Hazro HZ24Wi - not exactly happy with it...

F

firebird67

n00b
Joined
Aug 28, 2008
Messages
3
Hello all,
I’m hoping you can help me with this...

Recently (a week ago) I purchased a Hazro HZ24Wi from Overclockers. Whilst the casing is very nice to look at the actual screen is not. That is to say, I am less than impressed with the display quality. Here are my problems:

  1. The backlight
  2. Greyscale reproduction
  3. Glittering bright green pixels

Please note that I am not able to calibrate my screen, and everything is left at factory default.

The backlight:
I don’t know is this is what ‘bleed’ refers to, but the distribution of the backlight is distractingly uneven, and also discoloured in some areas. At first I thought this was due to magnetic interference, so I moved my speakers (that were right to either side of the monitor) out of the room totally, and no difference. A couple of pics below to help illustrate.
2.jpg

(it actually feels a little worse than this shows most of the time, the top left is very bright)

1.jpg

(this photo was overexposed, but highlights the problem. The right hand side shows colouring like exaggerated here)

Greyscale:
Below are photos of my screen when displaying a simple black to white gradient in Photoshop (the PS window shown is zoomed in to a section showing dark grey to a lighter grey). Apart from a lot of dark clipping (guessing proper calibration would sort this though) a bizarre effect is evident... strange artefacts appear. It is definitely not a ‘malfunction’ of Photoshop as the pixellated artefacts are overlaid on the image – I can move sections of the background and the artefacts don’t follow as if part of the image. Also, this was not present on my ancient 17” LCD that this Hazro is replacing, so that suggests it is not my graphics card.
4.jpg

(can clearly see a greyscale problem)

3.jpg

(a little bit closer)

Glittering pixels.
These appear seemingly randomly across the screen but only when a specific colour is displayed. For example, in the picture below (same as the greyscale pic), right across the middle there are about 10 bright green dots, these are stationary but blinking until the screen changes and then some other part of the screen with exhibit these, presumably when it has to display a colour it doesn’t like? Or... perhaps the supplied cable is a load of rubbish?
3.jpg

(can see bright green pixels across the middle and at the top in the dark area of the gradient)

If you can advice me on these problems before I speak with Overclockers or perhaps Hazro, I would very much appreciate it.
 
Wow, that looks horrible. You should return it, as i doubt the monitor is supposed to come with that kind of serious defects.
 
3 out of 3 for RMA-able symptoms, although the grayscale might be improved after calibration. However, the blinking green pixels would be enough to make me run screaming from the building. Not to put too fine a point on it, but this panel is busted. Broken. Toast. Return to Sender ASAP.

To consolidate your position, check the TFTcentral HZ24 review and compare their BLB pic to yours. http://www.tftcentral.co.uk/reviews/hazro_hz24w.htm
And no where in the review did they mention flashing green pixels.

Sorry to hear you've discovered the infamous LG Q/C IPS issues.
 
Other than LG quality problems, I think Hazro has a problem, this is the second person to report heavy banding in gradients. They need to sort their firmware. I think I heard they were using a genesis scaler, same as Dell. Dell had these same banding issues with a bunch of monitors for a while. They were running the scaler chip even at native res and it caused a mess. I had one...
 
I did the same thing as you and brought one yesterday. I love nearly everything about the panel apart from the terrible gradient banding.. seriously how did they miss it in testing? some gradients look 8 bit.

I don`t have any of your other problems but i will say that the supplied cable is rubbish, try replacing it with a better one and make sure its well pushed in, the connector does seem a bit ropey.

its such a shame that what is 99% an amazing panel is ruined by the banding problem, i guess i will have to send it back and get what?

what graphics card do you have?
 
Contact customer support and let them know. I don't know how this stuff gets through test either. But let them know so they can fix it. This sounds like exactly the same problem dell had with it's scaler being on all the time. Dell fixed it with a firmware change.
 
i have, but no reply, someone on the oc forum got this back:

...Hazro are currently investigating the banding
and gradient issue and are aiming to resolve this problem
promptly. Our engineers are also aware of a spark' issue
which is only present on a handful of monitors. We believe
both these issues are being caused by the scaling chip used...

can a firmware update be done without sending the monitor away?
 
some good news (maybe):

Got a voicemail saying a firmware update for the issues mentioned is being rolled out next week and that it can be done by the customer. The estimated rollout is late next week and more info will be given next week before rollout.
 
Excellent. Dell had the same issue when I bought my 2007fp. It took a couple of months of screaming and they only rolled out the firmware fix in new panels.
 
Thanks for all the replies everyone... this has to be the most alive forum I've ever visited!

So fingers crossed the firmware upgrade fixes the gradient issue...

I don't have another suitable cable to try, so I'll forget about about the bright green glittering pixels for now. However, is the backlight abnormal enough to warrant a replacement? I'm not happy with it, but maybe it's within acceptable tolerances of manufacture?
 
I have had my PSU go for my monitor and overclockers said they were getting a new one out to me. Twice then denied having any info on agreeing to do this. This saga stretched out 3 weeks and then they said as i was now over 30 days they wouldnt refund me and bounced me directly onto Hazro.

The fact that they lied to me twice by two seperate members of staff saying they were getting me a PSU and they stretched my time out to past 30 days means they are dodgy and should be taken very carefully.

Hazro are now trying to interviene to get me a refund as I had to go out and buy a different monitor and this one is now useless to me. Mine had lightness banding patches too in the seven days it was working... so not ideal. Good resolution though. Hazro so far are sympathetic to my problem with Overclockers and are trying to get Overclockers to behave a bit better towards me, we shall see what happens.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top