X-bit labs

Closer Look at 19” Monitors Features: Pixel Response Time and More! (page 12)

Category: Other

by Oleg Artamonov

[ 10/06/2003 | 07:18 AM ]

Samsung SyncMaster 191N (GH19ASAB)

SyncMaster 191N is the junior model in the 19” display line from Samsung and is one of the least expensive displays participating in our today’s roundup. It comes to retail at about $700. The design is typical for the “N” series: a relatively large (and too high, to my opinion) base allows adjusting the tilt and height of the screen and turning it into the portrait mode. The compact case has a very narrow plastic framing, a built-in power unit and control keys below the screen. Note that not all 191N series models have the rotating base – SSS, SSN, and SSB-marked models (the third letter stands for the color of the case) don’t have it. So, if it’s important for you, be careful when shopping. The display has only one D-Sub input.

All Samsung displays follow one standard in the menu design and 191N is no exception. The structure of the menu is quite comprehensive and user-friendly. The settings you use most often – brightness and contrast are assigned to quick buttons.

By default, the brightness control stood at 80%, and the contrast – at 46%. To get the screen brightness equal to 100nit, I had to reduce both controls to 26%. The brightness is controlled by modulation of the power of the backlight lamps with a high frequency – about 520Hz. Thus, if you are uncomfortable with the flicker produced by the modulation frequency of 200-250Hz, you should not worry about this problem with Samsung displays.

The color temperature can be set in three ways: Reddish (as measurements showed, it corresponds to 5600K on white and 5760K on gray), Bluish (5960K and 6710K) and User Adjusted, which is by default set to the same temperature as Bluish.

At default settings, the color curves have nearly perfect shapes. The dynamic range is fully represented; there’s no misbalance for any of the basic colors.

The same is true for 100nit screen brightness, only the blue color becomes slightly prevalent over red and green. Thus, I say that this display is perfectly set up and doesn’t in fact need any calibration. And really, when I tried to calibrate it, I noticed no significant changes in the screen colors.

I couldn’t find the specified response time – none of the numerous Samsung websites has it. I don’t quite understand the meaning of this, as Samsung has nothing to conceal – the display showed an excellent result of 24ms in my tests. Moreover, this value didn’t change when I reduced the contrast.

Pixel rise time

Pixel fall time

But it was the brightness measurements that astonished me. Measuring the display contrast at 100nit screen brightness (120.9nit, to be precise, because the calibration was performed with a slight error), I obtained a fantastic number – 1500:1. Increasing the brightness, I somewhat lowered this value, but the minimum was anyway higher than the specified 500:1.

I think this is probably the best display in this roundup in terms of price/quality ratio. The incredible contrast ratio, small response time, high frequency of the backlighting modulation, excellent color rendition and availability of the portrait mode – and all this comes at a reasonable price. This display will be an excellent choice for both office and home use, of course, if you don’t need a digital input.