VIEWSONIC VP201: Excellent ... but not perfect.
Written: Jan 27 '05 (Updated Aug 11 '06)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
| Ease of Use: |
 |
|
|
Pros: low price, high resolution, great viewing angle, pivot stand, USB hub, thin bezel
Cons: slight weakness at each end of gray shade spectrum, buttons, 3 bright sub-pixels
The Bottom Line: An excellent 20 inch monitor for gaming and office applications ... and your budget.
|
|
|
| theuerkorn's Full Review: ViewSonic VP201s 20 inch LCD Monitor |
With flat screen monitor prices dropping by the minute, my time has finally come to step up from my trusty Planar PX171M monitor to the Viewsonic VP201/s. If you're looking for a new monitor yourself, let me tell you what I found when inviting the Viewsonic VP201/s into my home.
Note: The VP201s is the silver bezel model but other than color identical to the black VP201b. Hence, this review covers pretty much both models. (Prices are very similar too.)
FIRST IMPRESSION
Upon arrival of the monitor, it was very hard to resist the urge to immediately try it out. Since this is generally my weak spot anyway, I gave in very quickly and the VP201s was set up in only a few minutes. In fact it took me longer to remove the Planar PX171M (connectors are very hard to reach) than plugging in and getting started with the VP201s.
The power supply is integrated in the housing and a hard power switch is provided to cut off power 100%. (Especially smaller monitors have often their power supply inline with the power cable and no mechanical power switch.)
LCDs are best with the digital signal, and I just use the DVI-D output of my x800 to connect to the monitor. It's plug'n'play and there are no drivers needed to speak of. Windows doesn't recognize the monitor by name when using DVI-D, and that already suprised me when encountering the same with my Planar PX171M where only the analog VGA connection would allow to recognize the monitor by name. Nevertheless, the OS recognizes the parameters of the screen without problems and sets the video limits accordingly. To access the maximum performance of the VP201s, Viewsonic actually provides a driver (monitor definition) on the disc that allows to go beyond 60Hz frequency via DVI-D and names the monitor correctly too.
The thin bezel holds 5 tiny buttons which are marked very cryptic with 1, up, down, 2 and the power symbol. The on-screen-display (OSD) helps with the use of button 1 and 2 but one has to read the manual to get to the menu (or simply try it out.)
Follow this link to find out: "How to find the right monitor for you."
MAIN FEATURES
Size: The full 20.1 inch of viewable screen makes for a big monitor especially at home. (I assume everybody knows that the 'viewable' makes for a great difference to CRTs where a 22 - 23 inch screen is needed to have the same viewable area.) With 20.1 inch it's already at a point where it takes the whole view from normal viewing distance. The 17" size is great for viewing a letter sized document at 100% in portrait mode, but leaves little room to do anything else. The 20 inch area is good enough to view the same page (letter) at 100% in landscape mode and still have about 1/3 of the screen to the side available for other 'stuff'.
Resolution: But size isn't everything. More resolution is needed at those sizes (unless your vision makes it hard to distinguish small details). The native resolution of 1600x1200 pixels (pitch 0.255mm) makes the pixel size comparable to a 17" monitor with 1280x1048 pixles (pitch 0.264mm). In other words it remains close to the standard 96 dpi. The ViewSonic VP201s boast actually a solid 100 dpi (99.6) which requires to set the 'Font Size' in the graphics driver to a custom 104% for WYSIWYG. (Hint: It's in the 'General' tab of the video driver for both ATI and nVidia.) The 0.264 dot pitch does not require that adjustment as it is very close to 96 dpi (the default resolution for Windows XP).
ThinEdge: is what ViewSonic calls the slim 0.71" bezel to "enhance your visual experience with clean, minimalist borders around the active image area.". If nothing else, a thin bezel looks professional, and 0.71" looks especially thin for a big monitor. The silver model VP201s complies with TCO'03 while the black bezel only meets TCO'99. The difference lies in the interpretation of ergonomics where the diffusive silver is considered easier to the eye than a high-contrast black bezel. As a side-effect of the thin edge, the gaps between panels is 'minimal' in multiple-panel setups. Further, the thinner bezel makes the active area look even bigger.
Base: The screen is mounted to the stand via VESA® wall-mount interface and is detachable. The base allows for pivot, height, tilt and swivel adjustments. It's very intuitive and easy to handle. The design is great too, and the foot print of the stand is more userfriedly to me that my previous Planar PX171M. A very nice attention to detail are the 3 cable clamps along the trunk of the stand. This way, all cables to the monitor can be routed cleanly.
ClearMotiv: is Viewsonic's term for 16ms video response time to eliminate ghosting in videos and games (where ever fast brightness changes might occur). Unimportant for office applications, it still allows full-motion video at 62.5 fps without the typical ghosting from 25ms models or slower. (Fortunately, it's kind of hard to find 40ms monitors these days.) However, keep in mind that the ghosting only occurs when high-contrast changes occur within less than the rated response (time between an unexcited pixel to go to maximum brightness and back to 'black'). Hence, this effect is reduced for less dramatic changes.
Brightness and Contrast: While 250 nit brightness (typ) and 400:1 contrast ratio (typ) were top-notch when I got my Planar PX171M, it became a standard for most recent models and pretty much all good screens are either similar or better. Brightness is more than I need anyway. Contrast ratio could be a little bit better for everybody who works a lot with grahics in order to improve very bright or very dark areas.
Viewing Angle: The 176 degree in both vertical and horizontal direction practically guarantees image clarity from all directions. I have not noticed a difference to the 170 degree of a Samsung T23 monitor sitting right next to it, but the usability of the screen is much better than my previous Planar PX171M with 140 degree. Colors are more homogenous between center and corners, which is important for DTP and graphics applications.
Consistency: The brightness across the screen is ideally the same no matter where measured. In CRTs it's the angle with which the beam hits the phosphors relative to the mask that can cause a dim picture in the corners. For LCDs it's all about creating identical pixels on the glass substrate. The bigger the more difficult. The ViewSonic VP201s actually suprised me by this one area in the right hand top corner (slightly smaller than the palm of your hand) that stuck out when painting a 'black' picture. LCDs are naturally not a true black anyway, but this one area was just slightly brighter (lighter Gray). While it seems to have no influence on the brighter portion of the spectrum, it's still somewhat visible for near black screens only. I noticed that this 'problem' goes away when reducing the screen's brightness from its default maximum to about 80%. (Black is defined better that way too.)
Bright & Dark Pixels: Since LCDs consist of millions of individual pixels (1600x1200x3) and each is its own entity, they also can break individually unlike the beam of CRTs. Most screens are specified with an allowable number of bright pixels (at least one color sub pixel is always on due to a shortcut in the matrix) and dark pixels (sub-pixel cannot be illuminated). My VP201s revealed 3 bright (sub-)pixels (2x Red, 1x Green) and no dark pixels. This is a minor letdown since the Planar PX171M had none. However, it's still in spec since ViewSonic's warranty states: "ViewSonic sets limits on 20" & greater LCD's at 10 bright sub-pixels, 10 dark sub-pixels, or a combination of 10." (1 actual pixel consist of 3 sub pixels RGB.)
Note: "Bright Pixels" are often referred to as "Hot Pixels", and "Dark Pixels" as "Dead Pixels".
Color Accuracy: When running the colorimeter function of my ColorVision SpyderPro I noticed that correction is needed in both the very dark ranges as well as the very bright portion of the color spectrum. This is mostly related to the LCD characteristics and does not result in a color cast. It's more a compression of the dynamic range of the mentioned areas. However, color accuracy is still better than the Planar PX171M. The latter had significant deficiencies in the dark ranges while the VP201s requires slightly more correction in the bright range.
User Interface: As mentioned above, the monitor does provide 5 small buttons to adjust settings and their use is slightly cryptic at first (Marked as '1', 'Up', 'Down', '2', 'Power'). However, the tactile feedback is pretty bad (rubbery) and especially the power button requires some force to actuate. The OSD (on-screen-display) is well organized and adjusts function according to the used input (VGA or DVI-D). Labelling is relatively mysterious as '1' and '2' because of the context sensitive function. Normally '1' will enter the OSD while '2' cycles manually between DVI-A, DVI-D and D-SUB (VGA) input.
Included Software: ViewSonic is 'generous' with their packaged software and includes a custom screen pivoting software (The Planar PX171M required to purchase PivotPro separately.) What's sold by PortraitDisplays as PivotPro, is called PerfectPortrait 7 in the ViewSonic version. However, most recent drivers for both nVidia and ATI now support this function and make such software obsolete. The other CD includes the manual (there is a printed quickstart guide) and driver. On the positive side, ViewSonic also includes a predefined ICC profile for the display color management. Accuracy is fairly good, and if you absolutely need to know, well you know where to look.
UP-CLOSE & PERSONAL
The VP201s won me over in a heart beat. Basically, most things that I was not completely satisfied with my Planar PX171M now have been taken care of. Granted I may be under the influence of 'gadgedralin' (you know, when you get some cool new toy), but I tried to be critical in order to make sure that this investment was the right one. This is one cool monitor for desktop publishing, web design and CAD. But don't forget about games either.
Nevertheless, for dark videos or games like DOOM III I wish the VP201s would be closer to a CRT. Color definition is good, but calibration is still required to make sure it's as close to WYSIWYG as possible. (At least for those who have to rely on it.)
The high resolution helps out for applications like webdesign, where it allows to keep Dreamweaver MX open and still have other applications visible to comfortably 'switch' between programs or simply compare. (Actually, this was the main reason for this investment to begin with.)
Pro:
- large viewing area
- high resolution
- great viewing angle
- USB 2.0 hub (4x)
- power supply integrated
- refresh rate (16ms)
- pivot stand
- thin bezel
- attractive design
Con:
- slightly weak near white shades
- power button hard to operate
- some pixel inconsistency
SPECIFICATIONS
- 20.1" color TFT active matrix UXGA LCD
- Display Area: 16.1" (horizontal), 12.1" (vertical)
- Optimum Resolution: 1600x1200 pixles (native)
- Contrast Ratio: 400:1 (typ)
- Viewing Angle: 176 horizontal, 176 vertical @ CR>10
- Response Time: 16ms (typ)
- Brightness: 250 cd/m2 (typ)
- Panel Surface: Anti-glare
- Analog (VGA): RGB analog (75 ohms, 0.7/1.0 Vp-p)
- Digital (DVI-D): TMDS, 100 ohms, or analog capable
- Frequency: Fh:30~92kHz, Fv:50~85Hz
- USB: V 2.0 Up stream (B type) x1; Down stream (A type) x4
- Voltage: AC 100-240V (universal), 50-60Hz
- Power consumption: 70W (typ)
- Operating temperature: 32-104F (0-40C)
- Humidity: 10-90% (non-condensing)
- (WxHxD): 448mm x 480mm x 267mm (with stand)
- Weight: 18.7 lb. (8.5 kg) with stand;
ONLINE RESOURCES
http://www.viewsonic.com/products/desktopdisplays/lcddisplays/proseries/vp201s/
© 2005, theuerkorn
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 709
Operating System: Windows
|
|
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.