Frans,

I hate to have to repeat myself, but: I think if you really reasearch the 19" LCD's you will find the panels themselves are relatively old designs. I chose not to write any of them up because they did not reproduce a sufficient color gamut. That is why when the 20.1 inch models were introduced I covered them in Shutterbug and primarily because tested with Chromix software they reproduced very close to the same size color gamut as my Sony 520P 21 inch CRT.

You know with LCD's you can bring them a bit closer to you so smaller text can be read. If like me you wear glasses, you might have your ophthamologist prescribe glasses just for monitor use with the exact focal length for the distance between your eyes and the screen. I did this, at age 72 and 50 some years of photography my eyes aren't what they used to be, and the special "computer" glasses made a world of difference.

I think you will also find that the LCD industry puts their latest technology and best performance in the largest new LCD's. From what I can determine from the companies involved the latest 23 inch LCD's are providing the best performance to date for photographic image work.

David,

Please don't make assumptions. I thoroughly researched the three particular 19" lcd monitors that I am considering!

Eizo confirmed that the 19" FlexScan L768, introduced in April of 2004, has the same color gamut and other characteristics as their 19, 21 and 22" top of the line ColorEdge monitors.

NEC confirmed that the 19" Professional Series MultiSync LCD1980FXi, introduced in March 2005, has the same color gamut and other characteristics as their 20 and 21" monitors in the same top of the line MultiSync Professional Series.

It is also a fact that the LaCie 319 is EXACTLY the same monitor as the NEC LCD1980FXi.

I hope this alleviates any of your fears that I would be looking at older technology that you apparently evaluated in the past.

I would love to hear from other people who have used or are considering any one of these particular three monitors.

Frans Waterlander
frans2001@netzero.net

Why a 19 inch? If you've been using a 19 inch CRT monitor, an LCD monitor of the same size will take up less desktop space so you might consider moving up to a 20 or 21 inch. Something to consider.

Larry,

I currently use a 21" Sony Trinitron CRT and its useable area is about the same as for a 19" lcd. Further, this CRT is set to 1280x1024 resolution and this works well for me; I don't like to work at a higher resolution because text becomes very small and is hard for me to read, even with special reading glasses for use with a monitor. You can adjust text size in word processing and spreadsheet programs but not in Photoshop so I would need to squint all the time to read the words in Photoshop. The bigger than 19" lcd monitors have a 1600x1300 or so native resolution, which yield such small text. You can set many lcd monitors to less resolution, but this will degrade image quality. One more factor is price; I'm perfectily happy with the current usable screen size and am hard pressed to justify spending more money on a bigger screen.

Frans Waterlander
frans2001@netzero.net

Frans,

Sure, the companies claim anything they need to that will sell their product. They know that most users do not have the means to measure color gamut, so they can claim almost anything and get away with it. Look a little further and you will find the data and descriptions, as well as the claims made for their latest, like the Eizo CG 220 deny that the color gamut is the same for their earlier 19 inch models.

David,

You'r right: the Eizo ColorEdge CG220 has an expanded gamut range. However, this $6000+ model is out of my price range.

Did you review any of these 19" models: the Eizo FlexScan L768, the NEC MultiSync LCD1980FXi or its twin, the LaCie 319?

Could I suggest that you do a 19" lcd monitor review, including these models, for Shutterbug? These products are considerably lower in cost than the 20 or 21" models, but 19" should be very satisfactory for many digital darkroom enthousiasts.

Frans Waterlander
frans2001@netzero.net

Frans,

Yes, the Eizo CG 220 is horribly expensive, so it is not something I will get to write up because it is beyond affordability for most Shutterbug readers.

A few years ago shortly after the first 19" LCD's were available I attended an invitation press presentation by one of the major monitor manufacturers. A Vice President of the company made the presentation. I pointedly asked if their LCD matched the color gamut of their CRT. He replied NO without hesitation. I kept in touch with that VP and obtained the 20.1 inch models I covered over a year ago because he assured me the 20.1 came close to a CRT's color gamut. My tests, which I included in my Shutterbug report using Chromix color analysis software provided evidence that the 20.1 inch models were in fact close to pro graphics CRT's in the size of the color gamut.

The color gamut of an LCD from what I understand from the technical experts in the companies, is established almost entirely by the physical LCD screen technology itself. What companies like Eizo, that does not manufacture their own screens, offer is superior control of the the different dimensions of LCD screen performance, which is of course very valuable and necessary for photographers. This too applies to LaCie, which I found out when I tested their 20.1 inch.

Currently the price of a 20.1 inch LCD is down to almost one-half of what it was when I tested them when they first came out. Thats about the same as a 21-22 inch CRT without built-in sensor and calibration. However, one Shutterbug reader just bought a LaCie 22 inch CRT and reported they have now been pulled off the LaCie web site. Looks like maybe no more CRT's for graphics pro's.

I am keeping my eye on what is developing as far as LCD's are concerned and will very likely report on some once I see what's new this fall. But I don't expect to go backward to 19 inch models just because they are cheap. The newer, larger LCD's are getting more affordable and offer superior performance, even better than the 20.1 inch models I wrote up previously.

Hi David, Needing a monitor for my older computer, I originally purchased the Dell 2405, which a lot of photographers seem to be using. I found it's minimum brightness to be more than twice as bright as my reference Artisan monitor and returned it after two days. I then ordered the same LaCie 22" ElectronBlue CRT as the other person did. PC Connection has them for an unbelievable low price of $789 with free shipping, while they last. It came yesterday.

Calibrating it wasn't that easy though. I had ordered the LaCie Blue Eye 2, which is the recommended calibration device and it would continually lock up 75% of the way through. I called LaCie tech support and was immediately told that it was the second such call they received this week and recommended the older Blue Eye Vision calibration. But the older software didn't work with the newer oval puck. The round pucks from the different manufacturers must have all been made by the same company because the older LaCie software did work with the older round Monaco Optix puck and I was able to complete the calibration. In 30 days I'm going to just install the Monaco Optix calibration software and use it instead of the LaCie software.

Bottom line is that this is a great monitor for my second system. But in a side by side visual comparison, it doesn't give quite the life to the images that my eight month old Sony Artisan does.

Maybe in three or four years when it's time to replace the Artisan, technology in LCD monitors will have come to the point where they can accurately display images like the best CRT monitors do now. Or I'll regret not picking up a second Artisan and storing it away for the future.

OK, guys, maybe I'm missing something here, and it may have something to do with working on the poverty end of the monitor acquisition scale. I recently replaced my moribund HP FX-70 15" LCD monitor with a Proview 19" LCD monitor. The experience is somewhat analagous to the improvement in one's vision after cataract surgery. The Proview is adjustable for both gamma and color temperature, and calibrates very, very well with Spyder2. The color and tonal range in my prints are bang on with the monitor image. I paid something like $370 for the Proview. And yet, unrepentant gearhead that I am, I can't help but wonder if there's really that much more functionality in a monitor costing several $K than I enjoy right now?

If the shoe fits.... Obviously there are mixed reviews out there as to whether or not LCD monitors can be calibrated and work accurately within an existing system.

I'll follow a forum thread where about ten people are getting excellent results with their LCDs and then another person posts that their monitor can't be calibrated and is too bright and outsourced prints are coming back too dark. Then ten more people jump in an agree. This inconsistancy may also be attributed to the graphics card and device used to calibrate the monitor.

I read in two consecutive issues of PC Magazine that the Dell 2405 FPW is one of the highest rated monitors for graphics. But after purchasing it, I found that it's minimum brightness setting was way too bright to even start the calibration with the Monaco Optix XR, which is capable of calibrating LCD monitors. Then I read another review on the Internet that the 2405 was too bright for even office use, which I found to be my experience also.

So bottom line is that if what you're using works for you, all the better. But I'd also be curious about how outsourced prints come back when they look perfect on your monitor. That's the real text as to whether your system is compatible with the rest of the graphics world.

As to monitor real estate, if you've ever worked with a Sony Artisan in a dual 21" monitor system, you'll feel like you've died and gone to heaven.

Thanks, Larry. I suppose the key is that I don't outsource my prints, and never will unless one of my printers dies and I'm facing a short deadline. I like having end-to-end control of the work.....

I have a friend who has done just what you suggested, he has had a Sony 21" 520P stored in its box for awhile now. Of course I cannot take comfort in being that much of a Luddite considering what I do for a living(S).

If need be, and it was all I could afford to replace a monitor if I had to, the 20.1" LCD's I reported on in Shutterbug over a year ago, particularly the LaCie because it offers better image performance adjustment, would do the job of replacing a CRT. The only fly in the ointment remains the gamma correction issue I described in my reply above to Frans. I think using my ColorVision Spyder2Pro calibration and profiling I could with a little effort find a satisfactory workaround. However, there are enough technical people who have recognized the problem in the color management field, so I think a REAL solution is at hand soon.

And, as I suggested over the next month or two I plan to take another close look at what is available in LCD's, do some testing, and write another report on the results which I expect will provide some viable choices.

The problem is that sellers of LCD's realize the information that is made available to buyers is not very revealing of how the LCD monitors actually perform, as you found out. So far LCD sellers have been able to get away with obfuscating and feeding buyers with a lot of unintelligible data and misleading claims. And, they are not that cooperative with the press. Maybe they feel it is better for business to keep the public ignorant about the realities of LCD performance, although that makes little sense to me because in time it will come back to them with a big bite in their rears.

Bill,

A lot of the LCD monitors on the market do not have the control capabilities even your Proview has. And, LCD's for their primary market, office use, have a pretty high level of backlight illumination. Many are not capable of successful calibration and profiling largely because to adjust the LCD's output to reach the output criteria calibration and profilingt requires is beyond the range of the LUT's (Look Up Tables) of the computer's video card that drives the monitor.

In other words, the one physical attribute that is ideal for effective perceptual photo image editing is the range of colors an LCD reproduces, color gamut. If the color gamut is much smaller than that of Adobe RGB (1998) then if you have a digital camera raw file or a scan of color film open in Photoshop you are only seeing part of all the colors represented in the file information. YOU CANNOT ACCURATELY EDIT COLORS YOU CAN'T SEE BECAUSE THE MONITOR DOES NOT DISPLAY THEM.

Beyond that color gamut physical capability of an LCD, the rest of the requirements to be idealing suited to doing Photoshop work are the adjustment controls provided by the LCD. Ideally both the backlight level and screen brightness level should be adjustable. In addition the two adjustments of color temperature and gamma your LCD has should also be adjustable. These four adjustments will both support effective calibration and profiling while at the same time provide an optimum image quality from the physical capabilities of the LCD. For instance, if you do not have a backlight level control, having to rely on the brightness control of the screen to lower it enough so highlights in photo images don't burn through, sometimes requires a too severe adjustment that degrades image quality. That degradation can be avoided if you can first turn down the backlight level.