Samsung Sync Flat Panel Monitor - good choice for photo editing?

I have a 15" Samsung LCD bought new in early 2001 and am about to replace it only because it's outmoded. It's been heavily used and the backlight is still OK. About a year ago I tried to buy a spare backlight and Samsung Australia wouldn't sell me one. I'm looking at the Sony, not the Samsung.

Analogue Samsungs, including mine, are dim on Mac Minis. That Mac puts out too low a voltage on VGA and Samsung take the VGA standard at face value, as they have every right to do. I would not buy a new monitor which didn't have a DVI interface. But if your new machine has only VGA it might make sense to go for a VGA-only monitor.

The two that have been recommended to me are the Sony and the Apple.

As I said before, I've been using flat-panel for 4 1/2 years and after two hours you will never go back to CRT. There has been a lot of nonsense posted here about the alleged superiority of CRT's - ignore it.

Read this article for more information lcd panels: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/display/lcd-guide.html

I'm not an LCD technology expert but I'm speaking from experience as as a colour management service provider. If you need/want an LCD for photo editing I suggest you invest in an 8bit s-ips lcd panel such as the LG L1920P, LaCie, Apple Cinema Displays etc.

I would not recommend cheap TN+ lcd panels because they cannot display true 16.8M colours and have limited viewing angles. The Samsung MVA type lcd panel such as the 193P is not bad for photo editing. But it's a bit of a challenge to calibrate to get good gray balance in the shadows.

If your budget is limited then I suggest you get a good Trinitron or Diamondtron based crt monitor.

good luck

I wish the above-mentioned article could be trusted, but it includes a couple of bloopers:

"...eyes don't perceive flicker of a frequency of 60Hz". Wrong, many people can see it, some subliminally.

"...reduces the electrostatic field [from a CRT] to acceptable levels." Wrong, skin infections from the ionized air are well documented - as my doctor told me years ago.

I don't know whether the raw information there is right or wrong, but the article shows every sign of having been written from the conclusion back to the evidence.

I would avoid Viewsonics for critical photo editing. I brought two of them home and was not impressed. They are very lively appearing which is great for general computing but not for accurate editing.

Doug

Dougs MF Film Holder for batch scanning of 120/220 medium format film with flatbeds

I've been happy with Samsung 213T (21", 1600x1200 native res, true 8-bit color). In fact, just bought a 2nd one, Amazon.com has them for $700 (free shipping & no tax in USA).

I've done preliminary profile and calibration with Optix XR Pro, the LCD display's dE is substantially better (dE = 1-2) than the 4 yr old Sony CPDG400 CRT (dE = 3-4) I'm replacing. I expect other Samsung LCDs will be similar.

But shadow detail is not as good on LCD. Dark Shades the old CRT can distinguish, the LCD cannot. MAybe I need to tweak gamma and other settings a bit.

But shadow detail is a general weakness of LCD. For this reason I am a diehard fan of projection CRT for large home theater systems.

I'm also not impressed with my ViewSonic. it's a VG175 running on a dual-head Matrox card under Windows XP. I've had the hardest time getting rid of a pink cast on it and the shadow detail sucks. Next to it, I've got a Dell Trinitron that I got for free at a local computer repair place's You Can Have It For Free, Just Take It Away sale. Prints come off ot it looking exactly the same as they appear onscreen.

Thanks everyone for you input. I'll show your responses to my son who will help me make my final decision. I love photo.net. There are so many helpful people!