Dell UltraSharp 2001FP Preview: Gaming LCDs for the Masses
by Kristopher Kubicki on November 10, 2003 12:36 AM EST- Posted in
- Displays
Wallmount, Swivel, Pivot & Cable Management
How many of you remember the pivot feature on the 191T LCD that we reviewed last year? That's right — Dell brought this feature back in the 2001FP. The original Samsung 191T was pivotable, but fairly awkward. The 191T cable management provided difficulties when attempting to pivot the unit. Dell took a slightly different approach to this problem, but essentially reevaluated the stand of the LCD in the form of a primitive universal joint.
Click to enlarge.
Dell's first move was to build the monitor in two separate pieces; the mount and the screen are two totally separate units. The screen has a receptacle for a standard 100mm VESA wall mount, but can be interchanged with the stand. Interchanging the stand with a VESA wall mount was very simple and requires no tools. Dell deserves some extra credit points here. It sounds obvious, but believe us, not many monitors are built this way. As you can see below, the stand allows a swivel of about 50 degrees left and right, as well as a 90 degree pivot clockwise. A small button locks the monitor in place in either landscape or letter pivot mode.
All of the inputs are fed into the LCD under the stand mount. This is acceptable, but not particularly thrilling. Samsung's 192T, arguably, has the best cable management, with the interfaces all running down the inside of the stand. Dell's whole stand can be folded into VESA compatible mount point. On one hand, we enjoy the fact that Dell set the monitor up to be easily interchanged with a VESA arm, but on the other hand, we miss the extremely simple cable management on the 192T.
As somewhat of an unusual move, the 2001FP has a small cable holster at the base of the stand. Good intentions, but poor foresight. Any premium VGA or DVI cable has an insulator a few inches from the end, and usually, this happens to be the same linear distance as the cable holster on the bezel. This is fine if you keep the monitor stationary, but if you pivot the screen, the cable instantly snags on the holster. This, therefore, makes the holster useless.
We would further like to note that even if you do not use the holster, the monitor can still be a slight pain to rotate. It needs to be tilted slightly before pivoting because there is not enough clearance between the monitor base and the screen bezel to come all the way around in an upright position.
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jjll - Monday, December 15, 2003 - link
to those of you who have the 2001fp, are you happy with the lcd?Singletary - Monday, December 15, 2003 - link
You said: ". . . we ran ColorVision's Spyder and OptiCal software. Not only does this calibrate accurately the monitor on the DVI and analog interface . . . ."Because I can't afford this software, but have this monitor, would your friends allow you to share the calibration file for this monitor?
Thanks!
abster - Thursday, December 11, 2003 - link
I just got one. Did you try connecting it to a HDTV cable box? I am interesting in using it as a HDTV and PC monitor at the same time!randolo - Wednesday, December 10, 2003 - link
I just bought and set up two of the 2001FP's. Interestingly, one of them displays at 1600x1200 via analog just fine (no streakiness or blur), while the other is really streaky at 1600x1200, and less streaky (but still annoyingly unfocused) at 1280x1024. Gonna do some reorientation and box-swapping to try and isolate the source of the discrepancy between the two...MONSTERUS - Sunday, December 7, 2003 - link
Hi there! No offence,but there were several parts of review that I didn't like.Most important part:"By popular request".
*The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix — As with our previous benchmarks, these are not spectacular movies to test colors subjectively*-
Than how come you tested them and not something more colorfull? Matrix movies are all in dark tones, so they will probably look good on almost any LCD monitor.
*both movies were quite acceptable on the 2001FP*-when they say something like that I begin to suspect that movies on this monitor are just "quite acceptible",hope you know what I mean,lets say 3 out of 5 - that's what is "acceptible"means for me :-)
Other concern is that while testing games seems like you only used on game rich in color depth -
Halo,and that was gosting.
Saying "For probably 2/3 of the games we play, pixel blur is not noticeable" makes me wander what kind of games you played more.
Didn't really understand about bluring in Halo,as you said camera captured some blur,but how about your feeling? Did it disturb the gameplay?How often blurin accured?All the time,or just in some scenes?
Lots of people still wander how UT2003 goes on this monitor,because lots of developers are going to use this 3D engine for their future games.
Another concern-there was no clear saying how good watching of DVDs is on this monitor from different angles. Was there big lack on colors and tones from viewing from angle?
Hope to see some answears soon,thank you!
golemite - Saturday, November 29, 2003 - link
"Halo — We had some mixed feelings while playing Halo. Granted, we spend a lot of time playing Halo on DLP screens via component input (PS2 of course)."dude, its called an XBOX ;P
maxter - Tuesday, November 25, 2003 - link
It's not fair to compare a 1280x1024 monitor to a 1600x1200 one. That aside, my old Radeon 8500 drives the samsung 213T at native DVI output flawlessly. I'd never go back to my CRT. The geometry is perfect, the color is stable and matches my print output perfectly, the gray scale levels are stable and accurate, the resolution is razor sharp edge to edge, and its easy on the eyes. It helps me spot flaws in my images that I never noticed on my CRT. Only drawback is that you can't view it from the sides, you have to have your eyes centered to the screen.henmaster - Friday, November 21, 2003 - link
Actually an 1600x1200 native LCD can also run 800x600 without interpolation, since it is a whole number multiple. So you dont need that great of a computer to run games full screen, without interpolation, on a 1600x1200 native LCD, as you can always bump the resolution down to 800x600.tygrus - Thursday, November 20, 2003 - link
The bulge near the end of the video cable is not an insulator and not a magnet. It is a Ferrite core (two halves) - it forms an inductor circuit with the cable running through it to filter spikes and filter some interference.Analog RGB signals are designed for CRT monitors. Remember that CRT's use electron guns emitting beams of electrons and electro-magnets to scan across a horizontal line hitting phosphorous dots. The signal then goes low (low electron gun emissions) while moving to the start of the next line (typically on the left). This means that any interference or poor signal quality (eg. slow slew rate) affects horizontal pixels. A slow slew rate will cause a smearing of the image horizontally. Poor signal termination (eg. Mismatch of impedance, earthing) can cause ghosting. Poor colour accuracy and interference can also be caused by cross-talk when signal wires are not properly shielded.
I've just done this quickly so let me know if you want more information.
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PS. I'm not saying that this article is bad, the following is a comment/warning about articles/reviews in general in print/internet. I get frustrated with reviews that leave information out, make assumptions based on incomplete information or don't investigate/research.
lindloff - Tuesday, November 18, 2003 - link
The article does a good job of convering the new LCD. It does a bad job explaining the CONS of a LCD with a native resolution of 1600x1200.As with any LCD if you dont run your application at its "Native Resolution" it looks bad....just plain bad. Most people buying them dont understand this..and then think LCD's dont look good.
To run a new game like Halo on this LCD at its native resolution of 1600x1200, you would need a monster computer....like a P4 3.4EE to get any kind of playable FPS.
Sure it has that zoom out feature to avoid the problems of not using the native resolution...but then why have a 20inch LCD? It would be nice if they made a 20 inch LCD with great response times that came in different native resolutions.
I bought my 19inch because I did not have a system that could run a new game at 1600x1200 at good speed. 1280x1024 was my target, even then some games with my P4 2.4C and 9700Pro need to have AA turned off to get good FPS.