Dell Ultrasharp 2408WFP Monitor - Mini Review

[Andy Wilkinson]

Thought I'd start a new thread for this mini review so it could have the correct title. I'll put a link into the previous thread on the lower spec monitor that developed into a discussion on this specific high spec monitor as well - below;

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=116660

Actually, this is more a first impressions thing, I'll probably add more detail at some point when I'm not busy.

My new 24-inch Dell Widescreen Ultrasharp 2408WPF Monitor arrived this morning complete with all the cables you need (including a HDMI cable.) As you unpack it and assemble the panel on the stand you can see that this is a well designed, engineered and quality product. And then you connect it up and turn it on.

One word. Wow!

It definitely has a much warmer/redder hue than I've seen on PC monitors before. No dead/stuck pixels either. However, I know from bitter experience that these can occur at any time - but no worries with this one (due to Dell's superb guarantee on this monitor.)

Anyway, spent a minute ot two getting it to display at the correct 1920x1200 pixel resolution and as my primary panel. Then relegated my previous Dell Ultrasharp 1703FP (i.e. a non-widescreen monitor) to becoming the secondary display. I have to say that for the last 3.5 years I've had high impressions of this 1703 (it was a mid to high end monitor when I bought it in July 2004 along with my Dell PC for editing.) Now though, it's absolutely no match to it's new sister screenwise. I've always liked viewing pictures on it but video was a bit crippled by its 25ms response time spec (but, for me, still enjoyable.)

I then had another surprise. I'd read that this new 2408WPF was exceptionally bright. Sure mine looked very bright and clear. Anyway, went into the (very easy to use) menu functions using the buttons on the lower right rim of the panel and saw that the brightness and contrast were only at 50% in the ex-factory settings. Started turning them up to see the limit.

Another wow!

In the end I left them at 65% - above that the brightness is so stunning it's like staring at the sun. This monitor has one of the most powerful/best backlights I think I've ever seen. Certainly, if you are used to working in a bright room/near big windows (i.e. non-ideal environment) then this stunning brightness/contrast capability would be of great value and justify the price tag on this monitor alone (I paid 430 quid when I ordered it at 4:00AM yesterday.)

Then I played around a bit with the presets (Desktop / Multimedia / Game / sRGB / Warm / Cool / Custom RGB.) This all needs a bit of time on my part but, from first impressions, it looks to me like you could set it up more or less anyway you want. Sure, all you DVInfo professionals will say it's not a studio monitor but that's not what I wanted it for, expected or need (or could afford!) By the way, this monitor can be set to display from a PC or Mac.

Next, looked at some 5 Megapixel digital pictures of my kids; superb warm skin tones, razor sharp clarity and subtleness in colours like in individual strands of their very dark brown/black hair...and, of course, NICE AND BIG!!!

Got a Vegas project up. Again, everything is razor sharp, bright and clear and a bit bigger than I'm used to!! Editing's going to be even more fun now!!!!!!! (even my wife is smiling/laughing/talking to me again now she's seen just how good this screen is!)

Anyway, that's it for now. I'll investigate its capabilities more over the next few days and hopefully add additional/useful information to this thread. If anyone has any specific questions about it I'd be glad to try and help with an answer as and when my time allows.

Posting a quick grab pic below (just to show how this baby looks on a desk really.) In fact, it's already not looking so big now - maybe I should have got a 27 or 30-inch!!! (just kidding!)

Full specs and details on Dell EU site (link below)

http://accessories.euro.dell.com/sna...hs1&sku=147262

[Martin Mayer]

Andy, have they fixed the aspect ratio bug?

On the 2407WFP, when feeding a widescreen anamorphic video image into any of the analogue composite, component or S-video inputs: the image is scaled to fit the full 1920x1200 screen, which is 16:10 and NOT 16:9 as it should be. The image is thus rather too tall. Circles are displayed as tall ellipses.

Has this been fixed on the 2408?

[Andy Wilkinson]

I think I read your mind as you were typing!

This last 30 minutes I was just trying my Sony HC1 into it via the component inputs. Initially, it played at 16:10 but a quick delve into the on-screen menu and display settings (gives you the choice to toggle between 1:1 / Aspect / Fill) and easily got it to 16:9. On Aspect you get the full width of the screen and about 1 cm of black banding top and bottom. I was worried I might only get 3/4 of the width with 1440x1080 HDV but it's absolutely fine on Aspect of course. There's no sound sockets to plug the audio lead into but the video sure looks nice!!!

Then, to check, after I'd watched the HD video I switched inputs back to the DVI for PC use and it automatically goes back to the full 16:10 for computer desktop.

Watching a DVD on it as well gives you the control bars in these narrow areas top and/or bottom and still the full 16:9 video.

[Martin Mayer]

OK, thanks, Andy. They've obviously changed things: the 2407 Display Settings (on component input) are also "1:1/Aspect/Fill" - but none of them gives the correct 16:9 aspect ratio.

Hopefully, Dell might realise it's just a firmware upgrade to the 2407 one day, but I'm not holding my breath!

Glad the 2408 sounds sorted! "c.1cm of black banding top and bottom" is exactly what I'd expect - it's 1920x1080 (true 16:9) with two black bands of 60 pixels each, top and bottom.

[Kajito Nagib]

Andy thanks for the review:-)

[Mark Keck]

Andy, what adjustments are possible for color correction???

[Andy Wilkinson]

Apologies for naff text format below but this is some crude info I've cut and pasted from the the sub-section of the user guide CD that deals with this and then then I've tried to make it make sense.

Basically, although I've not had much time to play with these adjustments yet it seems it's pretty adjustable! I gather sRGB is something to do with emulating the way NTSC displays colour (something about 72%) which might be useful for some. 0 to 100 scale single point custom adjustment of RGB is possible in PC/Mac mode and 0 to 100 scale single point adjustment again for Hue and Saturation is possible when sending video to the monitor.... so I imagine would allow you to get it looking closer to what you might want in either mode (but I'm no expert in this area!)

I'll post more info when I get time later tonight or tomorrow. Hope the stuff below makes some sense. I'm still greatly impressed with this new monitor/very happy!

....................................

Brightness adjusts the luminance of the backlight (0 to 100 scale.)

Adjust Brightness first, and then adjust Contrast (0 to 100 scale) only if further adjustment is necessary.
...........................................................

Color Setting mode: Input Color Format for either VGA/DVI-D input or Video Input.

To achieve the different color domain for PC RGB and HD YPbPr (HD YPbPr is suitable for HD video playback over DVI. PC RGB is suitable for normal PC graphics display over DVI).


GRAPHICS (VGA/DVI-D input) from PC or Mac
.............................................................

Desktop Mode

Multimedia Mode

Game Mode

sRGB Mode

Warm Mode

Cool Mode

Custom (R, G, B) i.e. each one 0 to 100 scale.


VIDEO INPUT
..................

For Video Input it can be Gamma or YPbPr

Movie Mode

Game Mode

Sports Mode

Nature Mode

Custom (R, G, B) i.e. each one 0 to 100 scale

Hue (0 to 100 scale)

Saturation (0 to 100 scale)

[Mark Keck]

Thanks for the info Andy. One more question... What will be your usage... general PC usage or video monitoring??? I'm specifically looking at this for video monitoring and would like it to be cal'ed as close as possible. Problem is that computer LCDs typically don't have the adjustments necessary to get them anywhere close. And I don't have the funds for a real broadcast or studio monitor. Here's the place I here from all those advocating a used 17" BVM from ebay :-)

Mark

[Mark Keck]

Andy, just found the users guide on dell.com... this is the first computer LCD that I've seen that has hue and sat controls... might just work out fine.

Mark

[Andy Wilkinson]

Certainly, switching it to Video mode gives more of a blue hue than the warmer/redder hue in Graphics mode, but, as you know/have mentioned you have some adjustment options not normally seen.

My primary use is PC/Graphics (almostly entirely Vegas video editing of HDV) on this particular screen. I do watch videos on it but these are mainly ones I'm working on (and I usually watch the downconverted Std Def DVD files which I render out periodically just to check progress/show to people on my Archos 604wifi or whatever.) I'm now using my second monitor for the previewing whilst editing and can view reasonable resolution settings in Vegas until the projects get complex and then I normally have to take it down to Draft > Best for Preview (Vegas guys and gals will know all about these flexible options).

This is mainly because my current editing PC is 3.5 years old and is not really up to full screen 1920 x 1080 HD video playback without a little stuttering. Some HD resolution DivX movies playback OK on full screen with this new monitor, others don't (not sure why, my Graphics card drivers are up to date and I have tons of RAM etc. - full spec in my profile) and HDV .m2t files (HDV) within Vegas have some stuttering if viewed full screen. Normal DVD's/Std Def MPEG2s look just fine though. However, note that the spec on the refresh rate for this panel is not as fast as some - but just fine for my needs.

Any edited HD videos I'm working on that I wish to watch big screen in HD I tend to dump on one of my many Sandisk U3 4GB USB Flashdrives (or on a DVD+R as a .m2t file.) I then just watch them on my big Samsung HDTV via my Playstation 3 (these are not in my Studio/Home Office but in our main Bedroom). A 24 inch screen for full HD playback is a bit too small, IMHO anyway. The PS3/HDTV system handles/displays my edited HD video files (DivX or .m2t) beautifully without any stuttering at all as you would expect!

One other point, the 2408WFP monitor chucks out quite a lot of heat after it's been on a few hours which could be a good or bad thing depending on your specific working environment/climate! In England this is mostly a good thing!

I'm still grinning ear to ear using all this new screen area I now have!

Link to manual download page below for those that are interested.

http://support.euro.dell.com/support...P/en/index.htm

[Michael Liebergot]

I too would be interested in how the 2408 is in regards to color adjustments.
I currently edit on a 2.66 Quad core Mac Pro in Vegas (via Bootcamp) and FCP (Leopard OSX) on the 2407 and rely on my JVC SD monitor for SD color correction and even downconverted HD to SD preview via Intensity Pro HDMI/Component.

Space is an issue with my work area right now, so I have been looking for a small affordable HD preview option (via HDMI).
And this would fit the bill perfectly if it is configurable enough for color calibration via blue gel.

Some good information here right now though, thank you.

[Andy Wilkinson]

More information (some praise and some critism) here and some technical information about the colour performance this monitor can display. For a very in-depth assessment I strongly recommend the detailed "monitortest blogspot review" (which is a further link within this review below - the 1st link I've given below.) Excellent information - in fact so good that I've given you all a direct link to it below (as the 2nd) as well.

http://www.tftcentral.co.uk/articles/dell_2408wfp.htm

http://monitortest.blogspot.com/

I have to say I've NOT seen any of the issues outlined (some appear to be quite isolated anyway) except for the occassional colour banding that is mentioned (and then it's no worse than I've seen on LCD's in general.) The colour banding (on colour gradients) only seems to be with SOME DivX encoded HD videos playing off my one of my HDD's, and certainly not all of my HD DivX videos. I'm no PC expert but I suspect it might mean my graphics card is struggling a little (as these particular videos are sometimes stuttering on my system anyway, maybe?) Certainly, I don't see it on stills. I've also not seen any colour banding (at least not yet) with HDV video played into the monitor from my camera via component (i.e. circumventing the PC/Graphics card) but that might just be the type of material I've viewed so far.

I'm afraid you'll have to form your own opinions until I and others know more but at least you now have the links and can be aware of this and the other niggles that it may or may not have.

Edit: Used it today to screen a selection of 12 MegaPixel still photos with a friend (for getting close to a short list for a charity calander and some postcards we're working on for the local Cathedral.) He was mighty impressed with the screen and it was so easy for us both to work with the images because of this screens size, clarity and wide viewing angle.

[Andy Wilkinson]

One other thing I've noticed with this monitor is that, in order to rotate it vertically (portrait mode) you have to first tilt it backwards so that the corners don't "ground" with the top of the stand/desk. Others (on various forums) have complained that the USB 2.0/Card reader sockets are then at the top of the monitor and not at the bottom (because it rotates clockwise through 90 degrees) Personally, I think this is better as I would want to unplug these items before turning such a huge screen anyway (don't want to risk damage to the USB sockets with any temporary peripherals still plugged in etc.)

My mate just phoned me to say that the pictures we both selected yesterday look "dim and dark" on his monitor when he views the files. I'm not surprised! I'm still thrilled to bits with this new baby! : - )

[Mark Keck]

Thanks Andy for all the good info and links you've provided. As to the reviews, I've not read anything to make me think differently about the 2408. Some good, some bad... kinda reminds me of life... but overall a good monitor that looks to be what I need (ok.. want :-). No if I can just find a few extra sheckels.

Mark

[Michael Maier]

Is the vieo mode when using component noisy and low quality as was the case with the prior generation 2407?