bikerdude on 12/2/2009 at 16:50

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I Found these guys selling the 2209WA (which is an E-IPS based screen), £194 - (http://www.pcbuyit.co.uk/product_info.php?products_id=331)

E-IPS(Dell) versus AS-IPS(NEC) Review:

Ok here is the review you lot have been waiting for, the Dell 2209WA(£180-200) versus the NEC 20wgx2Pro(£270-300):-

The Dell has better colour reproduction, lower black levels, slighly better viewing angles. The Whites are better on the Dell, the colour saturation in certain modes (Video, Sports) are better on the Dell than the NEC. Some response times are on par with the NEC, and possibly a tad smoother, but....... The menu is difficult to navigate and the dynamic contrast work in reverse to the way it does on the NEC. Also the Dell has a matt screen, unlike the NEC's glossy unit.

Dynamic contrast operation:-

* Dell
- in dark areas it decreases the Brightness and increases the detail in the shadows - hmmm ok'ish.
- in light areas it increases the Contrast, making a bright light source even brighter - wtf, ouch my eyes.
* NEC
- in dark areas it increases the Contrast and increases the detail in the shadows - as your eyes would.
- in light area it decreases the Contrast, adjusting to a bright light source - as your eyes would.

Monitor Menu operation:-

* NEC
- You can change between viewing modes (standard, gaming, photo etc) on the fly with a single button click
- You can turn DNR on/off per viewing mode.
* Dell
- There are several button presses to change viewing mode, grrrr.
- You can only turn DNR on/off, no per-mode setting. Also confirmation required everytime its changed...wtf.

The long and short of it is, if you can put up with the weird dynamic contrast operationg and the horrid menus then the Dell is a very good monitor for Thief. Here are some Thumbnails - the Dell is on the Left.

(http://www.imagebam.info/multihost/viewer.php?file=aexvq29n3i11tyqr3wv.jpg) http://www.imagebam.info/multihost/images/aexvq29n3i11tyqr3wv_thumb.jpg (http://www.imagebam.info/multihost/viewer.php?file=jwkti5h5upt1900kdv0a.jpg) http://www.imagebam.info/multihost/images/jwkti5h5upt1900kdv0a_thumb.jpg (http://www.imagebam.info/multihost/viewer.php?file=ze3uwu3ie7wytigv5qof.jpg) http://www.imagebam.info/multihost/images/ze3uwu3ie7wytigv5qof_thumb.jpg

bikerdude on 12/2/2009 at 21:53

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Ah, Arse... I bloody thought it was too good to be true...:mad:

Chimpy Chompy on 13/2/2009 at 08:42

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Hey Ostriig, let us know what you think once it arrives!

Ostriig on 13/2/2009 at 15:19

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Biker - Sorry, dude, I wasn't clear. I meant to say that your thread title says 2207WA while the monitor you're talking about is 2209WA. :p

Chimpy - Sure thing, will do, but I just got delayed one more day, it seems.

Ostriig on 14/2/2009 at 12:15

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Right on, it was worth getting up at ~7 on a Saturday morning. The package finally got here around 8, and I've now been toying around with it roughly 2 hours (I let it heat up for a while first, as the whole thing was frozen), so I can share my first impressions on the 2209WA.

Um, yeah, I'll start off by saying, once again, thank you Bikerdude, for all the helpful info and for pointing me to it! It's a beauty.

http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb67/Ostriig/2209wa.jpg
Sorry I've got no better images to post now, though the internet has plenty. I've got a camera somewhere around here, but the batteries are out, and that poorly lit 640x480 is all my phone can manage.

Anyway, viewing angles are indeed great, I can barely notice a colour shift when moving far to the side. Regarding the colours - I tried a no-name "Arianet" 22'' a few days ago to get a feel of the performance impact, and one thing I distinctly remember is being displeased with the display's faded colours. No such problems here, it's all looking very pretty, though, as you might imagine, I'm still toying around with various configurations for Brightness/Contrast and Colour Balance modes. Regarding that last category, the screen does come with a bunch of presets. First off, it lets you choose a display mode, either Video or Graphics. Haven't look into the former, but the latter then gives you, aside from the option to individually customize your colour settings, five different presets: Standard, Multimedia, Game, Warm, Cool. I'm currently oscillating between Standard and Game, leaning towards the former.

I've so far tried it out in the following games: UT3, Mirror's Edge, and BioShock, and I've been perfectly content with the results. The image is sharp, the colours are vivid, and I haven't noticed anything to suggest an unsatisfactory response time. I'll be waiting for the evening to test out some darker environments and see how the screen handles them. I have noticed that when looking at predominantly bright/white screens (like TTLG for instance), I'm right now feeling my eyes rather tired, but I think that's more of a result of my actually being tired due to the past two days than anything with the screen settings.

Question - jumping through the display's menu options, in Other Settings, I noticed a thing called Dynamic Contrast, which by default is set to Off. If I turn it On and I'm on the Game preset (on Standard if has no effect), it bumps up the contrast (and brightness, I think), but if I turn it off again it gives me a notice saying something like "If you turn Dynamic Contrast, the gaming preset (the only other one I've used aside from Standard) contrast corrections will be disabled (or lost? I forget...). Are you sure...etc". Any idea what it's supposed to do? I'm keeping it On for now, because it appears to look somewhat better with said white screens. Edit: Ah, I think I've figured it out. Just browsed to a dark picture with this thing on, hit full screen, and when I came back to a light one I noticed that contrast adapting dynamically. So, it's pretty much what the name says. It is, however, a gradual and clearly noticeable shift, so I might want to disable it.

Some other notes: The physical position of the screen is very smooth to adjust in all the directions described on the product sheet. Regarding complaints about the reflective bezel - this is true, I can clearly see a reflection of the icons on my taskbar, though I only noticed this when I started typing this post, it in no way registered with me while playing games, and I don't think it's an issue. It is, however, a bit of an embarrassing oversight on the designers' side, since the rest of the screen frame is non-reflective.