Box Content

Inside the box you get 1 x D-Sub cable, 1 x DVI cable, 1 x Power cable, 1 x User Manual/CD, 1 x Stand.

Spec

• LCD: 19.0" colour TFT active matrix LCD
• Display Area: 14.8" horizontal x 11.9" vertical; 19.0" diagonal
• Max Res: 1280x1024
• Brightness: 280 cd/m2 (typ)
• Contrast Ratio: 800:1 static; 2000:1 dynamic (typ)
• Viewing Angle: 170º horizontal, 160º vertical @ contrast ratio > 10:1
• Response Time: 2ms gray-to-gray (avg); 5ms black-white-black (typ)
• Panel Surface: Anti-glare
• Mac: G3/G4/G5 up to 1280x1024; PerfectSuite Plus and pivot function not supported by ViewSonic.
• CONNECTOR: Analog/Digital 15-pin mini D-sub / DVI-D
• USB: V2.0, 1-up/4-down
• Consumption: 32W (typ)
• ERGONOMICS: Height adjustment range 4.7", tilt, swivel range 120º, pivot
• WARRANTY: Three-year limited warranty on parts, labour and backlight.

Design

The first thing we noticed about the Viewsonic screen was the build quality, the stand is pretty weighty and seems well constructed, the LCD itself also has the same treatment and you feel the £217 is money well spent - even at this early stage.

Once the base is connected to the screen it can also be raised up/down, tilted, rotated and pivoted, which in practice never feels cheap, as each rotation offers solid build quality once again.

At the front of the screen is the standard set of control buttons, for adjusting the colour temp, contrast, response time etc. The controls themselves are a bit fiddly compared to some monitors we have used, primarily because it is almost impossible to make out the symbols on each button - unless you get really close - and their positioning could of been better.

Underneath the front of the screen lies the connection ports, you have 1 x DVI, 1 x D-Sub and four USB ports. The latter is powered via your computer (using a printer style USB connector) and again these are not in the most useful place for quick swop outs, though we can assume that most graphic designers will normally have all their EQ permanently plugged in, so it won't be too much of an issue.

Some could also complain of the lack of a HDMI port (especially in the modern HD world), but the DVI is more than adequate for the size of screen on offer.

Being a Graphic design style monitor you won't find any internal speakers either, but thankfully the money has been spent on the screen technology itself.

Performance

Again after turning on the screen the most noticeable aspect was the quality of the colours themselves, which were boosted by the OptiColour technology which gives 98% NTSC colour capability for natural colours across the entire colour spectrum. In English the colours were vibrant - out of the box - and in all honesty we did not need to do hardly any adjustment to the colour depth during testing - which is a first.

Along side the monitor you have the Perfectsuite Plus software, which allows various levels of adjustment to your screen from a graphical user interface.

There is also an auto pivot function, so when you rotate the screen into a portrait stance it will automatically adjust the screen resolution and angle to match, though you can set the pivot angle yourself if you so wish.

With the software you can adjust all the monitors colours and assign them to profiles or run through a calibration wizard. Also on offer is different plug-ins for additional functionality, including a default screen lock which will assign a PIN number to the screen, so in the event of theft the monitor is useless without the password.

Plus using Adobe software we could also pick the Viewsonic colour profile from the list, which is essentially ingredient for graphic designer.

We did find one dead pixel on the screen, which was unfortunately smack bang in the center, however this is always luck of the draw, but again not that noticeable unless working on dark backgrounds.

Games

Even though the screen is not designed for games we still tried it on one of our favourite games, 'Battlefield 2' and the quality was excellent, with fast response times and vibrant colours.

DVD

Again DVD’s looked fine, though the blacks were fine in the movie themselves but the widescreen boarders were not complete black, but in fairness we had not optimised the screen.

Like we said before, we hardly needed to adjust this screen at all during testing, which for general all-round use is great.