Thursday, August 19, 2010

Samsung SyncMaster P2770H




- So the Westinghouse 24" died after only two years. It died the same way the first one I had (which died in 30 days) where the screen goes all pink. It has a crappy 1 year warranty too so I'm hosed. I'm done with third tier producers. Never again!
- So I was looking for a replacement. 27" seemed like it would be a nice upgrade and I've been very happy with my previous samsung hdtv's and monitors. Newegg had this model on sale for $315 shipped 3 day.
- I noticed most monitors these days are only 1920X1080 vs 1920X1200. I kind of miss the additional vertical resolution but I can't complain about the price.
- It has hdmi and a dvi-i inputs and audio outputs which pulls audio from hdmi. It does not have speakers. The stand is not very adjustable. All you can do is tilt it a bit. It does not swivel or have height adjustment.
- It comes with a dvi-dvi and dvi-vga cable.
- I'm primarily using this for gaming and some programming. It's a TN panel but I really don't care. I'd rather have the quicker 2ms gtg response time and reduced input lag. View angle and color reproduction are secondary to me.
- Backlight is pretty uniform with no obvious bleeding. I didn't find any dead pixels.
- HDMI worked fine with the 2 computers I'm using it with through a monoprice hdmi switch. On the nvidia 8600gt it looked fine without any adjustments. My ATI radeon 5850 hd though defaulted with a lot of underscan. It's a little hard to find in the catalyst drivers. Look here for some nice directions on how to turn underscan off so you get 1:1 native resolution without any scaling. Text is very clear.
- I'm sure a gaming console would work nicely with the HDMI too. Also, there is the P2770HD model for about $40 more you get a nice hdtv/monitor hybrid with a built in tuner, speakers, remote, and a lot more input options.
- Under setup | PC/AV Mode: Set it to PC Mode. Also set Auto Source to manual so sleep works properly.
- I tried some world of warcraft and call of duty modern warfare 2 on it. The size is pretty overwhelming at first but in an awesome sort of way. I quickly adjusted to it. Picture looked great with no ghosting or input lag.
- It has a very subtle red touch of color which matches my 46" samsung hdtv in the same room quite nicely. It also uses the same touch controls. There are no physical buttons. You just touch specific spots in the lower right corner and the area lights up with menu, arrows, etc for you to touch for each function. It's very aesthetically pleasing but some people might prefer physical buttons. My samsung hdtv is the same way too.
- 3 year warranty.
- I'm still messing with the picture settings but I already like what I see.
- No mounting holes on the back.

Highly recommended. For $315 you would be hard pressed to find a better panel. Sure some frills and features had to be cut but for the price and size it's an amazing deal.

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