Compared with the releases of the NEC EA231WMi and recent Dell IPS models, the launch of the Viewsonic VP2365wb seemed to go fairly quietly really. It's surprising, as the screen features the same 23" LG.Display IPS panel as the EA231WMi and Dell U2311H and has some decent features and an attractive price point. There's not many other IPS based models in this size range, and so there seems to have been an increase in interest over the last month or two from what we have seen. Thanks to reader feedback, we have decided to take an in depth look at the Viewsonic offering, to see how it compares with its competition and to see whether it can match some of the impressive performance we have seen from the NEC and Dell equivalents.

Let's start by taking a look at the specs for the VP2365wb:

Above: Front and side views of the screen. Side views show range of tilt adjustment. Click for larger versions

The design of the screen is pretty simple but attractive. There is a thin matte black bezel around the panel with a small Viewsonic logo in the bottom left hand corner and a "VP2365wb" label in the top right. The stand and base are also black. The panel itself features a matte anti-reflective coating as opposed to any glossy solution.

Above: Front view showing maximum height adjustment (left) and rear view of the screen. Click for larger versions

The VP2365wb offers a good range of ergonomic adjustments. There is a height adjustment range of 5.3" which is smooth and easy to operate. The lowest setting was perhaps not as low as some people might want, and doesn't reach much below about 13 cm from your desk. The upper limit is very high though, not sure if anyone would really need to be using the screen at that height! (see above)

Above: Rotate and height adjustments shown

Above: Rotated portrait mode (left) and cable tie on the back of the stand (right). Click for larger versions

The pivot range was nice and smooth, with 90� movement possible. Tilt was again smooth and easy to alter, with a range of -5� to +20� possible. The rotate function was again easy to use and thankfully once settled in normal landscape mode there was no major wobble from the screen and the panel felt sturdy. Materials were of a good standard and the screen felt stable and well built. During operation, the top of the screen becomes fairly warm and if you listen closely you can detect a faint buzz from the back of the screen. My working environment is not deadly silent so not an issue for me, but some might find it a bit annoying.

Above: OSD menu operation buttons. Click for larger versions

In the middle of the lower bezel were 5 buttons for controlling the screen and OSD menu. The first two were labelled "1" and "2", with each having a designated function once you get into the menu. Pressing button "1" brings up the menu first of all while the "2" button provides quick access to the input select (D-sub or DVI). The middle button controls the screens power on and off, while the last two buttons have a down and up arrow respectively. These control the menu options up and down once you're in the main section, but also provide quick access to brightness and contrast controls. The menu itself was quite intuitive once you get the hang of the options that the "1" and "2" buttons provide and there was a decent enough range of options.

The power LED glows a bright blue colour during normal operation and is perhaps a little too bright. Would have been useful if this could be turned down or off in the OSD menu. When in standby, it glows a more subtle orange colour.

The OSD menu itself had a fairly decent range of options. There's the usual brightness and contrast controls as well as access to the colour presets and some additional options like dynamic contrast ratio and aspect ratio control.

The 'Color Adjust' sub-menu has access to the preset colour modes shown above. The factory default is 6500k, but there's also an sRGB mode, settings for various colour temperatures and a 'user' mode where you can manually adjust the RGB channels for calibration or personal settings. We'll test these a little later on.

The 'Manual Image Adjust' sub-menu has options for aspect ratio control (more later) and the dynamic contrast ratio option which we will test later on. You can also access the ECO mode options, designed to help reduce power consumption as we examine below.

The Viewsonic spec states that the VP2365wb will typically use 45W of power during operation, and also says that there is a saving on power consumption of "up to 40%" when using the ECO modes. Our independent tests revealed that at default settings (where brightness was set at 100% as well), the power consumption was 40.7W. Once calibrated the power consumption dropped to 32.5W thanks to the reduced brightness setting mostly. In standby, the screen uses only 1.2W.

The ECO mode is accessible through the OSD menu with options for: "standard" = default brightness setting, "optimize" = decreases brightness  by 25%, and "conserve" = decreases brightness by 50%. I measured the power consumption at each once the screen had been calibrated. The "optimize" mode offered a saving of ~12%, while the "conserve" setting was more like 27%. Not quite matching the 40% saving advertised by activating these modes. Still, these might be useful as a psuedo preset mode.

Above: Rear view showing power connection (left) and interface options (right). Click for larger versions

The back of the screen offers a fairly standard range of interface options, with power connector (left hand image) and then DVI and D-sub video connections. There was no HDMI or DisplayPort which was a bit of a shame. There is an integrated 4 port USB 2.0 hub as well which you can see in the right hand image, along with the USB upstream port to connection to your PC. These are a little tucked out of the way, and it would have perhaps been useful to feature the USB ports on one of the sides of the screen as well for quick connection of external devices like cameras, printers etc.

 

 

Colour Accuracy, Black Depth and Contrast

Updated Feb 2011: The Viewsonic VP2365wb utilises an e-IPS panel, capable of producing 16.7 million colours. The panel itself actually uses a 6-bit colour depth with advanced frame rate control (A-FRC) to produce the 16.7m colours. This is different to regular 8-bit IPS matrices, but this is likely a measure taken to achieve a lower price point for these so-called e-IPS displays. Originally the panel was listed as true 8-bit based on the manufacturers spec, but studying detailed information from LG.Display's datasheet confirms the panel is in fact 6-bit+AFRC. This review has been updated accordingly in this section.

Unlike many modern displays, the screen uses standard CCFL backlighting and offers a colour gamut covering 72% of the NTSC colour space, approximately the same as the sRGB space. For those who are wary of extended gamuts and only want to work with sRGB content, this is an important thing to note.

An important thing to consider for most users is how a screen will perform out of the box and with some basic manual adjustments. Since most users won't have access to hardware colorimeter tools, it is important to understand how the screen is going to perform in terms of colour accuracy for the average user. I restored my graphics card to default settings and set it to its standard profile. The VP2365wb was tested at default factory settings using the DVI interface, and analysed using LaCie's Blue Eye Pro colorimeter and their accompanying software suite.

Default settings of the screen were as follows:

Viewsonic VP2365wb - Default Factory Settings

I'll talk through the results step by step. On the left we have a CIE diagram with triangles representing the colour space (gamut) displayed by the monitor. The black triangle represents the gamut of the screen itself, with an orange triangle being shown as a reference to the sRGB colour space. As you can see, the monitors colour space matches this very closely and is in keeping with other modern standard gamut displays.

Beneath this you can see the result for gamma, which on average was 2.0, that being quite close (9% deviation) from our target of 2.2 which is the default for computer monitors. Colour temperature was recorded at 5978k, being only 8% out from our target of 6500k, the temperature of daylight. Luminance was also a fairly modest 169 cd/m² which was good since many displays can be set far too bright at default settings. This was not that far our from our target of 120 cd/m² (41% deviance), the recommended luminance for LCD monitors in normal lighting conditions. At a luminance of 169 cd/m², we obtained a pretty impressive black depth of 0.23 cd/m² which gave us a very good static contrast ratio of 735:1. A pleasing result.

Testing with the colorimeter revealed the graph on the right hand side above, showing DeltaE (dE 94) values across 16 shades. As a reminder, the lower these bars down the Y-axis, the better, in terms of colour accuracy. For reference, LaCie describe the DeltaE readings as:

• If DeltaE >3, the color displayed is significantly different from the theoretical one, meaning that the difference will be perceptible to the viewer.

• If DeltaE <2, LaCie considers the calibration a success; there remains a slight difference, but it is barely undetectable.

• If DeltaE < 1, the color fidelity is excellent.

 

Default accuracy of the screen was actually pretty good, with an average dE of only 2.5, leaving a slight difference between requested and rendered colour. Some shades like blue ranged up to dE of 5.5 as a maximum, but overall I was quite pleased with the factory settings and colours felt pretty even to the naked eye. If you're buying a screen in this price range you might well not have a colorimeter or want to fork out more money for one, so it's good to see that even without one, you can get some fairly accurate colour performance out of the box. An alteration to the default 100% brightness down to about 50 - 60% should return a more comfortable luminance as well.

 

 

 

I also wanted to see how the screen performed with only a simple change to the preset colour mode:

 

Viewsonic VP2365wb - sRGB Preset Default

I changed the preset mode to sRGB which is supposed to be optimised for the sRGB colour space. When you change to this setting, you loose access to the brightness and contrast controls. This had a rather odd effect, as it lowered the luminance of the screen noticeably. The colorimeter revealed luminance had dropped from 169 cd/m² to 71 cd/m², giving the same deviance as before, but this time too low. Black depth however remained at 0.23 cd/m², giving a static contrast ratio of 309:1. Looks like this mode alters the digital white level or something as opposed to the backlight, reducing the luminance reading but crushing the contrast ratio.

Gamma was improved a little to 2.1 and colour temperature was a little closer now at 6038k. Colour accuracy was also improved a little actually, with dE average being 1.9 now, maximum of 4.5. I wouldn't really recommend using this mode as it has a negative affect on contrast.

 

Viewsonic VP2365wb - User Color Mode Default

Changing nothing again but the preset mode provided the above results. I reverted to the 'User Color' mode which gives you individual control over the RGB channels. For now, I left these all at 100 as default. This was a better result, and made a positive improvement compared with the factory default 6500k mode. Gamma was now 2.2 but colour temperature was a little further away from the 6500k target at 5720k. The 6500k preset mode was a little closer to the target than the custom mode it seemed. Luminance was very similar to the default factory settings at 175 cd/m², but black depth was now 0.23 cd/m², and contrast ratio was 761:1. This mode didn't have the problem that the sRGB mode appeared to, which was good. Colour accuracy was also improved compared with default settings, with dE of 1.6 average, and 5.1 maximum. I'd recommend if nothing else changing into the User Color mode and then lowering the brightness control a bit.

 

Calibrated Results

Viewsonic VP2365wb - Calibrated Settings - User Color Mode

Monitor OSD Option	Adjusted Setting
Brightness	67
Contrast	70
RGB	62, 97, 78
Preset Mode	User Color

	Calibrated Settings, User Color Mode
luminance (cd/m2)	120
Black Point (cd/m2)	0.17
Contrast Ratio	706:1

I had found a good starting point for those without a colorimeter, but wanted to now see what the screen was capable of with proper hardware calibration and profiling. I entered the 'User Color' mode so that I could change the RGB values as shown above. Brightness was also adjusted to 67% from the default of 100%. The automated stages were then used to carry out further adjustments and corrections at a graphics card LUT level, and creating an ICC profile. There is no hardware level calibration possible since that is reserved for high end graphics screens.

Results from our calibration were very good. Gamma, colour temperature and luminance were all corrected very nicely. We had a black depth now of 0.17 cd/m², which gave us a static contrast ratio of 706:1 which was respectable. Colour accuracy was now excellent, with average dE of only 0.2 and maximum of only 0.5. LaCie would consider colour fidelity to be excellent.

You can use our OSD settings and try our calibrated ICC profile if you wish, which is available in our ICC profile database.

 

Viewsonic VP2365wb - Calibrated Settings - 6500k Mode

Monitor OSD Option	Adjusted Setting
Brightness	67
Contrast	70
RGB	n/a
Preset Mode	6500k

	Calibrated Settings, Standard Mode
luminance (cd/m2)	121
Black Point (cd/m2)	0.17
Contrast Ratio	712:1

Out of interest I also calibrated the screen in the 6500k preset mode to check if corrections could be made in that setup. Thankfully they could, and gamma, colour temperature and luminance were all corrected nicely. Colour accuracy was again excellent, although ever so slightly behind our calibrated 'User Color' mode. dE average was 0.3, maximum of 0.7. It was good to see you can calibrate this preset mode properly, as some other models we have tested (e.g. Dell U2311H) do not seem to allow accurate performance in some of their modes.

 

Calibration Performance Comparisons

 

 

I plotted the results of our calibration profiling on the above graphs, pitting the VP2365wb against some of its popular rivals. Out of the box colour accuracy was actually very good at 2.5 average dE, and very similar to that of the NEC EA231WMi (2.7) and Dell U2311H (2.3) which use the same panel. It's good to see a default colour accuracy which is actually quite good, as you may well not want to invest in a colorimeter when buying a monitor in this kind of price range.

 

Once calibrated, the Viewsonic VP2365wb actually offered the combined best performance we have seen. Average dE was only 0.2, with a maximum of 0.5. This matched the NEC EA231WMi and even the NEC 2490WUXi which is a screen aimed at colour enthusiasts and the professional market. Keep in mind though that the 2490WUXi does have some further advanced features which make it a more professional grade screen. You can't rely purely on this test when considering colour critical application. For any general user though, wanting good colour accuracy after calibration (and out of the box for that matter), the Viewsonic VP2365wb performs very well indeed.

 

 

I also plotted the calibrated black depth and contrast ratio on the above. The black depth was very good (0.17) but was a little behind the NEC EA231WMi (0.15) and Dell U2311H (0.14). Despite using the same panel, these screens will feature different electronics, backlighting units and build, and so small variations can certainly be expected. The 0.17 black depth was still very good. Contrast ratio was 706:1 which was again slightly behind the NEC equivalent and a fair way behind the Dell U2311H which was very impressive in this regard, even rivalling the S-PVA based HP LP2275W. A static contast ratio of 706:1 is still very good, but not quite as good as we had hoped after testing the NEC and Dell offerings.
 

Contrast Stability

 

 

The contrast ratio of the screen was reasonably stable, but did fluctuate more than we have seen on other modern screens. Ideally this should remain flat, no matter what the brightness setting is. In practice it did vary between 739:1 and 866:1. Average contrast ratio across the range was 792:1. Between the range of 70% and 30% brightness, there was less variation and to be honest this is the range which is likely to return you a comfortable luminance as well for normal use.

 

The luminance of the screen was recorded at 175 cd/m² when brightness was set at 100%. This was quite a long way off from the advertised maximum brightness of 300 cd/m² so might be worth noting if you need to be using the screen at a higher luminance. We noticed a similar issue with the NEC EA231WMi which only reached 211 cd/m² at maximum brightness, although that had a slightly lower advertised max brightness of 270 cd/m². At the lower end, the VP2365wb ranged down to a very low 46 cd/m². A setting of around 50 - 65% should return a comfortable luminance of around 120 cd/m².

 

Black depth also reduced as you would hope when you lowered the backlight intensity via the brightness control. This was a pretty decent 0.23 cd/m² even at maximum brightness, but dropped down to a very low 0.06 cd/m² at 0% brightness.

 

 

Dynamic Contrast

The Viewsonic VP2365wb features a dynamic contrast ratio (DCR) control, but oddly Viewsonic do not seem to talk about the actual figure on their webpage or datasheet. DCR requires the screen to be able to produce a very bright white, and a very dark black at the two ends of the control. Dynamic contrast ratio involves controlling the backlight automatically, depending on the content shown on the screen. In bright images, the backlight is increased, and in darker images, it is descreased. For this test I would use the colorimeter to record the luminance and black depths at the two extremes. Max brightness would be recorded on an all white screen once the DCR has caught up. Black depth would be recorded on an all black screen.

 

 

On first glance this looks a very good result indeed, however it's not quite as good as you might hope in practice. For some odd reason, the DCR seemed to do pretty much nothing in normal use, and didn't seem to change the backlight intensity at all during games or videos from what I could see. To get the DCR to do anything I had to literally use a full black screen image in slideshow mode. Even having the Windows taskbar visible seemed to limit its use and stop it from changing anything! When you enter full screen slide show mode on an all black image, the DCR kicked in quickly, and within about 1 - 2 seconds had noticeably changed the brightness of the screen making the black image even darker. If you had the OSD menu visible during this, you could spot the change quite easily. I was able to measure this using an extended desktop across dual screens.

 

Blacks became very very black, and it was an impressive change. You'd be forgiven even for thinking the screen had switched off. The maximum luminance from a white screen is just whatever you have calibrated the screen to, and viewing an all white background didn't seem to push the brightness up further. Looks like this DCR is a control of the black level, but is very very fussy. In day to day use, I'm not sure whether it is even useable to be honest, as it didn't seem to do anything! This could perhaps be a marketing feature, possible under the right conditions, but really not much use in every day use.

 

Viewing Angles

Above: Viewing angles shown from front and side, and  from above and below. Click for larger images

Viewing angles of the VP2365wb were generally very good and indistinguishable from the NEC EA231WMi and Dell U2311H really. Being IPS based, you can expect wide fields of view in all directions, also being free from the VA off-centre contrast shift and the obvious limitations of TN Film matrices. Horizontally there was a contrast shift detectable from angles of >45�. Vertically the contrast shift was more pronounced, with a rather obvious change from above, and a slightly less obvious change from below. Nothing too serious, but I did feel it a was a little more restrictive than some other IPS panels.

 

Panel Uniformity

Measurements of the screens luminance were taken at 35 points across the panel on a pure white background. The measurements were taken using BasICColor's calibration software package, combined with the LaCie Blue Eye Pro colorimeter. The above uniformity diagram shows the difference, as a percentage, between the luminance recorded at each point on the screen, as compared with the reference point of a calibrated 120 cd/m². This is the desired level of luminance for an LCD screen in normal lighting conditions, and  the below shows the variance in the luminance across the screen compared with this point. It is worth noting that panel uniformity can vary from one screen to another, and can depend on manufacturing lines, screen transport and other local factors. This is only a guide of the uniformity of the sample screen we have for review.

Uniformity of Luminance

 

Luminance uniformity was average overall, with most of the  display staying with about 10% variation from the target luminance. The left hand edge of the screen was a fair bit darker, ranging down to 89 cd/m² in the worst case (top left). Along the left hand edge of the screen the luminance was around 30 - 35% darker than the centre of the screen. The panel was also a bit darker towards the right hand edge ar around 15 - 20% deviance. We'd seen a fairly similar pattern from the NEC EA231WMi and Dell U2311H to be honest, with some fairly noticeable discrepency between the right and left hand portions of the panel.

 

When I tested the VP2365wb in dark conditions and using solid colour backgrounds, I could spot a difference in the luminance along the edges, particularly the left hand side. This wasn't really apparent in normal use, but if you looked closely at a light grey background for instance, you could pick out some differences. There wasn't any colour tinting issues that I could see from the sample we had.

Above: All black screen in a darkened room. Click for larger version

As usual we also tested the screen with an all black image and in a darkened room. A camera was used to capture the result. There was some very slight backlight leakage in the top right and bottom left corners, but this was hardly noticeable to the naked eye to be honest. The camera picked out the discrepency as you can see above. Thankfully there was no serious leakage, especially along the edges which can be a problem in movies and videos where black borders are present.

 

Office and Windows Use

 

The VP2365wb has a nice high resolution of 1920 x 1080 which is good for side by side office work although not as practical as a 16:10 format screen with 1920 x 1200 resolution in my opinion. You do lose a bit vertically and the screen did feel smaller than a 'normal' 24" model. The aspect ratio of this screen is a pretty common trend in todays market with the move to multimedia orientated displays and widescreen formats. With a pixel pitch of 0.265mm, the text was comfortable and of a decent size for prolonged office use. Picture quality was very good using the DVI and D-sub connections, with DVI providing a slightly sharper image.

 

Default luminance of ~170 cd/m² was not too bad actually, but you will probably want to turn it down a little. A setting of around 50 - 60% should return a luminance of around 120 cd/m². There were no preset modes on this screen which can sometimes be useful I think. You'll have to calibrate the screen to an overall luminance you want, as there's no different modes to have different set ups. I personally find ambient light sensors quite useful, offering dynamic control of the backlight brightness depending on your working conditions. There was one of these sensors on the NEC EA231WMi, but not on the Viewsonic. There are however the 'ECO mode' options to reduce backlight intensity and therefore power consumption. May be useful as a substitute for preset modes like "internet" and "text".

 

Ergonomically the screen was very good, with a decent and smooth range of tilt, pivot and height adjustments available. There's a rotate function as well in case you want to work in portrait mode. It might have been useful to feature easy-access USB ports on the left hand side which are useful for connecting printers, cameras etc. At least there are 4x ports on the underside of the screen if you need them.

 

Responsiveness and Gaming

The Viewsonic VP2365wb was tested using the chase test in PixPerAn, a good bit of software for trying to quantify differences in real terms responsiveness between monitors. As a reminder, a series of pictures are taken on the highest shutter speed and compared. The images below show the best case example on the left hand side, and the worst case example on the right hand side. This should only be used as a rough guide to comparative responsiveness but is handy as a way of keeping a constant test of each screen.

 

14ms LG.Display e-IPS

14ms LG.Display e-IPS


8ms G2G LG.Display e-IPS
 

6ms G2G LG.Display H-IPS
 

5ms G2G LG.Display e-IPS

 

The Viewsonic VP2365wb has a specified response time of 14ms, which is without any mention of being "grey to grey" (G2G). This is because the screen does not have a Response Time Compensation (RTC) impulse applied, unlike some other competing screens. Viewsonic have stuck with the 14ms ISO response time figure, as did NEC with their EA231WMi model. The Dell U2311H uses the same LG.Displays LM230WF2 panel, but being a more recent release, offers an RTC acceleration of the response time to 8ms G2G.

 

The observed results back this up as well. The Viewsonic is pretty much identical to the NEC EA231WMi and you can see the same degree of ghost image in the 'best case' pictures. In practice, the moving car is noticeably blurred, and you can spot a difference between this screen and an RTC enabled model. It's not as bad as some other non-RTC screens though I would say so you might well find it is adequate for casual or light gaming. There is a noticeable improvement with the Dell U2311H thanks to its overdrive application, something which is apparent in these test images as well. Since the VP2365wb does not feature RTC, it is at least free from any negative artefacts such as white / dark trailing. You can spot this a little in the Dell U2311H pictures, a sacrifice made to reduce the blur and improve the response time.

 

 

14ms LG.Display e-IPS

 

3ms G2G Samsung TN Film + 120Hz

 

I have also provided a comparison here between the Viewsonic VP2365wb and our current champion in this test, the Samsung SM2233RZ. The super fast TN Film panel of the Samsung, along with 120Hz panel technology, can offer some marked improvements in moving images. There's very little blurring and very few RTC artefacts. The 120Hz also serves to offer a higher frame rate where needed.

 

The screen features hardware level aspect ratio control available via the OSD menu. There are options for 1:1, fill aspect and full screen available.

 

Input Lag

As usual I tested the screen in clone mode with a CRT to determine the level of input lag. This is something which can put off some gamers and is a delay between graphics card and monitor output. By hooking up a CRT you can show that  the LCD lags behind somewhat, which can affect users in some situations where they rely on the screen image being as fast as their inputs (e.g. fast FPS shooting games). Often, input lag is very low and probably wouldn't represent too much of a problem in real terms.

 

The input lag of the VP2365wb measured 16.3ms on average, ranging up to ~30ms in the worst case examples. Overall this wasn't too bad really, and only a little behind the Samsung 2233RZ (15ms) and Viewsonic VX2268wm (14ms) which are 120Hz gamer orientated screens. The VP2365wb was a little behind the NEC EA231WMi (8.8ms) and Dell U2311H (10.6ms), but I'd hardly call that a big difference. Shouldn't be any major issue for gamers in this regard.

 

 

Movies and Video

The following summarises the Viewsonic VP2365wb's performance in video applications:

• 23" screen size makes it a reasonable option for an all-in-one multimedia screen, although larger screens are becoming more common place now and LCD TV sizes continue to grow

• 16:9 aspect ratio is more suited to videos than 16:10 format screens, leaving smaller borders on DVD's and wide screen content.

• 1920 x 1080 resolution can support true 1080 HD resolution content

• Digital DVI interface supports HDCP for any encrypted and protected content

• Limited connectivity options available with only D-sub and DVI available. Would have been good to see HDMI or DisplayPort for connecting external devices, and these have also become popular on graphics card more recently.

• Black depth and contrast ratio are good. Detail in darker scenes should not be lost

• Dynamic contrast ratio is available but barely works at all in practical use from what I could tell

• No 'multimedia' or 'movie' preset modes available meaning you need to use the same mode for office work as for movie work. Sometimes these presets can be handy for boosting brightness and colours to make movies more attractive.

• Fairly good pixel responsiveness which should mean the screen is capable of hadling fast moving images. There may be some more noticeable blur compared with overdrive panels.

• There was no obvious backlight leakage or bleed along the edges which is good as that can become distracting when watching movies, especially where black borders are present. Some slight leakage from the top right and bottom left hand corner, but not really obvious in movies I didn't think.

• Wide viewing angles thanks to IPS panel technology making it suitable for viewing from different positions and for multiple viewers without issue

• Good ergonomic adjustments available as well to obtain a comfortable viewing position

 

Head to Head Comparisons

I know people are going to ask this question, so I'll try and answer it now - "How does the VP2365wb compare with the other mainstream models in this size range?" I've included a little table summarising several of these screens side by side based on the testing we have carried out and on my opinions. Each screen will have either a ranking or the actual measurement shown. Where they are ranked, it is from 1st to 5th place where applicable in each category and colour coordinated:

1 - Green
2 - Yellow
3 - Light orange
4 - Dark orange
5 - Red

• Approximate price - The VP2365wb is the cheapest of the bunch at a very reasonable �225 GBP. This is a fair bit cheaper even than the new Dell U2311H (�260), and the NEC EA231WMi (�280) which has been around for a while. It's a hefty price difference compared with the other three 24" models which is surely significant for any potential buyer?

• Features - I've placed the VP2365wb just behind the U2311H and HP ZR24W which have DisplayPort interfaces available and USB ports on the side of the screen. The U2410 and LP2475W have an even wider range of interface options, and things like extended internal processing (Dell U2410) etc. The NEC EA231WMi is also ranked slightly ahead as it's got an ambient light sensor and integrated speakers, so I've put that on par with the U2410 and LP2475W.

• Interfaces - Again, the VP2365wb is slightly behind as it is missing a DisplayPort which the Dell U2311H, HP ZR24W and NEC EA231WMi offer. There is at least DVI and VGA, but no component, HDMI, composite etc as there is on the U2410 and LP2475W. Presumably removing the DisplayPort is one of the ways they have managed to keep the price down even lower than the other two 23" models.

• sRGB colour support - Obviously the VP2365wb has a good edge here since it's a standard gamut screen anyway. If you are wanting to work only in the sRGB colour space, the standard backlighting here is probably more suited. The Dell U2311H, NEC EA and HP ZR are also standard gamut models. The Dell U2410 does feature a fairly decent sRGB emulation mode at least, and the LP2475W's emulation doesn't seem to work at all!

• Extended gamut support - The LP2475W and Dell U2410 are both using extended colour gamut backlighting, whereas the others are limited to only sRGB / 72% NTSC. If you want to work with extended colour spaces, the VP2365wb is not for you.

• Panel Uniformity - The HP models take the combined crown here being pretty good from what we saw. The Dell U2410 has some leakage issues while the Viewsonic VP2365wb, NEC EA231WMi and Dell U2311H have some fairly significant luminance uniformity issues. In the case of the NEC there was some bad backlight leakage as well. Results may vary, but this is based on the review samples we have looked at

• Office and Windows - There's very little to separate them all here. The three 16:10 aspect screens would normally have the edge in my mind compared with a 16:9 aspect screen. However, I've bumped the NEC EA up slightly since it also offers a range of carbon saving options and an ambient light sensor which are useful. The Viewsonic VP2365wb has a couple of ECO modes, but no ambient light sensor so I've left it slightly behind.

• Viewing angles - only a minor separation here really, but there was a slightly more pronounced contrast shift vertically on the VP2365wb, U2311H, ZR24W and EA231WMi than on the other two. A change relating to e-IPS vs. H-IPS here.

• Movies Overall - I've put the VP2365wb slightly behind the other models due to its more limited connectivity options which could have been useful for connecting external DVD / Blu-ray players. The Dell U2410 and HP LP2475W take first place as they have a massive range of connectivity options. The Dell U2311H is ahead of the VP2365wb as it has some preset modes and a DisplayPort interface. The NEC EA231WMi is ahead of the VP2365wb as again it has DisplayPort and also integrated stereo speakers.

• Responsiveness - Since the VP2365wb and NEC EA231WMi do not offer RTC to boost grey to grey transitions, they are unfortunately a little behind the other models. There is a more noticeable blur in moving images as well. The RTC enabled screens are all very close really on the most part but I'd have to give the slight edge to the U2311H. The Dell U2410 is close behind but has a slightly more pronounced trail behind the moving car. The HP LP2475W shows a fairly obvious dark RTC artefact and the ZR24W shows a slightly more noticeable ghost image.

• Input lag - pretty good all round really, but the NEC EA takes the 1st place here at 8.8ms, with the HP ZR24W and Dell U2311H practically the same at ~10ms. Behind that was the Dell U2410 at 14.4ms, and the VP2365wb was a little further behind again at 16.3ms. The LP2475W was perhaps the only one which was lagging (no pun intended) a more considerable way behind the pack at 25ms.

• Colour accuracy Default - Out of the box, the VP2365wb offers some of the best colour accuracy we have seen with dE average of 2.5, matching the HP ZR24W and only just behind the Dell U2311H (2.4). The NEC EA is also very close behind at 2.7. Neither the Dell or LP2475W offered particularly good colour accuracy at default settings, and need some decent calibration really to get the most out of them. This can cause further problems due to the extended gamut where oversaturation of reds and greens can be common.

• Colour accuracy calibrated - All very good and pretty much nothing in it, but the HP LP2475W falls ever so slightly behind.

• Black depth - The Dell U2311H holds first place with a slight edge here over the NEC EA. There's not much in it between all these models, although the Dell U2410 does fall a little behind. The HP ZR24W is ok if you are using a 100% contrast setting (see review for details) but could be considered weak in this regard if you do not.

• Static Contrast Ratio - as a static number of 706:1, the VP2365wb is comparable to the HP LP2475W. These aren't far behind the NEC EA231WMi, but the Dell U2311H holds the crown with an excellent 857:1. The Dell U2410 is a fair bit weaker at 541:1.

• Dynamic Contrast Ratio - The only one which really works quite well is the NEC EA at 3312:1. The Dell U2410 and HP ZR24W work to a small degree, and the U2311H barely works at all from what we saw. I'm cautious about going with the 12,000:1 number we recorded from the VP2365wb as the DCR function doesn't seem to work very well in practice. The LP2475W doesn't feature this technology.

So as you can see, there's some tough competition in this sector. I think it's very hard for me to tell you which is the best really, since it really does depend on what you want from the screen and of course how much you're willing to spend. I would say that the VP2365wb is a good screen though, and at that price, it's surely got to be a contender. It's even cheaper than the Dell U2311H and NEC EA231WMi as well and only really lacking in a couple of features which would make much real difference I think. Hopefully the above will help you pick out the areas which are important to you so you can decide which screen is for you.

 

Conclusion

The Viewsonic VP2365wb had some tough competition coming in, as we had already reviewed the popular NEC EA231WMi and the new Dell U2311H in depth. We had some high expectations based on those reviews, and it was interesting to see how the Viewsonic equivalent faired. All in all I thought the performance of the VP2365wb was very good. Colour accuracy out of the box was very good, and once calibrated it offered some of the best performance we have seen. This was a similar story to the NEC and Dell models so no complaints there. Black depth and contrast ratio were a little behind the NEC, and a fair bit behind the Dell which had obviously made some nice improvements, being released last out of the three models. They were still very good on the Viewsonic though, and certainly decent for an IPS matrix. As you would expect, the IPS panel also offered some very good all round performance in terms of viewing angles, picture quality etc.

The luminance uniformity was a little disappointing however, and we had seen the same thing from this e-IPS panel on the NEC and Dell models. I think the only real things which might separate the VP2365wb from the other two 23" models would be 1) the price, and 2) the lack of RTC boosted response times. The price is a fair bit less than the NEC and Dell and all you're really missing out on is a DisplayPort interface and a couple of extras from the NEC like an ambient light sensor and integrated speakers. Being released around the same time as the NEC, the Viewsonic does not use RTC and so has a slightly more limited use for gaming and fast moving  images than the recent Dell U2311H. I suppose the question is - are you that bothered by the improved responsiveness and the DisplayPort of the Dell, or would you rather save yourself �35 or so?