Alright, so I've been working the hell out of this thing, trying to make sure you guys get the most in-depth review I can, and as you've noticed so far with a couple of my other posts, it hasn't been happy trails to get to this review done.
I'm not a professional reviewer. Dell/Alienware didn't send me a test sample, so no cracking open the casing to get panel info, and I don't have the full range of equipment to get every little detail of this monitor properly recorded and graphed (I do have a Xrite i1 Display 2 for calibration purposes, though). Instead, what I have is a keen sense of vision, and perhaps a really overly picky attitude when it comes to the products I buy. To borrow a quote from the character Anton Ego, "I don't like [it], I [i]love[/i] [it]...if I don't [i]love[/i] [it], I don't [i]swallow[/i]."
Please note that a majority of this review is based on subjective results, so other users opinions will be different. As a point of comparison, I've got a BenQ FP241VW monitor, Rev 01, which I'll be referencing from time to time in the review as "my previous monitor" or something along those lines. Also, my test setup is a Core i7 @ 4.2 GHz, a EVGA Classified x58 760, 6GB DDR3-2000, and a EVGA GTX 285 running the latest driver kit from nVidia (CD v1.20).
So without further adieu, let's get to the review!
[b]
Product Brief:[/b]
The Alienware AW2310 is the first-to-the-US-market 1080p 3D Vision capable monitor, and utilizes a TN panel, which has the benefit of a low response time and low cost, with the tradeoff of lower color quality and fairly well defined color shifting. The version I received is marked revision A00, with a manufacture date of "Week 46 / 2009", or somewhere around the first week of November of last year.
[i]From Dell's website:
Panel Size: 23″ Widescreen, 16:9
Panel Type: TN – Twisted Nematic
Native Resolution: 1920 x 1080 (Full HD)
Contrast Ratio: 80000:1 (dynamic)
Brightness: 400 cd/m2 (typical)
Response Time: 3ms (typical) (gray-to-gray)
Viewing Angle : 170°/ 160°
Color Support : 16.7 million colors
Color Gamut: 83.4%
Refresh Rate: 120Hz (3D Capable)
Video Connectivity: DVI x1, HDMI x1
Audio Connectivity: Yes; Audio In and Out (2.0)
USB Ports : Yes: 4 USB 2.0
User Input / Controls: Touch Capacitive OSD Buttons
Stand: Tilt, Swivel and Height Adjustable[/i]
Wow, looks great on paper! But how does it perform...
[b]Colors and Calibration[/b]
Well, here's where the monitor starts having some problems. When I first turned on the monitor to let it warm up, I immediately noted how washed out the image looked. My desktop images, the "Bing's Best" theme from Microsoft, which generally had a high range of contrast, looked almost overblown, and the fine details were lacking. The first image that was on the screen was that of a panda cub, which, on my previous monitor, had a significant amount of detail in the cub's fur...none of which was present on the Alienware. While this was a put-off at first, a subsequent color calibration on the "Standard" setting restored a bit of the missing detail.
After letting the monitor run for a while, I went back and tried out a full range calibration, with the target settings of 6500k temp, 200cd/m2 brightness, and a gamut of 2.2. This is when I discovered yet another fun fact about the monitor: the RGB setting, which allows for individual tweaking to the three primary color channels, comes with each channel maxed by default (100 out of 100). This is immensely frustrating, as other monitors I've worked with generally start with their RGB settings around the 50% mark. Because the Xrite starts with calibrating the contrast, this means that I have to first lower the RGB settings, then start the calibration over to get a proper result...if the RGB test shows up with a color value outside the range of what I can adjust, I have to restart the whole process.
After tinkering with it, I got a final result of 35 Brightness, 60 Contrast, R90 G93 B100 with a temp of 6600k. The color curves were normal, and actually fared better than my BenQ, despite the outward appearance being somewhat lacking (more on that below). My other thread on this board ("What to Blame") has the ICC profile if you want to try it yourself.
[b]Sub-Section: Backlight Bleed and Uniformity[/b]
Now, another problem found in most TN panels is color uniformity and viewing angle, and this monitor is no exception.
In this image, I've got the lights in my room off and the camera set to a night shot mode to enhance the image a bit. As you can see, there's a fairly significant backlight bleed at the top and bottom, and a slight color shift on either side. While the image may exaggerate these problems, they are quite noticeable during general use of the monitor, especially when browsing these forums, or the ones at Hard|OCP.
Here, I've run the Lavalys Everest Monitor checker, and took a image of the grey background, which fairs a bit better at showing the panel's uniformity. The top of the screen is generally a bit darker, and when set to lower contrast values, like suggested by our 3D Vision mod Andrew in my other thread, this problem is even more apparent. The top of the screen looks almost like someone burned it, while the bottom looks blown out.
Returning to the issue of backlight bleed, I snapped this image under some better lighting conditions. While you might think that this problem would only show up on a pure black background, think about the number of games out there that have a dark environment, or a menu system that isn't as bright as the sun. No matter how much I did to adjust the contrast and brightness, the backlight bleed is [i]very[/i] noticeable during almost any game I played, and moreso when that game was played with 3D vision enabled.
[b]2D Performance, General Use, and Gaming[/b]
As far as the monitor's performance in a 2D setting, for both gaming and general use, this monitor is a bit problematic. Despite being 120hz, scrolling text and little things, like moving windows and the cursor on the desktop, become a blur. What proved to be hell to me was constantly losing my cursor on a white background when I moved it around, something that's never happened to me before on any screen I've used. Lines of text also had some issues while scrolling, sometimes changing from black to blue, just becoming a mess of black, other times staying normal. Setting the monitor to a lower response time just made the problem a hell of a lot worse...something I'd expect from a monitor at fraction of the AW2310.
The color uniformity issues I mentioned above also make an impact on my day to day use, and I can't help but look at this monitor and wonder if something is wrong, or if it has a mind of it's own. Hell, I put up with the [url="http://i974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/023.jpg"]top of my BenQ monitor practically melting[/url], and despite that, it still has uniform color, little backlight bleed, and great responsiveness when even the fine details are moving around.
Now, in a gaming environment, it actually performs quite well. The 120hz frequency is really nice for today's gaming, and I was blown away by how Team Fortress 2 and Mass Effect performed with a much higher framerate that was unrestricted by 60hz. However, the problems mentioned above do hamper my overall enjoyment, especially in games like Dead Space and Mass Effect, which utilize dark, heavily contrasted images. Mass Effect in particular performed below my expectations, with the backlight bleed and uniformity making it very difficult to pick out the details in many of the scenes and dialogue segments. Talking to Dr. Chakras or Garrus while on board the Normandy really emphasizes these problems, as both of them are found in settings with minimal lighting. There actually was a point where I could barely tell where Shepard's torso ended and the wall began.
[b]3D Vision Performance[/b]
Well, I'm going to be perfectly honest. This was my first real use of the 3D Vision tech outside of a demo kiosk, and boy, my heart is torn. On one hand, I'm a big proponent of the future of 3D film and gaming, and I firmly believe shutter tech is the way to go...but on the other hand, I can see a great deal of technical problems with the current iteration of the technology. Most of you guys on this forum have been avid 3D Vision users for a long time, and know all there is to know about ghosting, afterimage, and the like; many of you were hoping that the newer releases of monitors would perform a lot better, but as you might have noticed in my other thread, all hasn't been as well as I personally had hoped.
The first game I played using 3D Vision was Avatar, which is a flagship title for almost any 3D tech. After playing the game like mad for the past few days, I can say with certainty that 3D gaming in the future, so long as developers take a similar approach, is incredibly viable, and greatly enhances the gameplay experience. If there's one thing to be said about Avatar, is that this game was meant for 3D, and is actually quite difficult to play otherwise.
But enough about the game for now. How does this monitor handle 3D Vision?
Eh...this is where it gets bipolar. The ghosting at the top of the screen, mentioned by almost everyone in regards to the Samsung and Viewsonic monitors, is quite apparent on the Alienware, but varies from game to game. Avatar was quite minimal, while Batman AA was very noticeable. Overall scene ghosting is quite debilitating when playing other games like Team Fortress 2, CounterStrke Source, and Mass Effect, which have problems related to foreground depth (in my other thread, I mentioned how some objects appeared to have an "aura" of doubles).
Now, when I mentioned the monitor being bipolar, here's what I mean: When playing Avatar the first time, the bottom of the screen had some ghosting problems, and the water splash effects had a duplicate that appeared only on the right lens of the 3D Vision goggles. However, after quitting and coming back to the game, the ghosting problem was gone, and only appeared in areas where there was a waterfall. Likewise, when playing Mass Effect, the depth of the scene seemed fine, and the environment, aside from mild ghosting, didn't have many flaws. However, going back to the game at a later point resulted in the terrain being doubled, despite the glasses, and monitor working properly. These might be quirks related to the 3D Vision software itself, but it is hard to tell.
The monitor also has some odd quirks related directly to how it functions with 3D Vision enabled. Like the other monitors available, the monitor will set itself to max brightness when the 3D effect is running. However, I've found that a good chunk of the time, the brightness level doesn't revert to what it was previously after exiting the game, and that changing a monitor setting, such as resolution or refresh rate, does cause the monitor to revert to the original values, but more often than not, the screen won't return to how it looked before gameplay until you restart your computer.
[b]Final Thoughts[/b]
It is really hard to summarize my thoughts on this monitor into a few short sentences. It is one of the few screens out there that operates at 1920x1080@120Hz, and manages to do so adequately, but the limitations of the technology in the panel itself put a massive damper on my enjoyment. I had originally purchased this monitor to replace a dying one, and to jump fully into the world of truly 3D gaming, and expected probably too much out of it. I wanted something that would work well for day to day use, with great color accuracy and performance, that could be the definitive screen to keep for the next few years, but now I've come to realize that it is still going to be a while before I can have my cake and eat it too. There are just too many problems with this monitor that I can't ignore, or write off as normal. Normal for me is a high standard, and having a monitor that is, at this point, a $500 accessory to use 3D Vision, isn't worth the cost.
This doesn't mean I'm writing of 3D Vision as strictly a novelty; in fact, quite the opposite. It is a wonderful technology, and a step forward for gaming moreso than others might choose to acknowledge, but the technical problems associated with getting every little bit of it to work properly is a massive boulder in the path to the end user's enjoyment. I don't think the average consumer is going to fork over $200 for the kit and $500+ for a 1080p monitor and be contempt with "okay" performance. If time spent with the Alienware has taught me anything, it is that nVidia and the panel makers out there need to get it together and greatly improve the quality of both the screen and 3D Vision kit if they intend to go anywhere with it.
Overall, [u]I cannot suggest this monitor to anyone except the truly diehard 3D Vision fans[/u] looking for an upgrade from their current setup. If I had to assign a letter grade, it would be [b]C-[/b].
Alright, so I've been working the hell out of this thing, trying to make sure you guys get the most in-depth review I can, and as you've noticed so far with a couple of my other posts, it hasn't been happy trails to get to this review done.
I'm not a professional reviewer. Dell/Alienware didn't send me a test sample, so no cracking open the casing to get panel info, and I don't have the full range of equipment to get every little detail of this monitor properly recorded and graphed (I do have a Xrite i1 Display 2 for calibration purposes, though). Instead, what I have is a keen sense of vision, and perhaps a really overly picky attitude when it comes to the products I buy. To borrow a quote from the character Anton Ego, "I don't like [it], I love [it]...if I don't love [it], I don't swallow."
Please note that a majority of this review is based on subjective results, so other users opinions will be different. As a point of comparison, I've got a BenQ FP241VW monitor, Rev 01, which I'll be referencing from time to time in the review as "my previous monitor" or something along those lines. Also, my test setup is a Core i7 @ 4.2 GHz, a EVGA Classified x58 760, 6GB DDR3-2000, and a EVGA GTX 285 running the latest driver kit from nVidia (CD v1.20).
So without further adieu, let's get to the review!
Product Brief:
The Alienware AW2310 is the first-to-the-US-market 1080p 3D Vision capable monitor, and utilizes a TN panel, which has the benefit of a low response time and low cost, with the tradeoff of lower color quality and fairly well defined color shifting. The version I received is marked revision A00, with a manufacture date of "Week 46 / 2009", or somewhere around the first week of November of last year.
From Dell's website:
Panel Size: 23″ Widescreen, 16:9
Panel Type: TN – Twisted Nematic
Native Resolution: 1920 x 1080 (Full HD)
Contrast Ratio: 80000:1 (dynamic)
Brightness: 400 cd/m2 (typical)
Response Time: 3ms (typical) (gray-to-gray)
Viewing Angle : 170°/ 160°
Color Support : 16.7 million colors
Color Gamut: 83.4%
Refresh Rate: 120Hz (3D Capable)
Video Connectivity: DVI x1, HDMI x1
Audio Connectivity: Yes; Audio In and Out (2.0)
USB Ports : Yes: 4 USB 2.0
User Input / Controls: Touch Capacitive OSD Buttons
Stand: Tilt, Swivel and Height Adjustable
Wow, looks great on paper! But how does it perform...
Colors and Calibration
Well, here's where the monitor starts having some problems. When I first turned on the monitor to let it warm up, I immediately noted how washed out the image looked. My desktop images, the "Bing's Best" theme from Microsoft, which generally had a high range of contrast, looked almost overblown, and the fine details were lacking. The first image that was on the screen was that of a panda cub, which, on my previous monitor, had a significant amount of detail in the cub's fur...none of which was present on the Alienware. While this was a put-off at first, a subsequent color calibration on the "Standard" setting restored a bit of the missing detail.
After letting the monitor run for a while, I went back and tried out a full range calibration, with the target settings of 6500k temp, 200cd/m2 brightness, and a gamut of 2.2. This is when I discovered yet another fun fact about the monitor: the RGB setting, which allows for individual tweaking to the three primary color channels, comes with each channel maxed by default (100 out of 100). This is immensely frustrating, as other monitors I've worked with generally start with their RGB settings around the 50% mark. Because the Xrite starts with calibrating the contrast, this means that I have to first lower the RGB settings, then start the calibration over to get a proper result...if the RGB test shows up with a color value outside the range of what I can adjust, I have to restart the whole process.
After tinkering with it, I got a final result of 35 Brightness, 60 Contrast, R90 G93 B100 with a temp of 6600k. The color curves were normal, and actually fared better than my BenQ, despite the outward appearance being somewhat lacking (more on that below). My other thread on this board ("What to Blame") has the ICC profile if you want to try it yourself.
Sub-Section: Backlight Bleed and Uniformity
Now, another problem found in most TN panels is color uniformity and viewing angle, and this monitor is no exception.
In this image, I've got the lights in my room off and the camera set to a night shot mode to enhance the image a bit. As you can see, there's a fairly significant backlight bleed at the top and bottom, and a slight color shift on either side. While the image may exaggerate these problems, they are quite noticeable during general use of the monitor, especially when browsing these forums, or the ones at Hard|OCP.
Here, I've run the Lavalys Everest Monitor checker, and took a image of the grey background, which fairs a bit better at showing the panel's uniformity. The top of the screen is generally a bit darker, and when set to lower contrast values, like suggested by our 3D Vision mod Andrew in my other thread, this problem is even more apparent. The top of the screen looks almost like someone burned it, while the bottom looks blown out.
Returning to the issue of backlight bleed, I snapped this image under some better lighting conditions. While you might think that this problem would only show up on a pure black background, think about the number of games out there that have a dark environment, or a menu system that isn't as bright as the sun. No matter how much I did to adjust the contrast and brightness, the backlight bleed is very noticeable during almost any game I played, and moreso when that game was played with 3D vision enabled.
2D Performance, General Use, and Gaming
As far as the monitor's performance in a 2D setting, for both gaming and general use, this monitor is a bit problematic. Despite being 120hz, scrolling text and little things, like moving windows and the cursor on the desktop, become a blur. What proved to be hell to me was constantly losing my cursor on a white background when I moved it around, something that's never happened to me before on any screen I've used. Lines of text also had some issues while scrolling, sometimes changing from black to blue, just becoming a mess of black, other times staying normal. Setting the monitor to a lower response time just made the problem a hell of a lot worse...something I'd expect from a monitor at fraction of the AW2310.
The color uniformity issues I mentioned above also make an impact on my day to day use, and I can't help but look at this monitor and wonder if something is wrong, or if it has a mind of it's own. Hell, I put up with the top of my BenQ monitor practically melting, and despite that, it still has uniform color, little backlight bleed, and great responsiveness when even the fine details are moving around.
Now, in a gaming environment, it actually performs quite well. The 120hz frequency is really nice for today's gaming, and I was blown away by how Team Fortress 2 and Mass Effect performed with a much higher framerate that was unrestricted by 60hz. However, the problems mentioned above do hamper my overall enjoyment, especially in games like Dead Space and Mass Effect, which utilize dark, heavily contrasted images. Mass Effect in particular performed below my expectations, with the backlight bleed and uniformity making it very difficult to pick out the details in many of the scenes and dialogue segments. Talking to Dr. Chakras or Garrus while on board the Normandy really emphasizes these problems, as both of them are found in settings with minimal lighting. There actually was a point where I could barely tell where Shepard's torso ended and the wall began.
3D Vision Performance
Well, I'm going to be perfectly honest. This was my first real use of the 3D Vision tech outside of a demo kiosk, and boy, my heart is torn. On one hand, I'm a big proponent of the future of 3D film and gaming, and I firmly believe shutter tech is the way to go...but on the other hand, I can see a great deal of technical problems with the current iteration of the technology. Most of you guys on this forum have been avid 3D Vision users for a long time, and know all there is to know about ghosting, afterimage, and the like; many of you were hoping that the newer releases of monitors would perform a lot better, but as you might have noticed in my other thread, all hasn't been as well as I personally had hoped.
The first game I played using 3D Vision was Avatar, which is a flagship title for almost any 3D tech. After playing the game like mad for the past few days, I can say with certainty that 3D gaming in the future, so long as developers take a similar approach, is incredibly viable, and greatly enhances the gameplay experience. If there's one thing to be said about Avatar, is that this game was meant for 3D, and is actually quite difficult to play otherwise.
But enough about the game for now. How does this monitor handle 3D Vision?
Eh...this is where it gets bipolar. The ghosting at the top of the screen, mentioned by almost everyone in regards to the Samsung and Viewsonic monitors, is quite apparent on the Alienware, but varies from game to game. Avatar was quite minimal, while Batman AA was very noticeable. Overall scene ghosting is quite debilitating when playing other games like Team Fortress 2, CounterStrke Source, and Mass Effect, which have problems related to foreground depth (in my other thread, I mentioned how some objects appeared to have an "aura" of doubles).
Now, when I mentioned the monitor being bipolar, here's what I mean: When playing Avatar the first time, the bottom of the screen had some ghosting problems, and the water splash effects had a duplicate that appeared only on the right lens of the 3D Vision goggles. However, after quitting and coming back to the game, the ghosting problem was gone, and only appeared in areas where there was a waterfall. Likewise, when playing Mass Effect, the depth of the scene seemed fine, and the environment, aside from mild ghosting, didn't have many flaws. However, going back to the game at a later point resulted in the terrain being doubled, despite the glasses, and monitor working properly. These might be quirks related to the 3D Vision software itself, but it is hard to tell.
The monitor also has some odd quirks related directly to how it functions with 3D Vision enabled. Like the other monitors available, the monitor will set itself to max brightness when the 3D effect is running. However, I've found that a good chunk of the time, the brightness level doesn't revert to what it was previously after exiting the game, and that changing a monitor setting, such as resolution or refresh rate, does cause the monitor to revert to the original values, but more often than not, the screen won't return to how it looked before gameplay until you restart your computer.
Final Thoughts
It is really hard to summarize my thoughts on this monitor into a few short sentences. It is one of the few screens out there that operates at 1920x1080@120Hz, and manages to do so adequately, but the limitations of the technology in the panel itself put a massive damper on my enjoyment. I had originally purchased this monitor to replace a dying one, and to jump fully into the world of truly 3D gaming, and expected probably too much out of it. I wanted something that would work well for day to day use, with great color accuracy and performance, that could be the definitive screen to keep for the next few years, but now I've come to realize that it is still going to be a while before I can have my cake and eat it too. There are just too many problems with this monitor that I can't ignore, or write off as normal. Normal for me is a high standard, and having a monitor that is, at this point, a $500 accessory to use 3D Vision, isn't worth the cost.
This doesn't mean I'm writing of 3D Vision as strictly a novelty; in fact, quite the opposite. It is a wonderful technology, and a step forward for gaming moreso than others might choose to acknowledge, but the technical problems associated with getting every little bit of it to work properly is a massive boulder in the path to the end user's enjoyment. I don't think the average consumer is going to fork over $200 for the kit and $500+ for a 1080p monitor and be contempt with "okay" performance. If time spent with the Alienware has taught me anything, it is that nVidia and the panel makers out there need to get it together and greatly improve the quality of both the screen and 3D Vision kit if they intend to go anywhere with it.
Overall, I cannot suggest this monitor to anyone except the truly diehard 3D Vision fans looking for an upgrade from their current setup. If I had to assign a letter grade, it would be C-.
DETHCUBE: Intel Core i7-5960x w/ GT 110i | Asus Rampage V Extreme | 32 GB Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR4-3000 | Corsair Air 540 w/ Noctua PPC | Creative Soundblaster X7 w/ OPAMP Mod | Titan X SC SLI w/ACX 2.0 | Corsair AX1500i | Samsung 850 Pro 1TB | beyerdynamic DT 880 |
Nice review and very useful info. Thanks for posting.
It would be great if a screenshot that have top ghosting can be viewed. I still don't have a clear idea of what this phenomenon is yet because I don't have 3D Ready LCD with my 3D Vision, only DLP TV.
Nice review and very useful info. Thanks for posting.
It would be great if a screenshot that have top ghosting can be viewed. I still don't have a clear idea of what this phenomenon is yet because I don't have 3D Ready LCD with my 3D Vision, only DLP TV.
[quote name='distant' post='987242' date='Jan 23 2010, 01:20 PM']Nice review and very useful info. Thanks for posting.
It would be great if a screenshot that have top ghosting can be viewed. I still don't have a clear idea of what this phenomenon is yet because I don't have 3D Ready LCD with my 3D Vision, only DLP TV.[/quote]
There was a post in my other thread that was a bit of a hijack, but it does show what the "top ghosting" effect looks like on the Samsung 2233rz. On the Alienware, it isn't as pronounced, but it is pretty distracting.
[url="http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=157273&view=findpost&p=986945"]http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?s=&...st&p=986945[/url]
[quote name='distant' post='987242' date='Jan 23 2010, 01:20 PM']Nice review and very useful info. Thanks for posting.
It would be great if a screenshot that have top ghosting can be viewed. I still don't have a clear idea of what this phenomenon is yet because I don't have 3D Ready LCD with my 3D Vision, only DLP TV.
There was a post in my other thread that was a bit of a hijack, but it does show what the "top ghosting" effect looks like on the Samsung 2233rz. On the Alienware, it isn't as pronounced, but it is pretty distracting.
In fact for Samsung this is not top ghosting, but ghosting is on full screen, but ghosting "type" changes from top to bottom.
You can see that easily if you prepare test image (for exable gray background for left eye and black strip from top to bottom for right eye) - in the top there is different ghosting than in the bottom of the screen - you can see also from such a image that glasses are perfectly synchronized with monitor.
From my point of view these monitors are normal average TN monitors with 120Hz and extra price tag. But stereo is good stuff.
In fact for Samsung this is not top ghosting, but ghosting is on full screen, but ghosting "type" changes from top to bottom.
You can see that easily if you prepare test image (for exable gray background for left eye and black strip from top to bottom for right eye) - in the top there is different ghosting than in the bottom of the screen - you can see also from such a image that glasses are perfectly synchronized with monitor.
From my point of view these monitors are normal average TN monitors with 120Hz and extra price tag. But stereo is good stuff.
Great reveiw! Given a lot of info i wanted. Thanks
Although did u install the Alienware drivers for this screen [url="http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?releaseid=R246871&formatcnt=1&libid=0&fileid=367998"]http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloa...p;fileid=367998[/url]
Not got a clue if it will help, but im meirly going off personal experiance with other screens.
As for me my Samsung 226BW dose all of what you listed in your 2d preformance section before I instaled the Drivers for the moniter.
Edit: Did you also make sure that no previous moniter drivers where installed?
[quote name='Adz 3000' post='987344' date='Jan 23 2010, 04:18 PM']Great reveiw! Given a lot of info i wanted. Thanks
Although did u install the Alienware drivers for this screen [url="http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?releaseid=R246871&formatcnt=1&libid=0&fileid=367998"]http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloa...p;fileid=367998[/url]
Not got a clue if it will help, but im meirly going off personal experiance with other screens.
As for me my Samsung 226BW dose all of what you listed in your 2d preformance section before I instaled the Drivers for the moniter.
Edit: Did you also make sure that no previous moniter drivers where installed?[/quote]
Yeah, I used the Alienware drivers and removed any previous ICC profiles and associated monitors. I made sure to cover all my bases before I plugged it in.
Not got a clue if it will help, but im meirly going off personal experiance with other screens.
As for me my Samsung 226BW dose all of what you listed in your 2d preformance section before I instaled the Drivers for the moniter.
Edit: Did you also make sure that no previous moniter drivers where installed?
Yeah, I used the Alienware drivers and removed any previous ICC profiles and associated monitors. I made sure to cover all my bases before I plugged it in.
DETHCUBE: Intel Core i7-5960x w/ GT 110i | Asus Rampage V Extreme | 32 GB Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR4-3000 | Corsair Air 540 w/ Noctua PPC | Creative Soundblaster X7 w/ OPAMP Mod | Titan X SC SLI w/ACX 2.0 | Corsair AX1500i | Samsung 850 Pro 1TB | beyerdynamic DT 880 |
Have you tried any other monitors? How do they compare? Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.
Have you tried any other monitors? How do they compare? Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.
[quote name='Chukibu' post='987527' date='Jan 23 2010, 11:35 PM']Thinking about getting this monitor.
Have you tried any other monitors? How do they compare? Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.[/quote]
This monitor sounds worse than the Viewsonic monitor that I paid $210 for. I hope the OP returns this turkey and gets a cheap option or waits for the Acer.
[quote name='Chukibu' post='987527' date='Jan 23 2010, 11:35 PM']Thinking about getting this monitor.
Have you tried any other monitors? How do they compare? Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.
This monitor sounds worse than the Viewsonic monitor that I paid $210 for. I hope the OP returns this turkey and gets a cheap option or waits for the Acer.
[quote name='Chukibu' post='987527' date='Jan 23 2010, 11:35 PM']Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.[/quote]
Yeah, because it's so unreasonable to expect a quality screen for $500...
The lack in QUALITY monitors is the only thing keeping me from buying 3d vision. It's sad, because I REALLY want to give Nvidia my money, but I'm not about to pay for junk.
[quote name='Chukibu' post='987527' date='Jan 23 2010, 11:35 PM']Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.
Yeah, because it's so unreasonable to expect a quality screen for $500...
The lack in QUALITY monitors is the only thing keeping me from buying 3d vision. It's sad, because I REALLY want to give Nvidia my money, but I'm not about to pay for junk.
@Chukibu: Are you talking about other 3D capable monitors, or monitors in general?
@Skyeclad: I've already re-boxed the monitor and I'm just waiting on a Dell rep to give me the RMA number. I've read a few reviews of the Acer, and while it looks promising, some of the tests done over at digitalversus show similar problems to the Alienware screen. I'm waiting for the guys at 3Dvision-blog to give it a full shakedown.
@Chukibu: Are you talking about other 3D capable monitors, or monitors in general?
@Skyeclad: I've already re-boxed the monitor and I'm just waiting on a Dell rep to give me the RMA number. I've read a few reviews of the Acer, and while it looks promising, some of the tests done over at digitalversus show similar problems to the Alienware screen. I'm waiting for the guys at 3Dvision-blog to give it a full shakedown.
DETHCUBE: Intel Core i7-5960x w/ GT 110i | Asus Rampage V Extreme | 32 GB Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR4-3000 | Corsair Air 540 w/ Noctua PPC | Creative Soundblaster X7 w/ OPAMP Mod | Titan X SC SLI w/ACX 2.0 | Corsair AX1500i | Samsung 850 Pro 1TB | beyerdynamic DT 880 |
[quote name='Jytra' post='987805' date='Jan 24 2010, 05:09 PM']@Chukibu: Are you talking about other 3D capable monitors, or monitors in general?[/quote]
So what is Dell's return policy? I only saw something about you having to contact support for returns. Are you getting a full refund?
I was just wondering if you took into account that these types of monitors might perform similar due to the requirements for 3D Vision (brightness, colors, etc.)?
Did the demo kiosk look better than this to you or was your time too short to judge?
So what is Dell's return policy? I only saw something about you having to contact support for returns. Are you getting a full refund?
I was just wondering if you took into account that these types of monitors might perform similar due to the requirements for 3D Vision (brightness, colors, etc.)?
Did the demo kiosk look better than this to you or was your time too short to judge?
There are only 2 others, the Samsung and the Viewsonic, that are readily available in the US, but I haven't tested them. There are plasmas and DLPs that support 3D vision, but I don't have access to either of them.
As far as I know, based on some other user's opinions of the monitor, the Alienware fares better than the Viewsonic and Samsung.
@Thundergod
From what I read, you can return a product as long as you submit an RMA request within 21 days of purchase. I think I'll have to wind up paying a restocking fee, and I probably won't get my RMA until Monday.
And to answer your second question, when I tried the kiosk, I really enjoyed it, but the whole rig was heavily used and abused, so I can't really give a good point of comparison. I did take into account the requirements of 3D Vision, and even so, I think there's potential for a monitor maker to create something a lot better than what I tested. I think what the tech really comes down to is the true 120hz frequency with low response time and the software being able to sync with it. Because of that, TN is the only panel option at the moment, but IPS also meets those requirements, and has far better image quality.
There are only 2 others, the Samsung and the Viewsonic, that are readily available in the US, but I haven't tested them. There are plasmas and DLPs that support 3D vision, but I don't have access to either of them.
As far as I know, based on some other user's opinions of the monitor, the Alienware fares better than the Viewsonic and Samsung.
@Thundergod
From what I read, you can return a product as long as you submit an RMA request within 21 days of purchase. I think I'll have to wind up paying a restocking fee, and I probably won't get my RMA until Monday.
And to answer your second question, when I tried the kiosk, I really enjoyed it, but the whole rig was heavily used and abused, so I can't really give a good point of comparison. I did take into account the requirements of 3D Vision, and even so, I think there's potential for a monitor maker to create something a lot better than what I tested. I think what the tech really comes down to is the true 120hz frequency with low response time and the software being able to sync with it. Because of that, TN is the only panel option at the moment, but IPS also meets those requirements, and has far better image quality.
DETHCUBE: Intel Core i7-5960x w/ GT 110i | Asus Rampage V Extreme | 32 GB Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR4-3000 | Corsair Air 540 w/ Noctua PPC | Creative Soundblaster X7 w/ OPAMP Mod | Titan X SC SLI w/ACX 2.0 | Corsair AX1500i | Samsung 850 Pro 1TB | beyerdynamic DT 880 |
I have purchased the monitor, I'll give my opinion on it when I get it.
I don't fault Jytra for being so picky, but he does has really high standards, certainly more than your average gamer. I certainly don't inspect color levels and backlight bleed, etc - so perhaps the average Joe interested in 3D can gleam something from my opinion of the monitor. I just want it to work, and to look good. Figured if I was going to invest hundreds of dollars into 3D, I may as well aim for the best (Really didn't want projectors or anything, though).
I have purchased the monitor, I'll give my opinion on it when I get it.
I don't fault Jytra for being so picky, but he does has really high standards, certainly more than your average gamer. I certainly don't inspect color levels and backlight bleed, etc - so perhaps the average Joe interested in 3D can gleam something from my opinion of the monitor. I just want it to work, and to look good. Figured if I was going to invest hundreds of dollars into 3D, I may as well aim for the best (Really didn't want projectors or anything, though).
I'm not a professional reviewer. Dell/Alienware didn't send me a test sample, so no cracking open the casing to get panel info, and I don't have the full range of equipment to get every little detail of this monitor properly recorded and graphed (I do have a Xrite i1 Display 2 for calibration purposes, though). Instead, what I have is a keen sense of vision, and perhaps a really overly picky attitude when it comes to the products I buy. To borrow a quote from the character Anton Ego, "I don't like [it], I [i]love[/i] [it]...if I don't [i]love[/i] [it], I don't [i]swallow[/i]."
Please note that a majority of this review is based on subjective results, so other users opinions will be different. As a point of comparison, I've got a BenQ FP241VW monitor, Rev 01, which I'll be referencing from time to time in the review as "my previous monitor" or something along those lines. Also, my test setup is a Core i7 @ 4.2 GHz, a EVGA Classified x58 760, 6GB DDR3-2000, and a EVGA GTX 285 running the latest driver kit from nVidia (CD v1.20).
So without further adieu, let's get to the review!
[b]
Product Brief:[/b]
The Alienware AW2310 is the first-to-the-US-market 1080p 3D Vision capable monitor, and utilizes a TN panel, which has the benefit of a low response time and low cost, with the tradeoff of lower color quality and fairly well defined color shifting. The version I received is marked revision A00, with a manufacture date of "Week 46 / 2009", or somewhere around the first week of November of last year.
[i]From Dell's website:
Panel Size: 23″ Widescreen, 16:9
Panel Type: TN – Twisted Nematic
Native Resolution: 1920 x 1080 (Full HD)
Contrast Ratio: 80000:1 (dynamic)
Brightness: 400 cd/m2 (typical)
Response Time: 3ms (typical) (gray-to-gray)
Viewing Angle : 170°/ 160°
Color Support : 16.7 million colors
Color Gamut: 83.4%
Refresh Rate: 120Hz (3D Capable)
Video Connectivity: DVI x1, HDMI x1
Audio Connectivity: Yes; Audio In and Out (2.0)
USB Ports : Yes: 4 USB 2.0
User Input / Controls: Touch Capacitive OSD Buttons
Stand: Tilt, Swivel and Height Adjustable[/i]
Wow, looks great on paper! But how does it perform...
[b]Colors and Calibration[/b]
Well, here's where the monitor starts having some problems. When I first turned on the monitor to let it warm up, I immediately noted how washed out the image looked. My desktop images, the "Bing's Best" theme from Microsoft, which generally had a high range of contrast, looked almost overblown, and the fine details were lacking. The first image that was on the screen was that of a panda cub, which, on my previous monitor, had a significant amount of detail in the cub's fur...none of which was present on the Alienware. While this was a put-off at first, a subsequent color calibration on the "Standard" setting restored a bit of the missing detail.
After letting the monitor run for a while, I went back and tried out a full range calibration, with the target settings of 6500k temp, 200cd/m2 brightness, and a gamut of 2.2. This is when I discovered yet another fun fact about the monitor: the RGB setting, which allows for individual tweaking to the three primary color channels, comes with each channel maxed by default (100 out of 100). This is immensely frustrating, as other monitors I've worked with generally start with their RGB settings around the 50% mark. Because the Xrite starts with calibrating the contrast, this means that I have to first lower the RGB settings, then start the calibration over to get a proper result...if the RGB test shows up with a color value outside the range of what I can adjust, I have to restart the whole process.
[url="http://s974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/AW2310%20Review/?action=view¤t=AW2310Calibration1.jpg"][img]http://i974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/AW2310%20Review/th_AW2310Calibration1.jpg[/img][/url]
After tinkering with it, I got a final result of 35 Brightness, 60 Contrast, R90 G93 B100 with a temp of 6600k. The color curves were normal, and actually fared better than my BenQ, despite the outward appearance being somewhat lacking (more on that below). My other thread on this board ("What to Blame") has the ICC profile if you want to try it yourself.
[b]Sub-Section: Backlight Bleed and Uniformity[/b]
Now, another problem found in most TN panels is color uniformity and viewing angle, and this monitor is no exception.
[url="http://s974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/AW2310%20Review/?action=view¤t=027.jpg"][img]http://i974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/AW2310%20Review/th_027.jpg[/img][/url]
In this image, I've got the lights in my room off and the camera set to a night shot mode to enhance the image a bit. As you can see, there's a fairly significant backlight bleed at the top and bottom, and a slight color shift on either side. While the image may exaggerate these problems, they are quite noticeable during general use of the monitor, especially when browsing these forums, or the ones at Hard|OCP.
[url="http://s974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/AW2310%20Review/?action=view¤t=028.jpg"][img]http://i974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/AW2310%20Review/th_028.jpg[/img][/url]
Here, I've run the Lavalys Everest Monitor checker, and took a image of the grey background, which fairs a bit better at showing the panel's uniformity. The top of the screen is generally a bit darker, and when set to lower contrast values, like suggested by our 3D Vision mod Andrew in my other thread, this problem is even more apparent. The top of the screen looks almost like someone burned it, while the bottom looks blown out.
[url="http://s974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/AW2310%20Review/?action=view¤t=029.jpg"][img]http://i974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/AW2310%20Review/th_029.jpg[/img][/url]
Returning to the issue of backlight bleed, I snapped this image under some better lighting conditions. While you might think that this problem would only show up on a pure black background, think about the number of games out there that have a dark environment, or a menu system that isn't as bright as the sun. No matter how much I did to adjust the contrast and brightness, the backlight bleed is [i]very[/i] noticeable during almost any game I played, and moreso when that game was played with 3D vision enabled.
[b]2D Performance, General Use, and Gaming[/b]
As far as the monitor's performance in a 2D setting, for both gaming and general use, this monitor is a bit problematic. Despite being 120hz, scrolling text and little things, like moving windows and the cursor on the desktop, become a blur. What proved to be hell to me was constantly losing my cursor on a white background when I moved it around, something that's never happened to me before on any screen I've used. Lines of text also had some issues while scrolling, sometimes changing from black to blue, just becoming a mess of black, other times staying normal. Setting the monitor to a lower response time just made the problem a hell of a lot worse...something I'd expect from a monitor at fraction of the AW2310.
The color uniformity issues I mentioned above also make an impact on my day to day use, and I can't help but look at this monitor and wonder if something is wrong, or if it has a mind of it's own. Hell, I put up with the [url="http://i974.photobucket.com/albums/ae225/Jytra/023.jpg"]top of my BenQ monitor practically melting[/url], and despite that, it still has uniform color, little backlight bleed, and great responsiveness when even the fine details are moving around.
Now, in a gaming environment, it actually performs quite well. The 120hz frequency is really nice for today's gaming, and I was blown away by how Team Fortress 2 and Mass Effect performed with a much higher framerate that was unrestricted by 60hz. However, the problems mentioned above do hamper my overall enjoyment, especially in games like Dead Space and Mass Effect, which utilize dark, heavily contrasted images. Mass Effect in particular performed below my expectations, with the backlight bleed and uniformity making it very difficult to pick out the details in many of the scenes and dialogue segments. Talking to Dr. Chakras or Garrus while on board the Normandy really emphasizes these problems, as both of them are found in settings with minimal lighting. There actually was a point where I could barely tell where Shepard's torso ended and the wall began.
[b]3D Vision Performance[/b]
Well, I'm going to be perfectly honest. This was my first real use of the 3D Vision tech outside of a demo kiosk, and boy, my heart is torn. On one hand, I'm a big proponent of the future of 3D film and gaming, and I firmly believe shutter tech is the way to go...but on the other hand, I can see a great deal of technical problems with the current iteration of the technology. Most of you guys on this forum have been avid 3D Vision users for a long time, and know all there is to know about ghosting, afterimage, and the like; many of you were hoping that the newer releases of monitors would perform a lot better, but as you might have noticed in my other thread, all hasn't been as well as I personally had hoped.
The first game I played using 3D Vision was Avatar, which is a flagship title for almost any 3D tech. After playing the game like mad for the past few days, I can say with certainty that 3D gaming in the future, so long as developers take a similar approach, is incredibly viable, and greatly enhances the gameplay experience. If there's one thing to be said about Avatar, is that this game was meant for 3D, and is actually quite difficult to play otherwise.
But enough about the game for now. How does this monitor handle 3D Vision?
Eh...this is where it gets bipolar. The ghosting at the top of the screen, mentioned by almost everyone in regards to the Samsung and Viewsonic monitors, is quite apparent on the Alienware, but varies from game to game. Avatar was quite minimal, while Batman AA was very noticeable. Overall scene ghosting is quite debilitating when playing other games like Team Fortress 2, CounterStrke Source, and Mass Effect, which have problems related to foreground depth (in my other thread, I mentioned how some objects appeared to have an "aura" of doubles).
Now, when I mentioned the monitor being bipolar, here's what I mean: When playing Avatar the first time, the bottom of the screen had some ghosting problems, and the water splash effects had a duplicate that appeared only on the right lens of the 3D Vision goggles. However, after quitting and coming back to the game, the ghosting problem was gone, and only appeared in areas where there was a waterfall. Likewise, when playing Mass Effect, the depth of the scene seemed fine, and the environment, aside from mild ghosting, didn't have many flaws. However, going back to the game at a later point resulted in the terrain being doubled, despite the glasses, and monitor working properly. These might be quirks related to the 3D Vision software itself, but it is hard to tell.
The monitor also has some odd quirks related directly to how it functions with 3D Vision enabled. Like the other monitors available, the monitor will set itself to max brightness when the 3D effect is running. However, I've found that a good chunk of the time, the brightness level doesn't revert to what it was previously after exiting the game, and that changing a monitor setting, such as resolution or refresh rate, does cause the monitor to revert to the original values, but more often than not, the screen won't return to how it looked before gameplay until you restart your computer.
[b]Final Thoughts[/b]
It is really hard to summarize my thoughts on this monitor into a few short sentences. It is one of the few screens out there that operates at 1920x1080@120Hz, and manages to do so adequately, but the limitations of the technology in the panel itself put a massive damper on my enjoyment. I had originally purchased this monitor to replace a dying one, and to jump fully into the world of truly 3D gaming, and expected probably too much out of it. I wanted something that would work well for day to day use, with great color accuracy and performance, that could be the definitive screen to keep for the next few years, but now I've come to realize that it is still going to be a while before I can have my cake and eat it too. There are just too many problems with this monitor that I can't ignore, or write off as normal. Normal for me is a high standard, and having a monitor that is, at this point, a $500 accessory to use 3D Vision, isn't worth the cost.
This doesn't mean I'm writing of 3D Vision as strictly a novelty; in fact, quite the opposite. It is a wonderful technology, and a step forward for gaming moreso than others might choose to acknowledge, but the technical problems associated with getting every little bit of it to work properly is a massive boulder in the path to the end user's enjoyment. I don't think the average consumer is going to fork over $200 for the kit and $500+ for a 1080p monitor and be contempt with "okay" performance. If time spent with the Alienware has taught me anything, it is that nVidia and the panel makers out there need to get it together and greatly improve the quality of both the screen and 3D Vision kit if they intend to go anywhere with it.
Overall, [u]I cannot suggest this monitor to anyone except the truly diehard 3D Vision fans[/u] looking for an upgrade from their current setup. If I had to assign a letter grade, it would be [b]C-[/b].
I'm not a professional reviewer. Dell/Alienware didn't send me a test sample, so no cracking open the casing to get panel info, and I don't have the full range of equipment to get every little detail of this monitor properly recorded and graphed (I do have a Xrite i1 Display 2 for calibration purposes, though). Instead, what I have is a keen sense of vision, and perhaps a really overly picky attitude when it comes to the products I buy. To borrow a quote from the character Anton Ego, "I don't like [it], I love [it]...if I don't love [it], I don't swallow."
Please note that a majority of this review is based on subjective results, so other users opinions will be different. As a point of comparison, I've got a BenQ FP241VW monitor, Rev 01, which I'll be referencing from time to time in the review as "my previous monitor" or something along those lines. Also, my test setup is a Core i7 @ 4.2 GHz, a EVGA Classified x58 760, 6GB DDR3-2000, and a EVGA GTX 285 running the latest driver kit from nVidia (CD v1.20).
So without further adieu, let's get to the review!
Product Brief:
The Alienware AW2310 is the first-to-the-US-market 1080p 3D Vision capable monitor, and utilizes a TN panel, which has the benefit of a low response time and low cost, with the tradeoff of lower color quality and fairly well defined color shifting. The version I received is marked revision A00, with a manufacture date of "Week 46 / 2009", or somewhere around the first week of November of last year.
From Dell's website:
Panel Size: 23″ Widescreen, 16:9
Panel Type: TN – Twisted Nematic
Native Resolution: 1920 x 1080 (Full HD)
Contrast Ratio: 80000:1 (dynamic)
Brightness: 400 cd/m2 (typical)
Response Time: 3ms (typical) (gray-to-gray)
Viewing Angle : 170°/ 160°
Color Support : 16.7 million colors
Color Gamut: 83.4%
Refresh Rate: 120Hz (3D Capable)
Video Connectivity: DVI x1, HDMI x1
Audio Connectivity: Yes; Audio In and Out (2.0)
USB Ports : Yes: 4 USB 2.0
User Input / Controls: Touch Capacitive OSD Buttons
Stand: Tilt, Swivel and Height Adjustable
Wow, looks great on paper! But how does it perform...
Colors and Calibration
Well, here's where the monitor starts having some problems. When I first turned on the monitor to let it warm up, I immediately noted how washed out the image looked. My desktop images, the "Bing's Best" theme from Microsoft, which generally had a high range of contrast, looked almost overblown, and the fine details were lacking. The first image that was on the screen was that of a panda cub, which, on my previous monitor, had a significant amount of detail in the cub's fur...none of which was present on the Alienware. While this was a put-off at first, a subsequent color calibration on the "Standard" setting restored a bit of the missing detail.
After letting the monitor run for a while, I went back and tried out a full range calibration, with the target settings of 6500k temp, 200cd/m2 brightness, and a gamut of 2.2. This is when I discovered yet another fun fact about the monitor: the RGB setting, which allows for individual tweaking to the three primary color channels, comes with each channel maxed by default (100 out of 100). This is immensely frustrating, as other monitors I've worked with generally start with their RGB settings around the 50% mark. Because the Xrite starts with calibrating the contrast, this means that I have to first lower the RGB settings, then start the calibration over to get a proper result...if the RGB test shows up with a color value outside the range of what I can adjust, I have to restart the whole process.
After tinkering with it, I got a final result of 35 Brightness, 60 Contrast, R90 G93 B100 with a temp of 6600k. The color curves were normal, and actually fared better than my BenQ, despite the outward appearance being somewhat lacking (more on that below). My other thread on this board ("What to Blame") has the ICC profile if you want to try it yourself.
Sub-Section: Backlight Bleed and Uniformity
Now, another problem found in most TN panels is color uniformity and viewing angle, and this monitor is no exception.
In this image, I've got the lights in my room off and the camera set to a night shot mode to enhance the image a bit. As you can see, there's a fairly significant backlight bleed at the top and bottom, and a slight color shift on either side. While the image may exaggerate these problems, they are quite noticeable during general use of the monitor, especially when browsing these forums, or the ones at Hard|OCP.
Here, I've run the Lavalys Everest Monitor checker, and took a image of the grey background, which fairs a bit better at showing the panel's uniformity. The top of the screen is generally a bit darker, and when set to lower contrast values, like suggested by our 3D Vision mod Andrew in my other thread, this problem is even more apparent. The top of the screen looks almost like someone burned it, while the bottom looks blown out.
Returning to the issue of backlight bleed, I snapped this image under some better lighting conditions. While you might think that this problem would only show up on a pure black background, think about the number of games out there that have a dark environment, or a menu system that isn't as bright as the sun. No matter how much I did to adjust the contrast and brightness, the backlight bleed is very noticeable during almost any game I played, and moreso when that game was played with 3D vision enabled.
2D Performance, General Use, and Gaming
As far as the monitor's performance in a 2D setting, for both gaming and general use, this monitor is a bit problematic. Despite being 120hz, scrolling text and little things, like moving windows and the cursor on the desktop, become a blur. What proved to be hell to me was constantly losing my cursor on a white background when I moved it around, something that's never happened to me before on any screen I've used. Lines of text also had some issues while scrolling, sometimes changing from black to blue, just becoming a mess of black, other times staying normal. Setting the monitor to a lower response time just made the problem a hell of a lot worse...something I'd expect from a monitor at fraction of the AW2310.
The color uniformity issues I mentioned above also make an impact on my day to day use, and I can't help but look at this monitor and wonder if something is wrong, or if it has a mind of it's own. Hell, I put up with the top of my BenQ monitor practically melting, and despite that, it still has uniform color, little backlight bleed, and great responsiveness when even the fine details are moving around.
Now, in a gaming environment, it actually performs quite well. The 120hz frequency is really nice for today's gaming, and I was blown away by how Team Fortress 2 and Mass Effect performed with a much higher framerate that was unrestricted by 60hz. However, the problems mentioned above do hamper my overall enjoyment, especially in games like Dead Space and Mass Effect, which utilize dark, heavily contrasted images. Mass Effect in particular performed below my expectations, with the backlight bleed and uniformity making it very difficult to pick out the details in many of the scenes and dialogue segments. Talking to Dr. Chakras or Garrus while on board the Normandy really emphasizes these problems, as both of them are found in settings with minimal lighting. There actually was a point where I could barely tell where Shepard's torso ended and the wall began.
3D Vision Performance
Well, I'm going to be perfectly honest. This was my first real use of the 3D Vision tech outside of a demo kiosk, and boy, my heart is torn. On one hand, I'm a big proponent of the future of 3D film and gaming, and I firmly believe shutter tech is the way to go...but on the other hand, I can see a great deal of technical problems with the current iteration of the technology. Most of you guys on this forum have been avid 3D Vision users for a long time, and know all there is to know about ghosting, afterimage, and the like; many of you were hoping that the newer releases of monitors would perform a lot better, but as you might have noticed in my other thread, all hasn't been as well as I personally had hoped.
The first game I played using 3D Vision was Avatar, which is a flagship title for almost any 3D tech. After playing the game like mad for the past few days, I can say with certainty that 3D gaming in the future, so long as developers take a similar approach, is incredibly viable, and greatly enhances the gameplay experience. If there's one thing to be said about Avatar, is that this game was meant for 3D, and is actually quite difficult to play otherwise.
But enough about the game for now. How does this monitor handle 3D Vision?
Eh...this is where it gets bipolar. The ghosting at the top of the screen, mentioned by almost everyone in regards to the Samsung and Viewsonic monitors, is quite apparent on the Alienware, but varies from game to game. Avatar was quite minimal, while Batman AA was very noticeable. Overall scene ghosting is quite debilitating when playing other games like Team Fortress 2, CounterStrke Source, and Mass Effect, which have problems related to foreground depth (in my other thread, I mentioned how some objects appeared to have an "aura" of doubles).
Now, when I mentioned the monitor being bipolar, here's what I mean: When playing Avatar the first time, the bottom of the screen had some ghosting problems, and the water splash effects had a duplicate that appeared only on the right lens of the 3D Vision goggles. However, after quitting and coming back to the game, the ghosting problem was gone, and only appeared in areas where there was a waterfall. Likewise, when playing Mass Effect, the depth of the scene seemed fine, and the environment, aside from mild ghosting, didn't have many flaws. However, going back to the game at a later point resulted in the terrain being doubled, despite the glasses, and monitor working properly. These might be quirks related to the 3D Vision software itself, but it is hard to tell.
The monitor also has some odd quirks related directly to how it functions with 3D Vision enabled. Like the other monitors available, the monitor will set itself to max brightness when the 3D effect is running. However, I've found that a good chunk of the time, the brightness level doesn't revert to what it was previously after exiting the game, and that changing a monitor setting, such as resolution or refresh rate, does cause the monitor to revert to the original values, but more often than not, the screen won't return to how it looked before gameplay until you restart your computer.
Final Thoughts
It is really hard to summarize my thoughts on this monitor into a few short sentences. It is one of the few screens out there that operates at 1920x1080@120Hz, and manages to do so adequately, but the limitations of the technology in the panel itself put a massive damper on my enjoyment. I had originally purchased this monitor to replace a dying one, and to jump fully into the world of truly 3D gaming, and expected probably too much out of it. I wanted something that would work well for day to day use, with great color accuracy and performance, that could be the definitive screen to keep for the next few years, but now I've come to realize that it is still going to be a while before I can have my cake and eat it too. There are just too many problems with this monitor that I can't ignore, or write off as normal. Normal for me is a high standard, and having a monitor that is, at this point, a $500 accessory to use 3D Vision, isn't worth the cost.
This doesn't mean I'm writing of 3D Vision as strictly a novelty; in fact, quite the opposite. It is a wonderful technology, and a step forward for gaming moreso than others might choose to acknowledge, but the technical problems associated with getting every little bit of it to work properly is a massive boulder in the path to the end user's enjoyment. I don't think the average consumer is going to fork over $200 for the kit and $500+ for a 1080p monitor and be contempt with "okay" performance. If time spent with the Alienware has taught me anything, it is that nVidia and the panel makers out there need to get it together and greatly improve the quality of both the screen and 3D Vision kit if they intend to go anywhere with it.
Overall, I cannot suggest this monitor to anyone except the truly diehard 3D Vision fans looking for an upgrade from their current setup. If I had to assign a letter grade, it would be C-.
DETHCUBE: Intel Core i7-5960x w/ GT 110i | Asus Rampage V Extreme | 32 GB Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR4-3000 | Corsair Air 540 w/ Noctua PPC | Creative Soundblaster X7 w/ OPAMP Mod | Titan X SC SLI w/ACX 2.0 | Corsair AX1500i | Samsung 850 Pro 1TB | beyerdynamic DT 880 |
It would be great if a screenshot that have top ghosting can be viewed. I still don't have a clear idea of what this phenomenon is yet because I don't have 3D Ready LCD with my 3D Vision, only DLP TV.
It would be great if a screenshot that have top ghosting can be viewed. I still don't have a clear idea of what this phenomenon is yet because I don't have 3D Ready LCD with my 3D Vision, only DLP TV.
Xeon X5675 hex cores @4.4 GHz, GTX 1070, win10 pro
i7 7700k 5GHz, RTX 2080, win10 pro
Benq 2720Z, w1070, Oculus Rift cv1, Samsung Odyssey+
It would be great if a screenshot that have top ghosting can be viewed. I still don't have a clear idea of what this phenomenon is yet because I don't have 3D Ready LCD with my 3D Vision, only DLP TV.[/quote]
There was a post in my other thread that was a bit of a hijack, but it does show what the "top ghosting" effect looks like on the Samsung 2233rz. On the Alienware, it isn't as pronounced, but it is pretty distracting.
[url="http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=157273&view=findpost&p=986945"]http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?s=&...st&p=986945[/url]
It would be great if a screenshot that have top ghosting can be viewed. I still don't have a clear idea of what this phenomenon is yet because I don't have 3D Ready LCD with my 3D Vision, only DLP TV.
There was a post in my other thread that was a bit of a hijack, but it does show what the "top ghosting" effect looks like on the Samsung 2233rz. On the Alienware, it isn't as pronounced, but it is pretty distracting.
http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?s=&...st&p=986945
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You can see that easily if you prepare test image (for exable gray background for left eye and black strip from top to bottom for right eye) - in the top there is different ghosting than in the bottom of the screen - you can see also from such a image that glasses are perfectly synchronized with monitor.
From my point of view these monitors are normal average TN monitors with 120Hz and extra price tag. But stereo is good stuff.
You can see that easily if you prepare test image (for exable gray background for left eye and black strip from top to bottom for right eye) - in the top there is different ghosting than in the bottom of the screen - you can see also from such a image that glasses are perfectly synchronized with monitor.
From my point of view these monitors are normal average TN monitors with 120Hz and extra price tag. But stereo is good stuff.
Although did u install the Alienware drivers for this screen [url="http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?releaseid=R246871&formatcnt=1&libid=0&fileid=367998"]http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloa...p;fileid=367998[/url]
Not got a clue if it will help, but im meirly going off personal experiance with other screens.
As for me my Samsung 226BW dose all of what you listed in your 2d preformance section before I instaled the Drivers for the moniter.
Edit: Did you also make sure that no previous moniter drivers where installed?
Although did u install the Alienware drivers for this screen http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloa...p;fileid=367998
Not got a clue if it will help, but im meirly going off personal experiance with other screens.
As for me my Samsung 226BW dose all of what you listed in your 2d preformance section before I instaled the Drivers for the moniter.
Edit: Did you also make sure that no previous moniter drivers where installed?
Although did u install the Alienware drivers for this screen [url="http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?releaseid=R246871&formatcnt=1&libid=0&fileid=367998"]http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloa...p;fileid=367998[/url]
Not got a clue if it will help, but im meirly going off personal experiance with other screens.
As for me my Samsung 226BW dose all of what you listed in your 2d preformance section before I instaled the Drivers for the moniter.
Edit: Did you also make sure that no previous moniter drivers where installed?[/quote]
Yeah, I used the Alienware drivers and removed any previous ICC profiles and associated monitors. I made sure to cover all my bases before I plugged it in.
Although did u install the Alienware drivers for this screen http://supportapj.dell.com/support/downloa...p;fileid=367998
Not got a clue if it will help, but im meirly going off personal experiance with other screens.
As for me my Samsung 226BW dose all of what you listed in your 2d preformance section before I instaled the Drivers for the moniter.
Edit: Did you also make sure that no previous moniter drivers where installed?
Yeah, I used the Alienware drivers and removed any previous ICC profiles and associated monitors. I made sure to cover all my bases before I plugged it in.
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Have you tried any other monitors? How do they compare? Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.
Have you tried any other monitors? How do they compare? Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.
Have you tried any other monitors? How do they compare? Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.[/quote]
This monitor sounds worse than the Viewsonic monitor that I paid $210 for. I hope the OP returns this turkey and gets a cheap option or waits for the Acer.
Have you tried any other monitors? How do they compare? Honestly, it just sounds like your expectations are so high that no 3D monitor would meet your standards.
This monitor sounds worse than the Viewsonic monitor that I paid $210 for. I hope the OP returns this turkey and gets a cheap option or waits for the Acer.
Yeah, because it's so unreasonable to expect a quality screen for $500...
The lack in QUALITY monitors is the only thing keeping me from buying 3d vision. It's sad, because I REALLY want to give Nvidia my money, but I'm not about to pay for junk.
Yeah, because it's so unreasonable to expect a quality screen for $500...
The lack in QUALITY monitors is the only thing keeping me from buying 3d vision. It's sad, because I REALLY want to give Nvidia my money, but I'm not about to pay for junk.
@Skyeclad: I've already re-boxed the monitor and I'm just waiting on a Dell rep to give me the RMA number. I've read a few reviews of the Acer, and while it looks promising, some of the tests done over at digitalversus show similar problems to the Alienware screen. I'm waiting for the guys at 3Dvision-blog to give it a full shakedown.
@Skyeclad: I've already re-boxed the monitor and I'm just waiting on a Dell rep to give me the RMA number. I've read a few reviews of the Acer, and while it looks promising, some of the tests done over at digitalversus show similar problems to the Alienware screen. I'm waiting for the guys at 3Dvision-blog to give it a full shakedown.
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Other 3D monitors.
Other 3D monitors.
I was just wondering if you took into account that these types of monitors might perform similar due to the requirements for 3D Vision (brightness, colors, etc.)?
Did the demo kiosk look better than this to you or was your time too short to judge?
I was just wondering if you took into account that these types of monitors might perform similar due to the requirements for 3D Vision (brightness, colors, etc.)?
Did the demo kiosk look better than this to you or was your time too short to judge?
There are only 2 others, the Samsung and the Viewsonic, that are readily available in the US, but I haven't tested them. There are plasmas and DLPs that support 3D vision, but I don't have access to either of them.
As far as I know, based on some other user's opinions of the monitor, the Alienware fares better than the Viewsonic and Samsung.
@Thundergod
From what I read, you can return a product as long as you submit an RMA request within 21 days of purchase. I think I'll have to wind up paying a restocking fee, and I probably won't get my RMA until Monday.
And to answer your second question, when I tried the kiosk, I really enjoyed it, but the whole rig was heavily used and abused, so I can't really give a good point of comparison. I did take into account the requirements of 3D Vision, and even so, I think there's potential for a monitor maker to create something a lot better than what I tested. I think what the tech really comes down to is the true 120hz frequency with low response time and the software being able to sync with it. Because of that, TN is the only panel option at the moment, but IPS also meets those requirements, and has far better image quality.
There are only 2 others, the Samsung and the Viewsonic, that are readily available in the US, but I haven't tested them. There are plasmas and DLPs that support 3D vision, but I don't have access to either of them.
As far as I know, based on some other user's opinions of the monitor, the Alienware fares better than the Viewsonic and Samsung.
@Thundergod
From what I read, you can return a product as long as you submit an RMA request within 21 days of purchase. I think I'll have to wind up paying a restocking fee, and I probably won't get my RMA until Monday.
And to answer your second question, when I tried the kiosk, I really enjoyed it, but the whole rig was heavily used and abused, so I can't really give a good point of comparison. I did take into account the requirements of 3D Vision, and even so, I think there's potential for a monitor maker to create something a lot better than what I tested. I think what the tech really comes down to is the true 120hz frequency with low response time and the software being able to sync with it. Because of that, TN is the only panel option at the moment, but IPS also meets those requirements, and has far better image quality.
DETHCUBE: Intel Core i7-5960x w/ GT 110i | Asus Rampage V Extreme | 32 GB Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR4-3000 | Corsair Air 540 w/ Noctua PPC | Creative Soundblaster X7 w/ OPAMP Mod | Titan X SC SLI w/ACX 2.0 | Corsair AX1500i | Samsung 850 Pro 1TB | beyerdynamic DT 880 |
I don't fault Jytra for being so picky, but he does has really high standards, certainly more than your average gamer. I certainly don't inspect color levels and backlight bleed, etc - so perhaps the average Joe interested in 3D can gleam something from my opinion of the monitor. I just want it to work, and to look good. Figured if I was going to invest hundreds of dollars into 3D, I may as well aim for the best (Really didn't want projectors or anything, though).
I don't fault Jytra for being so picky, but he does has really high standards, certainly more than your average gamer. I certainly don't inspect color levels and backlight bleed, etc - so perhaps the average Joe interested in 3D can gleam something from my opinion of the monitor. I just want it to work, and to look good. Figured if I was going to invest hundreds of dollars into 3D, I may as well aim for the best (Really didn't want projectors or anything, though).