[bossmanenter]

Does anyone know of any reviews the compares second monitors to that of the original iMacs? I want to add an additional monitor, but in the past monitors I have purchased did not match color or brightness wise.

[fotografx]

How many of these displys can be color managed and support digital photographic work? Probably none.

[whitedog]

bossmanenter, on 29 May 2012 - 10:44 AM, said:

Does anyone know of any reviews the compares second monitors to that of the original iMacs? I want to add an additional monitor, but in the past monitors I have purchased did not match color or brightness wise.

I suspect the best monitor to match your iMac's display would be an Apple Thunderbolt Display. Of course, if you have an older iMac without a TB connector, that won't work. And a 27" display may be more than you need. You might also look on eBay for an older Apple display with a MiniDisplay connection. Or Google "24" Apple Cinema Display" for a variety of sources.

[elroth]

charles Wood, on 29 May 2012 - 07:38 AM, said:

LeTap, on 29 May 2012 - 07:02 AM, said:

Photonerd, on 29 May 2012 - 06:00 AM, said:

It should be noted none of these are something you should consider for professional photo or video work. These are all consumer-level displays.

I use the HP LP2465 monitor, calibrated using a Spyder3 calibrator, and use it for "professional photo or video work". I would imagine that the featured HP monitor here would be as good as my LP2465.

Any monitor can be used in a professional application but how successfully is a different matter. Although you may be able to calibrate brightness, contrast and basic color balance, the chances are very good that HP doesn't spec your present monitor to sRGB gamut, much less full RGB.

I would find it hard to recommend any of the 'tested' monitors for anything other than casual surfing, text creation or editing family photos/videos. Nothing was mentioned about response time (important for video viewing or editing) or the type of panel. I would guess all are TN types rather than IPS.

Maybe you should do a little research before speculating. In fact, the HP 2440 (and maybe some of the others) is an IPS display. Yes, the review is wanting in a lot of details (only a few more details are available in the diplay's individual reviews). It appears this HP monitor is a replacement for the previous generation, which I believe sold for about $800. I don't know if prices have come down that much for the same quality monitor, or if they've really cheapened it - too bad the review tells us almost nothing that's very useful.

[sensel]

My aluminum Apple Cinema HD Displays 23 and 30 inches never hurt my eyes. But my LED based iMac 27 inch screen remains painful and tiring to use - even with its brightness turned down to under half.
I'll take LCD fluorescent any day over LED!

[whitedog]

sensel, on 29 May 2012 - 02:21 PM, said:

My aluminum Apple Cinema HD Displays 23 and 30 inches never hurt my eyes. But my LED based iMac 27 inch screen remains painful and tiring to use - even with its brightness turned down to under half.
I'll take LCD fluorescent any day over LED!

The difference may be that your Cinema displays have a matt finish screen - if I recall correctly - which is generally easier on the eyes. This is a good reason for getting a non-Apple monitor: you have more options to choose from. Also not covered in this article were any NEC monitors which, in my experience, are excellent, with a wide variety of models, including high-end versions with full Adobe gamma support. It's still the case that you get what you pay for. And what you get will depend on what you need.

Macworld is a general interest webzine; if you want in-depth reviews you will go elsewhere, and probably should do. There's no use in panning them for doing what they do. It's not intended to be a primary source for product information; it's a secondary source at best. If it doesn't meet your needs, your expectations may have something to do with that.

[Fixx]

Useless review. See http://tftcentral.co.uk/ how it should be done.

[rlav]

"only two of the monitors we tested feature DisplayPort. Just three of the nine displays in this group include HDMI connectors"

It would be great if you could actually spell out which two monitors feature DisplayPort, and which three include HDMI connectors.

[sensel]

whitedog, on 29 May 2012 - 08:45 PM, said:

sensel, on 29 May 2012 - 02:21 PM, said:

My aluminum Apple Cinema HD Displays 23 and 30 inches never hurt my eyes. But my LED based iMac 27 inch screen remains painful and tiring to use - even with its brightness turned down to under half.
I'll take LCD fluorescent any day over LED!

The difference may be that your Cinema displays have a matt finish screen - if I recall correctly - which is generally easier on the eyes. This is a good reason for getting a non-Apple monitor: you have more options to choose from. Also not covered in this article were any NEC monitors which, in my experience, are excellent, with a wide variety of models, including high-end versions with full Adobe gamma support. It's still the case that you get what you pay for. And what you get will depend on what you need.

Macworld is a general interest webzine; if you want in-depth reviews you will go elsewhere, and probably should do. There's no use in panning them for doing what they do. It's not intended to be a primary source for product information; it's a secondary source at best. If it doesn't meet your needs, your expectations may have something to do with that.

(I assume your second paragraph is a general comment to other posters and not focused on me…)

As far as matte versus non matte, I know what you mean but, it is not a reflection issue. In my case, the iMac is positioned so that has never been an issue. I think it is the type of light. LED light is more intense. I had an external hard drive with a blue LED on it. The LED just stuck out with no plastic diffuser. Drove me crazy with its intensity. LEDs have improved and I am hoping with the passing of time, we'll see no difference and experience less pain. BTW: I think in another MW article recently, a MW writer also commented about preferring Cinema HD to Apples LED monitors for same reasons.

This post has been edited by sensel: 30 May 2012 - 05:36 AM

[whitedog]

sensel, on 30 May 2012 - 05:35 AM, said:

whitedog, on 29 May 2012 - 08:45 PM, said:

sensel, on 29 May 2012 - 02:21 PM, said:

My aluminum Apple Cinema HD Displays 23 and 30 inches never hurt my eyes. But my LED based iMac 27 inch screen remains painful and tiring to use - even with its brightness turned down to under half.
I'll take LCD fluorescent any day over LED!

The difference may be that your Cinema displays have a matt finish screen - if I recall correctly - which is generally easier on the eyes. This is a good reason for getting a non-Apple monitor: you have more options to choose from. Also not covered in this article were any NEC monitors which, in my experience, are excellent, with a wide variety of models, including high-end versions with full Adobe gamma support. It's still the case that you get what you pay for. And what you get will depend on what you need.

Macworld is a general interest webzine; if you want in-depth reviews you will go elsewhere, and probably should do. There's no use in panning them for doing what they do. It's not intended to be a primary source for product information; it's a secondary source at best. If it doesn't meet your needs, your expectations may have something to do with that.

(I assume your second paragraph is a general comment to other posters and not focused on me…)

As far as matte versus non matte, I know what you mean but, it is not a reflection issue. In my case, the iMac is positioned so that has never been an issue. I think it is the type of light. LED light is more intense. I had an external hard drive with a blue LED on it. The LED just stuck out with no plastic diffuser. Drove me crazy with its intensity. LEDs have improved and I am hoping with the passing of time, we'll see no difference and experience less pain. BTW: I think in another MW article recently, a MW writer also commented about preferring Cinema HD to Apples LED monitors for same reasons.

I use a little freeware utility called f.lux (http://stereopsis.com/flux/) that enables me to change the color temperature of my monitor at sunset to produce a softer light after dark. You can control the color temperature for both day and night time. It even determines the local time for sunset and sunrise based on your zip code. Very handy. The theory is that a warmer temperature screen at night is less stressful. It doesn't dim the screen, it just changes the white balance. You can turn it off for an hour at a time using the menu bar icon. This is useful for those of us who do color sensitive work, even after dark. But for reading and writing text the color shift can take away some of the strain without otherwise affecting your work.

And no, my second paragraph was not directed at you, but was a general observation in response to those who find Macworld reviews like this one inadequate. I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone, as it were, but apparently, to judge by the continuing complaints, I missed the mark. Then again, Macworld product reviews often are extremely shallow. I have complained of this myself before now. But such complaints, however often repeated, don't seem to affect the editors who persist in publishing to the same low standard. Perhaps it's because they don't pay much for such articles that authors are not motivated to do better. Or perhaps the editors just don't care what they post under their banner. In either case, this is what webzines like Macworld are like these days and complaining clearly makes no difference, however justified it may be.

In which case, users who post links to better sources are doing the reading public a solid. I know I often follow such links - and occasionally even post them myself, as in the case of f.lux, which is not all that easy to find - it's not listed on MacUpdate for instance, but was easy to find with Google once I got around to looking there. ;-)

[JakeT]

Stewsburntmonkey, on 29 May 2012 - 09:35 AM, said:

JakeT, on 29 May 2012 - 09:17 AM, said:

Too many low end monitors. I want IPS and I want higher resolution. My iPad 3 has more pixels, than any of these monitors. I don't want to stare at a cheap piece of junk all day.

You also hold your iPad closer to you than a typical monitor would be, so it needs a higher pixel density to attain the same perceived resolution.

That may be fine for you, but I want more. We've basically been stuck on the same resolution for years. We should have better screens, by now.

[Stewsburntmonkey]

JakeT, on 30 May 2012 - 10:15 PM, said:

Stewsburntmonkey, on 29 May 2012 - 09:35 AM, said:

JakeT, on 29 May 2012 - 09:17 AM, said:

Too many low end monitors. I want IPS and I want higher resolution. My iPad 3 has more pixels, than any of these monitors. I don't want to stare at a cheap piece of junk all day.

You also hold your iPad closer to you than a typical monitor would be, so it needs a higher pixel density to attain the same perceived resolution.

That may be fine for you, but I want more. We've basically been stuck on the same resolution for years. We should have better screens, by now.

The point of the retina display terminology is that it is a pixel density high enough that your eyes can't detect them individually. Increasing resolution beyond the retina level will not make the display perceivably better. At that point the only thing you'd be doing is increasing numbers on the spec sheet, without having any real improvement.

[JakeT]

Stewsburntmonkey, on 31 May 2012 - 04:51 AM, said:

JakeT, on 30 May 2012 - 10:15 PM, said:

Stewsburntmonkey, on 29 May 2012 - 09:35 AM, said:

JakeT, on 29 May 2012 - 09:17 AM, said:

Too many low end monitors. I want IPS and I want higher resolution. My iPad 3 has more pixels, than any of these monitors. I don't want to stare at a cheap piece of junk all day.

You also hold your iPad closer to you than a typical monitor would be, so it needs a higher pixel density to attain the same perceived resolution.

That may be fine for you, but I want more. We've basically been stuck on the same resolution for years. We should have better screens, by now.

The point of the retina display terminology is that it is a pixel density high enough that your eyes can't detect them individually. Increasing resolution beyond the retina level will not make the display perceivably better. At that point the only thing you'd be doing is increasing numbers on the spec sheet, without having any real improvement.

Like I said, I want more. Let the customer choose.

[Stewsburntmonkey]

JakeT, on 31 May 2012 - 10:16 PM, said:

Like I said, I want more. Let the customer choose.

Wanting more simply because is not rational. The customer is not always right.