Hi All,
Since it seems nobody has actually reported on the performance of the farily new NEC 2490WUXi2, just thought I'd share my first impressions, although VERY early impressions on the European SpectraView model (after reviewing a 2090UXi PE and the original 2490WUXi):
- The new panel by LG.Display is a new generation "eH-IPS A" without the much touted "Advanced - True Wide / A-TW" polarizer that is used in the LM240WU2 of the 2490WUXi; as a result, the backlight bleed and glow are quite noticeable on dark images in the corners when viewing centered and at a normal distance. The glow can be probably compared to that of the HP 2475W.
- The lack of polarizer and/or the new pixel structure in the new panel (I'm making an assumption here), does not only affect shadow performance but also brightness evenness from wide viewing angles, especially vertically, leading me to say this is the poorest performing panel I have yet seen in the IPS category in this regard. Looking at an image from an extreme angle from below (which is not very normal anyway) it almost resembles a TN panel (exaggerating a little, of course) and it is, for instance, much worse than the 2080UXi that I have at my office. On the other hand, the 2090 and "old" 2490 are absolutely stellar: the image stability in color, contrast and brightness is as good as you'd wanted and very close to a CRT.
- The panel displays a curious horizontal banding that is not present in other IPS panels I have seen when viewing the backlight in complete darkness. This however, does not affect a "real world" working scenario, where solid colors and gradients look absolutely fine.
- Panel uniformity is very good, as you would expect from a SpectraView branded monitor, although I have only been able to check a few white and grey patches at factory native settings with "Uniformity" ON).
- I haven't been able to check color reproduction nor calibrate since the SpectraView Profiler CD has been shipped with no "TAN" sticker and cannot get a valid license file to enable hardware writing to the monitor LUT.
- NEC states the gamut of this monitor is slightly closer to the sRGB color space than the original 2490; to be honest the slightly lower coverage of the original was never a concern.
- Apparent sharpness at native setting is very good if a little strong (it can be easily tweaked in the OSD), making text very readable and pictures at less than 100 % magnification in Photoshop extremely sharp.
- As you would also expect from a NEC monitor, electronics and OSD are brilliant and well thought of, giving you full and fine control of every possible aspect.
- Incidentally, my new monitor shows a dead full pixel close to the center of the screen. I haven't checked very thoroughly to spot any other stuck/dead pixels or sub-pixels.
I will try to bring more information as soon as I carry more objective tests after calibration.
In conclusion, and in all honesty, my first thoughts on this new monitor are not very encouraging. I have the feeling that for 1.544 euros (equivalent to 2.200 dollars) you should be getting better than this.
Thanks for reading and sorry for the "block"! ;O)
Since it seems nobody has actually reported on the performance of the farily new NEC 2490WUXi2, just thought I'd share my first impressions, although VERY early impressions on the European SpectraView model (after reviewing a 2090UXi PE and the original 2490WUXi):
- The new panel by LG.Display is a new generation "eH-IPS A" without the much touted "Advanced - True Wide / A-TW" polarizer that is used in the LM240WU2 of the 2490WUXi; as a result, the backlight bleed and glow are quite noticeable on dark images in the corners when viewing centered and at a normal distance. The glow can be probably compared to that of the HP 2475W.
- The lack of polarizer and/or the new pixel structure in the new panel (I'm making an assumption here), does not only affect shadow performance but also brightness evenness from wide viewing angles, especially vertically, leading me to say this is the poorest performing panel I have yet seen in the IPS category in this regard. Looking at an image from an extreme angle from below (which is not very normal anyway) it almost resembles a TN panel (exaggerating a little, of course) and it is, for instance, much worse than the 2080UXi that I have at my office. On the other hand, the 2090 and "old" 2490 are absolutely stellar: the image stability in color, contrast and brightness is as good as you'd wanted and very close to a CRT.
- The panel displays a curious horizontal banding that is not present in other IPS panels I have seen when viewing the backlight in complete darkness. This however, does not affect a "real world" working scenario, where solid colors and gradients look absolutely fine.
- Panel uniformity is very good, as you would expect from a SpectraView branded monitor, although I have only been able to check a few white and grey patches at factory native settings with "Uniformity" ON).
- I haven't been able to check color reproduction nor calibrate since the SpectraView Profiler CD has been shipped with no "TAN" sticker and cannot get a valid license file to enable hardware writing to the monitor LUT.
- NEC states the gamut of this monitor is slightly closer to the sRGB color space than the original 2490; to be honest the slightly lower coverage of the original was never a concern.
- Apparent sharpness at native setting is very good if a little strong (it can be easily tweaked in the OSD), making text very readable and pictures at less than 100 % magnification in Photoshop extremely sharp.
- As you would also expect from a NEC monitor, electronics and OSD are brilliant and well thought of, giving you full and fine control of every possible aspect.
- Incidentally, my new monitor shows a dead full pixel close to the center of the screen. I haven't checked very thoroughly to spot any other stuck/dead pixels or sub-pixels.
I will try to bring more information as soon as I carry more objective tests after calibration.
In conclusion, and in all honesty, my first thoughts on this new monitor are not very encouraging. I have the feeling that for 1.544 euros (equivalent to 2.200 dollars) you should be getting better than this.
Thanks for reading and sorry for the "block"! ;O)
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