only seen on moving objects. Note the blurring on the right is due to camera exposure, not LCD ghosting.
moirecrop.jpg



More nitpicks from me
- The DVI cable is 5-6 feet, too short for me, so I'm getting a 10ft cable soon.
- The cable connects to the panel, instead of the bottom of the stand. This means that the cable is pulled if you rotate it into portrait mode.
- The moire/dither effect in games, as captured above.
- I get light backlight flickering after many hours of use, this goes away pretty quickly if I power cycle it. My power cable might be bad or my backlight slightly defective.
- Viewing angles are good, but colors at an angle desaturate and lose contrast.
- The usual panel flickering at low brightness (you'll see this on most panels)
- Already said, but brightness doesn't go low enough for sensitive eyes in a dark room.
- The "DIGITAL" OSD sign every time the resolution changes. (stays up for half a second or so)
- The anti-glare coat prevents solid colors from being very smooth and even.
- OSD buttons sometimes don't respond unless you press them hard.

One hell of a monitor though. I haven't returned it, and that means a lot. :)

If anyone needs any more photos or questions answered I'll be glad to do so.
 
Nice review, it really showed the monitor off nicely I think I have finally made up my mind to get this one. :D
 
I'm a little confused about the moire/dither effect. I don't really know what to look for, just the general lack of clarity in the last shot?

Looks like a pretty sweet monitor and it has been the one I've been planning on buying.

My other choices have been the 2005fpw(which is ruled out now for sure)
the L90D+ and the VX924.

I don't know if I would be satisfied with the L90D+ even though it is a good price and the VX924 doesn't look like it's all it's cracked up to be.

Plus I actually like the looks of the VP191b design over the VX924(judging by pictures and looking at the vx910 at best buy which has the same design as the vx924).

So in about 2 weeks I am planning to buy this one with a little more clarification on what moire/dither is.

Good little review though and nice pics.
 
The moire/dither effect is the alternating light/dark pixels of what should be a solid color. You can easily see it in the gray brightness/contrast adjust bar.

It's very hard to capture with a camera, so I just got lucky with that shot. You might notice it if you look carefully and have good eyes, but it's not distracting 99% of the time.
 
Oh I see it now,

looks like this monitor will be mine in a couple weeks.
 
Hmm this is interesting, they say the L90D+ is still probably the winner for gamers along with the 913n.

Makes consider getting an L90D+ over the vp191b. Though Tom's says the Vp191b is more reactive overall besides abrubt changes from black to white.

I don't think the VX924 is going to have those issues resolved though.
 
I see a clear difference...

Only for extreme FPS gamers with supernatural eyes (only care about ghosting/blurring):
Go with VX924 (4ms gtg) or L90D+ (8ms typical) (TN panel, 6-bit color, short viewing angle)

For all-round, everything, multi-purpose users that want to use the monitor for art designing, video watching, office working, and fast-paced FPS gaming:
Go with VP191b (P-MVA panel, 8-bit color, 8ms gtg, wide viewing angle).

The price, difference about $100, should be second priority under quality/performance.

...can't be any simpler.

---------------------------------------------
http://www.williamchang.org
http://www.creativecrew.org
 
Last edited:
I'm getting pretty distracting backlight flicker occassionally, at any refresh rate (in DVI mode.) If I can't somehow fix it I might have to RMA it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top