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KDS Avitron AV-7T

SUMMARY

PRO: Fair price, simple design. CON: Spreadsheet and newsletter text is ghosted. $547; 15.8-inch viewable area, .25mm stripe pitch Trinitron tube, up to 85 Hz refresh rate at 1024 by 768 resolution, Plug and Play ready, TCO'92 compliant, three-year warranty, 11-hour weekday toll-free support. KDS 800/283-1311 www.kdsusa.com

Even though the price is right, the Avitron AV-7T, KDS's first venture into the 17-inch Trinitron market, is a bust. The AV-7T faltered on our screen legibility tests, pulling its score down to one of the lowest among this month's new contenders. On our Word document, for example, letters had a light, gauzy look, and on our spreadsheet test corner fonts were not well defined. How do the AV-7T's graphics compare to those of this month's competition? While it rendered scanned photos better than either MaxTech's XT-7861 or CTX's EX710, the AV-7T was barely average. Colors on test images were intense, but its graphics quality landed the AV-7T almost in last place. The AV-7T has a no-frills look. Likewise, the on-screen controls were straightforward and bare-bones in design: four buttons access and adjust the on-screen controls, but adjustment required more button-pressing than we like.