Eizo L 885?

I need to replace my failing Sony 21" CRT, with which I've been
extremely happy. Sony isn't making it anymore, or I'd just replace it
and I don't know of any other CRTs that compare to Sony's color depth
and overall quality.

So, I decided it's time for an LCD.

I want

20" view
height adjustable and tilt adjustable
good angle of view
must have color temperature adjustments
low response time

An Eizo L885 seems to come close to my requirements but is rather
expensive. Is there anything else that compares?

TIA

Louise

I was in the same situation a few weeks ago, looking to replace an
irreplaceable 21" Sony aperture grille CRT with an LCD.

I looked hard at the Eizo, the ViewsonicVP201 and the Benq 2091. All looked
pretty good on specs, but I couldn't get comfortable with the idea of going
from the bright, sharp Sony to an (expensive) LCD, which still seemed to
require some compromise on brilliance, colour quality or response time. And
even when the numbers were good, the reviews were not overwhelming given the
price involved, and of course all LCDs have shortcomings in interpolating to
non-native resolutions.

I borrowed an Benq767/12 (12ms 17" screen) as an "interim" monitor, and to
check out the LCD technology for a few weeks. It was okay. But nothing
special. Colours were okay, but nowhere near the Sony CRT. No blurring in
games or graphics, so 12ms response seemed satisfactory. Interpolation was
very ordinary. All up, I was just underwhelmed by the LCD experience so,
when it came to buying my own long term new monitor, I chickened out and
bought the best 21/22" CRT I could find reviewed, the NEC Mitsubishi FP2141.
Another aperture grille (Diamondtron) monitor.

The twist in my story is that I wish I'd been a bit more courageous and
bought a 19 or 20" LCD.

The NEC is *nearly* as good as my old Sony. But not as good. In particular
colours are not as pure, despite much tweaking and use of reference tools.
So now I feel like I've gone backwards, and I still have a box on my desk
massive enough to have its own gravity well.

In retrospect, I should have made the decision to limit my PC use to
(mostly) one resolution, in order to avoid the biggest LCD problem of
interpolation limitations, and then bought the best 12ms response time LCD
for that resolution. For people that mainly use office apps the best
native res might be 1600 x 1200, but I find that too small (yes, I know font
sizes and default sizing can be varied in apps or system-wide, but try it
for a few days and you'll discover many limitations, such as for web
browsing where changing default font sizes etc doesn't solve the problem on
many sites of a blank right hand side of the screen). For me 1280x1024 on a
19" LCD would probably have been a better choice, although I was also
reticent to leave the familiar 4x3 screen ratio.

Aaanywaaay .... mine is just a cautionary tale. You won't find it easy to
satisfactorily replace that old Sony, and you can't really make direct
comparisons when going from a CRT to an LCD. With an LCD, definitely go
for a good response time of 12 ms or less, and these are coming out in more
models and with better prices. Have a look at the other monitors mentioned
above. I did note that, after my purchase, Sony has released new 12ms LCD
models such as the SDM-HS94P/B (19" true screen size) which would be
interesting to view or get reviews on.

Good Luck,
Greg


>I need to replace my failing Sony 21" CRT, with which I've been
> extremely happy. Sony isn't making it anymore, or I'd just replace it
> and I don't know of any other CRTs that compare to Sony's color depth
> and overall quality.
>
> So, I decided it's time for an LCD.
>
> I want
>
> 20" view
> height adjustable and tilt adjustable
> good angle of view
> must have color temperature adjustments
> low response time
>
> An Eizo L885 seems to come close to my requirements but is rather
> expensive. Is there anything else that compares?
>
> TIA
>
> Louise

In article <Y4J5d.5556$5O5.2357@news-server.bigpond.net.au>,
nospam@nsw.bigpond.net.au says...
> I was in the same situation a few weeks ago, looking to replace an
> irreplaceable 21" Sony aperture grille CRT with an LCD.
>
> I looked hard at the Eizo, the ViewsonicVP201 and the Benq 2091. All looked
> pretty good on specs, but I couldn't get comfortable with the idea of going
> from the bright, sharp Sony to an (expensive) LCD, which still seemed to
> require some compromise on brilliance, colour quality or response time. And
> even when the numbers were good, the reviews were not overwhelming given the
> price involved, and of course all LCDs have shortcomings in interpolating to
> non-native resolutions.
>
> I borrowed an Benq767/12 (12ms 17" screen) as an "interim" monitor, and to
> check out the LCD technology for a few weeks. It was okay. But nothing
> special. Colours were okay, but nowhere near the Sony CRT. No blurring in
> games or graphics, so 12ms response seemed satisfactory. Interpolation was
> very ordinary. All up, I was just underwhelmed by the LCD experience so,
> when it came to buying my own long term new monitor, I chickened out and
> bought the best 21/22" CRT I could find reviewed, the NEC Mitsubishi FP2141.
> Another aperture grille (Diamondtron) monitor.
>
> The twist in my story is that I wish I'd been a bit more courageous and
> bought a 19 or 20" LCD.
>
> The NEC is *nearly* as good as my old Sony. But not as good. In particular
> colours are not as pure, despite much tweaking and use of reference tools.
> So now I feel like I've gone backwards, and I still have a box on my desk
> massive enough to have its own gravity well.
>
> In retrospect, I should have made the decision to limit my PC use to
> (mostly) one resolution, in order to avoid the biggest LCD problem of
> interpolation limitations, and then bought the best 12ms response time LCD
> for that resolution. For people that mainly use office apps the best
> native res might be 1600 x 1200, but I find that too small (yes, I know font
> sizes and default sizing can be varied in apps or system-wide, but try it
> for a few days and you'll discover many limitations, such as for web
> browsing where changing default font sizes etc doesn't solve the problem on
> many sites of a blank right hand side of the screen). For me 1280x1024 on a
> 19" LCD would probably have been a better choice, although I was also
> reticent to leave the familiar 4x3 screen ratio.
>
> Aaanywaaay .... mine is just a cautionary tale. You won't find it easy to
> satisfactorily replace that old Sony, and you can't really make direct
> comparisons when going from a CRT to an LCD. With an LCD, definitely go
> for a good response time of 12 ms or less, and these are coming out in more
> models and with better prices. Have a look at the other monitors mentioned
> above. I did note that, after my purchase, Sony has released new 12ms LCD
> models such as the SDM-HS94P/B (19" true screen size) which would be
> interesting to view or get reviews on.
>
> Good Luck,

Thanks so much for your thorough descriptions and recommendations.
You've convinced me I have to find an LCD, which is what I kind of
thought - I've never been happy with anything but a Sony :-)

Interesting that you found it necessary to have a 12ms response time.
The present 20" Eizo has a 20ms response time - another reason to wait.
The new Sony you describe sounds very interesting - I dread to think of
the cost, but I also know I'll be glad I spent it (however much), as the
days go by.

I don't have the greatest vision and now run my Sony at 1024 x 768 using
large fonts. (ATI 9600 Pro Video Card). I've also set IE to use my
fonts instead of the fonts specified in the site's HTML code, and
usually that makes things pretty readable. Every once in a great while
I literally have to change resolutions just to get a site to work well
enough for me to click an "OK" button or something like that, but
usually using my own font (chose Arial) with the large font display size
set in control panel, works ok.

I was figuring I'd run an LCD with large fonts, even above 125% if
necessary, and make the same adjustments to IE. Firefox, (if you prefer
it), allows for almost infinite size adjustments using control/+ or -.

The hopeful end to my quest at the the moment is that I opened up my
computer case and found that the CPU fan adjustment knob (I have a fan
mate box that controls the fan speed of the CPU cooler), was right
against the edge of my video card and it seems that something wasn't
shielded very well. I moved the wiring so they no longer touch and so
far, so good. There is no more interference on the screen, it's not
popping, and the text is clear. I pray this really was the problem and
that all will be well until the "right" LCD comes along.

Hope you do ok with your NEC until we find the right LCD.

Take care.

Louise