New LCD Monitor Looks Bad 1

[osika]

Hi, today I bought a Samsung SyncMaster 225BW widescreen monitor. I hooked it up to my Dell Workstation running windows xp professional. My video card is an ATI Radeon 9800 Series with 1 DVI and 1 Analog port. The card is inserted into an AGP slot and has 256mb DDR Memory.

I have tried hooking my monitor up to both analog and digital ports. The desktop looks fine, simple graphics look good, but when I bring up a photograph, it looks terrible. Green edges around figures.

I have the resolution set to 1280 x 768 and highest color quality at 32-bit. Any idea what's gone wrong. I bought it off the shelf at Best Buy, so I saw it there and images looked fine.

Thanks very much for your help.

Ryan

 

[stduc]

You are not using the native resolution & I also suspect you have not installed monitor specific drivers.

LCD monitors should be run at their native resolution only. You have a Samsung 225BW - Black
22" Widescreen with a height-adjustable stand.

The Native Resolution is: 1680 x 1050

Use the digital port for best quality and go here and download and install the correct drivers.

http://www.samsung.com/Products/Monitor/LCD_Digital/LS22DPWCBQXAA.asp

 

[wahnula]

I have that exact monitor (free with credit card points!) and I was a little unhappy at first too, but after I got the driver and resolution sorted out I have grown used to it and it is perfectly fine. I don't like being stuck w/ 60 Hz refresh rate only but I have found that the norm with mid-line LCDs.

I also abandoned the up-down stand for an Ergotron arm that mounts securely to the desk:

http://www.buy.com/prod/Ergotron_LXD13M1B_LX_DESK_MOUNT_LCD_ARM_BLACK/q/loc/101/201981104.html

That allows you to place the monitor virtually anywhere, as well as rotate for portrait view. As an old-world draftsman with sliding tabletop rule it is the perfect system, also good for swinging the arm over for others to view.

Best of luck!

Tony

 

[Ploper001]

Unlike with CRTs, the 60Hz refresh rate doesn't mean too much. You can't tell the difference between 60Hz and 75Hz on LCD panels - whereas on CRTs, the difference is incredible.

 

[kmcferrin]

The refresh rate (sometimes called a scan rate) on a monitor is the number of times that the screen is refreshed per second. On a CRT the screen is refreshed one line of pixels at a time, going from top to bottom. A refresh rate of 60Hz means that the screen is refreshed from top to bottom at a rate of 60,000 times per second. This is related to the speed at which the electron gun at the back of the CRT can fire electrons at the coating on the back side of the screen to create light.

An LCD doesn't have an electron gun, nor does it refresh the screen the same way that a CRT does. With an LCD the pixel is either on or off, whereas with a CRT the pixel is temporarily illuminated with an electron beam. So the refresh rate on an LCD is pretty much irrelevant.

 

[Ploper001]

A refresh rate of 60Hz means that the screen is refreshed from top to bottom at a rate of 60,000 times per second.

60Hz = 60 times per second (i.e. the amount of FULL SCREENS that are produced on the monitor every second), NOT 60,000 per second...

 

[stduc]

I though everyone knew that 1Hz = 1000 cps

LOL

 

[Ploper001]

*is confused*

 

[UUVGuy]

1HZ=1cps, all joking aside.

 

[osika]

First, thanks for everyone's help. I've followed all the steps recommended, such as installing the proper drivers and adjusting the resolution. Still, when I watch, for example, trailers at apple.com, they don't look nearly as good as they did on the CRT monitor. There are halos around lights. It's especially noticeable when video fades up from black (if that makes any sense). I have no idea what I'm doing wrong. Any thoughts would be very helpful. Thanks.

 

[stduc]

I though everyone knew that 1Hz = 1000 cps

I was joking! Sorry if I confused anyone!

[navy]osika[/navy] It might help if you posted links to a couple of example trailers detailing what you are seeing. It is possible that your old CRT did not show the true picture? Or maybe you have the brightness or some other setting to high or low? Or there is still something wrong with your setup. But if we all see halo's then ?!?

If a few of us can see what you mean then maybe it will help.

Just a thought.

 

[osika]

Even if I don't look at video, but instead at full resolution photos that I've taken with my digital camera, skin tones look bad. Colors bleed and the color range appears very limited. However, when I look at the same photos on my CRT monitor or even the little LCD on the back of my camera, they look great, with excellent skin tones. I've spent nearly an hour making every possible adjustment to gamma, color, brightness, contrast with no luck. Any other ideas would be helpful. Thanks.

 

[osika]

Okay, I've done one more test. I have my system set at 32-bit color like it's supposed to be.

Just for kicks, I changed it to 16-bit color. The strange thing is, they looked identical. I think the problem I might be having is that no matter whether I set the color to 16 or 32 bit, it looks like 16-bit color. Strange. Any ideas why that might be happening? It doesn't happen with the CRT monitor on the same card.

Thanks very much.

Ryan

 

[stduc]

I think a reasonable conclusion is that the LCD screen has a fault. Is the result the same whether you use the digital or analogue connection?

You need either to put the monitor on a different PC to see what it looks like, or I suspect get a replacement on the guarantee. If you bought it in a shop - they may try it out to see if there is a fault.

 

[Ploper001]

If that is happening on the DVI Connection also, and you've ruled out the graphics card, then there is almost certainly a problem with your monitor, as stduc said.

Have you tried reinstalling your graphics card and monitor drivers though?

 

[smah]

Very interesting thread. I just bought a SyncMaster 920BW running at 1440x900 on a Radeon 8500 under windows Xp using the newest Samsung & ATI drivers. I haven't been particularly happy with the dispay either. It looks very 'grainy' & not very sharp (perhaps almost blurry). It is definately better on the digital input.

I also have a swapple drive tray & sometimes change drives to test other systems, etc. Just a few days ago I installed Vista on the same machine and even with the native Vista drivers the display looks beautiful. So it might not be the same as what you see, but my unpleasant experience seems to somehow be related to the drivers, not the monitor.

 

[Ploper001]

I don't know whether this is an entry-level monitor for the specific size, but a lot of cheaper monitors have poor VGA cables and/or connections - one of my friends has a cheap 19" Dell LCD and when he was using VGA on one of his PCs (DVI on the other), you could see clear ghosting and blurryness (he now uses a DVI Switch).

When I bought my 17" LCD I specifically went for a good one - I spent £170 when I could have spent £120. Even using the relatively thin VGA cable that comes with it, the picture is perfect. I can't wait until I get a new PC and can try it with DVI

But, anyway, DVI should theoretically eliminate any interference in the cable, and the picture transmitted to the monitor should be exactly the signal produced by the Graphics Card - however, cheaper LCDs may have poor quality boards that mean that the signals do not get displayed exactly as they're meant to...

 

[Nelviticus]

I have the same monitor (225BW) and I love it. If you're running it at the proper resolution (1680 x 1050) and it doesn't look good, then yours sounds as if it's faulty.

One of the things that made me buy this monitor was that it has a full 24-bit colour palette. Many cheaper LCDs don't.

I do have to ask one stupid question though - are you sure the pictures you're looking at are good-quality in the first place? I used to have a very cheap digital camera which took terrible pictures. Viewing these on a good LCD monitor would have made them look even worse because my cheap CRT hid some of the badness!

Regards

Nelviticus

 

[Ploper001]

One of the things that made me buy this monitor was that it has a full 24-bit colour palette. Many cheaper LCDs don't.

Yeah, mine does too - when I bought the monitor I only had 3 requirements:

- Decent response time (common)
- DVI Port (fairly common except on the really cheap models)
- 24-Bit Colour Palette (rare - most either don't have 24-Bit Colour, or they don't specifiy)

 

[kmcferrin]

60Hz = 60 times per second (i.e. the amount of FULL SCREENS that are produced on the monitor every second), NOT 60,000 per second...

Doh! Somehow I got a kilo in there.