Is this what S-IPS panels are meant to be like?

[Rajveer]

Armatoste: This is my second monitor (both have been like this) and others who have it (like philjohn) have confirmed it too, so yeah I'm pretty sure it's what the display was intended to be like unfortunately

Pawstar: That's terrible, I thought technology was meant to improve with time. Well that leaves me in a crap position, the way I see it there is no 24" IPS panel with no lag, no white glow from a normal position, good colours, and good black levels, and decent enough for gaming?

Solaris54: I looked at the Planar and DoubleSight but they're 26", I find getting used to playing on a 24" from a 19" hard enough! My Hazro looks pretty good with the earth pic too (I'll post a pic later) since the earth is so bright it makes the blacks appear darker. It's on a predominantly dark image where the crap black levels become obviously...crap :S. If only I could turn down the backlight permanently.

 

[albovin]

My own eyes, the poor black level, and tacit confirmation from Hazro.

I understand - no source. Just blah-blah.

 

[philjohn]

I understand - no source. Just blah-blah.

My contact at Hazro confirmed before I sent mine back, didn't really want to post that all over the forums though as there's already enough people who know the backlight doesn't dim.

Also, they are offering a backlight luminance reduction fix for 26" owners when they RTB for the banding fix, hence the "tacit confirmation from Hazro part".

I'm a little incredulous that you seem to not trust any members of the forums to post what they can deduce about a monitor however, we're a fairly knowledgable bunch, and lack of backlight control is obvious from a mile away.

 

[Rajveer]

Hmm, I read that too on the Overclockers forums (about the 26" monitors getting a backlight luminance fix). Any more information on this (i.e. would it just be a permanent reduction or could you modify the backlight yourself)?

I'm wondering if they're planning the fix for the 24", if they are I may hold on to it...

 

[albovin]

My contact at Hazro confirmed before I sent mine back, didn't really want to post that all over the forums though as there's already enough people who know the backlight doesn't dim.

Also, they are offering a backlight luminance reduction fix for 26" owners when they RTB for the banding fix, hence the "tacit confirmation from Hazro part".

I'm a little incredulous that you seem to not trust any members of the forums to post what they can deduce about a monitor however, we're a fairly knowledgable bunch, and lack of backlight control is obvious from a mile away.

No 26"!! We are talking about 24".
Have you measured brightness?
No?
Any links to measurements?
No?

But you state:

for some reason Hazro decided not to include hardware backlight control and instead opted to use "panel blocking" to emulate the functionality

How can you make such a statement without anything to prove it??
Why anyone should trust such statements?

 

[philjohn]

No 26"!! We are talking about 24".
Have you measured brightness?
No?
Any links to measurements?
No?

But you state:


How can you make such a statement without anything to prove it??
Why anyone should trust such statements?

Please calm down and read my last message again, particularly the first paragraph.

 

[lifanus]

hmm, i feel the posts getting pretty hot here~

 

[albovin]

Please calm down and read my last message again, particularly the first paragraph.

That's enough for housewives' forums.

For technical forums: tests, measurements, links, educated observations, please.

 

[Nenu]

That's enough for housewives' forums.

For technical forums: tests, measurements, links, educated observations, please.

Stop picking on him.

 

[nick8571]

lol

Has anyone measured the Hazro's power consumption at different brightness levels? Presumably that would give a strong indication as to whether or not it has a variable backlight?

 

[elvn]

I thought I'd post something someone in this thread was hinting at which seems related in my experience.

On my hannspree 28" LCD (which is TN but I am very happy with) the brightness out of the box was the was the worst I've ever seen. LCD's usually ship with their brightness very high but this was ridiculous. My Hannspree did show white flare in the bottom corners. After I tweaked / self-calibrated the LCD (turning the brightness setting off completely it was so bad), the light bleeding at the edges went away.

Before you send a monitor back consider trying to turn the brightness down way below the bazillion nit they ship with (1 bazillion candela per square meter, cd/m²). Separate backlight controls would help too as someone mentioned.

You also might try a more dim area for the monitor so you don't have to turn the brightness up as high vs. the room lighting. In a darker area a lower brightness level seems brighter in effect to your eyes, so your lower brightness setting may shrink the light bleeding or remove it completely. Another "trick" to enhance the way your eyes perceive an LCD's brightness and contrast is to put a soft lamp behind the screen, and try to limit the lights hitting the front of it.

 

[philjohn]

educated observations

Why? It's quite clear the only "educated observations" you are willing to listen to are those put forth by yourself.

I've already given my education observation, the panel backlight was not being dimmed; it's really not that difficult to notice. We also have the evidence from the poor black level of 0.6 cd/m2 after calibration, the excessive heat given off both through the casing and through the front of the panel.

If you have another explanation for what could cause those symptoms I'd really like to hear it.

 

[albovin]

We also have the evidence from the poor black level of 0.6 cd/m2

Where?

 

[Rajveer]

elvn: Cheers for the advice, but the problem is the backlight. At the moment my brightness (which appears to just modify the gamut not the backlight) is set to 50. Setting it lower doesn't change the darkest black it can display, which can be verified with an all black image.

philjohn: I've sent Hazro a webnote asking if they can possibly turn down the backlight like they offer with the HZ26wi, so I'll let you know their response!

 

[elvn]

Although my advice did include ways to help perceive the blacklevels better, I mainly meant to suggest that turning the brightness down a lot can minimize and even remove light bleeding on the edges of some LCDs.

 

[Armatoste]

Well at least I know that the TC's white glow isin't typical. Here's a pic from robbiekhan showing the black levels on his Hazro HZ24Wi. He did calibrate it though, but I don't know if that's the whole reason his black are better than the ones in this topic.

 

[philjohn]

Where?

http://robbiekhan.co.uk/root/temp/Report.pdf

It should be noted he calibrates to a higher luminance as he is in a very brightly lit room, but he also received the same black level when calibrating to 120cd/m2 IIRC.

I believe TFTCentral will also be reviewing the 24Wi, but tellingly, they only achieved about the same when calibrating the 26Wi - leading to more evidence for both not regulating backlight control (plus I was told by someone who works for Hazro it was the case).

 

[pawstar]

He did calibrate it though, but I don't know if that's the whole reason his black are better than the ones in this topic.

It should be noted he calibrates to a higher luminance as he is in a very brightly lit room, but he also received the same black level when calibrating to 120cd/m2 IIRC.

Yup, that would do it. It just proves what I have been saying on the other thread regarding the same type of problem. You don't notice the flaws as much when your surroundings are very bright and photographing the monitor doesn't reveal it because digital cameras still have a rather small dynamic range (especially consumer cams) but the issues are still there. But not everybody is in or wants to work/play in a bright environment. Even light biasing isn't the answer to this - minor mitigation yes, but the monitor still can cause eye strain.

 

[Armatoste]

I see. So is this poor black level problem really that much of a turnoff? I have high hopes for the Hazro to be my future upgrade. But goddam, everytime I see a new monitor come out I think: "this is the one I'm gonna get", and then someone finds a hidden flaw and my hopes come crashing down.

Maybe I should just get a refurbished DS-263N from the Doublesight store and call it a day.

 

[solaris54]

I see. So is this poor black level problem really that much of a turnoff? I have high hopes for the Hazro to be my future upgrade. But goddam, everytime I see a new monitor come out I think: "this is the one I'm gonna get", and then someone finds a hidden flaw and my hopes come crashing down.

Maybe I should just get a refurbished DS-263N from the Doublesight store and call it a day.

I think you would be very happy with the DS-263N. Im very picky about PQ and have been very happy with it. The flaws everyone talks about usually do not effect the normal text and pictures that you will be looking at.

 

[lifanus]

Well at least I know that the TC's white glow isin't typical. Here's a pic from robbiekhan showing the black levels on his Hazro HZ24Wi. He did calibrate it though, but I don't know if that's the whole reason his black are better than the ones in this topic.

Bro, pics can't tell if the lcd have more deeper black or not if it is not compared with another lcd in the same photo. Exposure time greatly affect how much white value is gonna showup in a digital image.

 

[Armatoste]

From the pic taker:

My photo was taken in a dark room, the flash was bounced at 1/64 power so has no affect on the backlight issue you note.


And don't call me bro.

 

[lifanus]

Sorry man, you don't get me. Because you are using a shorter exposure time, the screen appears more dark. back light is better examed in comparison to another LCD monitor right next to the one to be inspected, that way, you know if it is darker or lighter in comparison to another, or by increasing exposure time (preferably without flash, in a completely dark environment)

 

[Armatoste]

NO! I REJECT YOUR REALITY AND SUBSTITUTE MY OWN!


Alright, but seriously, even with the mediocre black levels and annoying glow of the Hazro; what other IPS options do I have that won't have a crazy wide gamut, will have low input lag, correct 1:1 scaling, lots of inputs and a reasonable price?

 

[lifanus]

SURE THING!

 

[philjohn]

NO! I REJECT YOUR REALITY AND SUBSTITUTE MY OWN!


Alright, but seriously, even with the mediocre black levels and annoying glow of the Hazro; what other IPS options do I have that won't have a crazy wide gamut, will have low input lag, correct 1:1 scaling, lots of inputs and a reasonable price?

To be honest, I don't think what you want exists, not a 24" anyway.

 

[Armatoste]

So true philjohn. But the Hazro is the closest thing to what I want in an LCD, so I'll just have to settle for the less stellar black level and contrast... and the possible banding... and snow effect... and the sparkling pixels.

I'm just awaiting a NA release. Hazro says on it's website that they anticipate October to start shipping to Western Europe and NA.

 

[Rajveer]

Got a call from Hazro late on Friday regarding their firmware update:

Banding: Totally fixed with new firwmare

Green snow: In his own words they have no idea what the cause is, they tried 3 things (firmware, shielding and changing cables) and neither worked. They said that they were working over the whole weekend and hope to have some good news. They said for people who are temporarily solving the issue with different cables e.t.c, once they know the exact cause they would rather fix the problem than have customers put up with a fix. Remember, this was on Friday, so since then they could have found the fix.

Backlight luminance: A lot of complaints from customers so the new firmware reduces the backlight luminance, we should be able to hit from ~180cd/m² to ~125cd/m² by default (trying to hit the target of 120 but obv screen dependent). This is done by reducing the amount of power the backlight uses, hence reducing it's luminance and allowing us to hit darker blacks.

Firmware: The RGB sliders problem is a bug which was an anomaly. He said this was totally unacceptable and will be fixed with others.

Future revisions: There will be a revision of the 24" and 26" monitors in around Feb, which will allow us to modify backlight luminance ourselves (amongst other fixes which I've forgotten).

Uneven colours (problem that I'm having where to get a neutral colour I have to set reds around 10 less than greens and blues using the OSD sliders): It's a common misconception that having all values at the same setting will result in a neutral picture, instead all values are independent of each other. Having said that, going to an extreme like I'm doing may imply a problem which they'll look into.

So hopefully I'll get the retailer to swap this current one with one from their updated stock and I can let you know if blacks have improved and the white glow reduced with the lower backlight level.