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Flat Panel Face-Off

With LCD screens, big is good, bigger is better, and both are more affordable than ever.

Richard Jantz

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Flat vs. Fat: LCDs Take On CRTs

Photographer Mark Rutherford found that LCDs are suitable even for pros.

Photograph: Robert Cardin
Like vinyl record lovers who turn up their noses at CDs, many of my fellow photographers and other graphics pros shun flat-panel displays because traditionally LCDs have trailed CRTs in the range and precision of color they produce. Our in-depth comparisons found, however, that flat panels have essentially closed the performance gap with CRTs.

In one test, the PC World Test Center set up side-by-side comparisons of the four best 19-inch LCDs from this roundup and the four top 22-inch CRTs from our February Top 5 Monitors chart. With a 20-inch viewable screen, the CRTs offer just a bit more area, and they fall into roughly the same price range as the LCDs. The lab techs set the CRTs to a resolution of 1280 by 1024, to match the LCDs' native resolution, and covered the monitors' bezels to ensure anonymity. (One advantage of large CRTs is their ability to display very high resolutions--at least 1600 by 1200 for 21- and 22-inch models.)

The Fault of Default

Tested at default settings, the flat panels all earned significantly higher scores than the CRTs for both text and graphics. To make certain that our jury of testers wasn't enchanted simply by the LCDs' high brightness (about twice that of a typical CRT), we brought the top CRT--the ViewSonic P220f--and two high-scoring 19-inch LCDs--the Dell 1901FP and the Eizo Nanao FlexScan L767--to my photo studio for a closer look.

Under controlled lighting, we compared a high-quality print of a test image--containing various skin tones, gray scales, and subtle color shades--with the same image displayed on the monitors. As before, at default settings the LCDs showed far more accurate colors. After we calibrated each monitor, the LCDs looked even better, but so did the CRT. (For more on calibration, see "Calibration for Color Perfection.") In fact, the color quality differences among all three monitors became minimal.

Finally, we compared high-end monitors. Here, the one to beat is Sony's $1800 Artisan, a 21-inch CRT with a built-in calibration system that many professionals consider the gold standard for color accuracy. Apple's $2000, 23-inch, wide-format Cinema HD Display and Eizo Nanao's $2566, 21-inch ColorEdge CG21 were the two LCD challengers.

Calibration Is Key

Calibrated, all did very well. The Apple and the Sony were almost equally good at showing detail in shadows. The Eizo lost a tiny amount of the deepest shadow detail, but it surpassed the others in reproducing saturated colors, especially reds and yellows. We felt the Eizo did the best job overall, but differences were slight. A professional could justify the cost (and benefits) of buying any of the three. With calibration, even the 19-inch LCDs and the ViewSonic CRT deliver professional-grade image quality.

Mark Rutherford

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